Can you talk about the big ‘M’ without offending someone? Can you talk about it without being too crass or perverse or inappropriate?

I’m going to try to today…and I hope I don’t offend any of my readers. It’s been a topic that’s been brought up more than once and I’ve been too much of a coward to blog about it. I want to talk about it now because I fear the stigma surrounding it lends itself to something we only avoid discussing, when maybe we should do the opposite.

Masturbation.
The word itself is hard to say, look at, type.
I remember the first time that I heard it in a movie and I innocently asked my three older brothers and my mom what it meant. They told me to look it up in the dictionary. I did, but the words failed me. I didn’t grasp the meaning behind it and so I lost interest.

It wasn’t until a few years later when it all started clicking. ‘Oh, that means that??’
I can’t say I blamed my family for avoiding the awkward conversation in the middle of enjoyable family time…I probably would have done the same.

It’s a word that is dirty, shameful, repulsive.
Or, at least that’s what many of us have been trained to think.

There’s much debate over the issue, especially in Christian circles. It seems you either stand on the side of it being undoubtedly a sin, or you stand on the side of it being no big deal. There’s probably a few of us in the middle… and that’s where I stand.

I see both sides of the argument–but I’m not convinced that either are entirely correct. There’s not a lot (or any) biblical stance on this specific issue either. Many might argue that the scriptures on lust are applicable to masturbation…and sometimes they probably are. I could never say that they always are though. There are instances where I think it can be especially harmful to someone, but sometimes I think our bodies are in need of a sexual release.

I’ve had many a girl shamefully confide in me about this secret habit…and my heart breaks for them. Not necessarily because of what they are doing/have done, but because of the shame and humiliation that surrounds it. There are usually always tears, and there’s always the fears of being thought of differently that accompanies such a confession. It makes me ticked off at society… probably our Christian world than anything else. Masturbation, especially among women, is simply not something we do.. let alone something we ever talk about, right? And so, rather than exist in a fellowship where we can openly discuss hard topics and figure out where we stand on these issues, so many women vow to never speak of it. No one else has to know…it’s soon a hidden, dark secret. The more hidden it is, the more it affects us in negative ways. It becomes a slippery slope.

I usually approach conversations with girls about masturbation in whatever way I feel like they need me to. Meaning, if you think it’s a sin…I’m not going to tell you it’s not. If you don’t think it is, I’m not going to tell you that it is. I think both can be true. Most importantly, I want you to know why you think it’s a sin….just like I want you to know why you think anything might be a sin. Sometimes I think we get too carried away in what other people are telling us is sin vs. finding out for ourselves what is and what isn’t. And… isn’t it possible (or just true) that sometimes what’s sin for me is not sin for you and vice versa??

But, as far as masturbation goes…
Here are the instances where I think it can be especially harmful:

• in Lust (I would say if you’re masturbating to pornography, this would be a big clue… or if you’re thinking about someone while doing it)
• Addiction (the lack of self-control… of feeling like you need to do it all the time, that you can’t stop)
• Loneliness (letting it fill some sort of void, trying to get fulfillment from it)
• Impatience (not wanting to wait for the pleasure of what sex can bring)
• Control (doubting God’s goodness in your life and His desire for you to ever have sex…so you’ll just take matters into your own hands)

It’s pretty sweet to walk a few blocks, jump on a bus and less than thirty minutes later be smack-dab in the middle of New York City. I’m not sure if I’d want it to be my entire life, but for a month? I love it. Add in the fact that it’s fall and the weather has been a-m-a-z-i-n-g and I’m finding out more about the true joys of aunthood every day… it’s so good.

My brother and I ventured into the city yesterday and were able to get into a Broadway show for $27.00 each. We won the lottery. The show? We hadn’t really ever heard of it before, but with five Tony’s and some high recommendations from people in the business, we thought we’d give Peter and the Starcatchers a chance. We weren’t disappointed.

I laughed a lot at the witty lines and ridiculous facial expressions and while the show painted a new picture of Peter Pan’s life for us to consider, the following line was the one that really stuck with me.

‘It’s supposed to hurt. That’s how you know it meant something.’ 

In a dialogue between Peter and Molly (the ‘Wendy-like’ character in a story about how Peter got to Neverland in the first place) where good-byes are painful and heart-wrenching, Molly spouts this out.

As I sat in my seat, I churned these words over and over again in my head. Is that a true statement? Do the things that mean more, hurt more? I reflected over my past wounds and deepest heartaches, recognizing on some level there’s some truth to it.

The people that hurt me the most are often the ones that matter most to me.
The hardest people to leave are the ones that I care the most about.
The things I love doing are the things that break my heart when I think about never doing them again.

So, really… the pain results in the absence of the thing that matters most. It results in the absence of loyalty or love, or the absence of someone’s physical presence, or the absence of getting to do what you feel like you were made to do. But perhaps it’s not ever ‘supposed’ to hurt at all…it’s the just the reality of how things are. It would seem that the ‘supposed’ to should actually be that the people we love/love us would never hurt us, that we would never have to leave those we care about, and we would always be able to do the things we love. Right?

I wonder if the ‘supposed to hurt’ is the way we now dictate how much something or someone means to us. Sometimes it’s probably how we decide whether or not to remain in relationships: ‘the thought of not being with you is too painful to bear, so I must care about you too much to ever let you go’. Perhaps the pain we feel can actually be the result of other things, too…and we too easily mix it up with love and passion (maybe we have an unhealthy attachment/addiction and the thought of releasing is devastating…even though the thing/person didn’t necessarily mean as much as we thought it did).

This is the kind of quote from something that you remember and then take with you other places. You make it your facebook status. You tweet it. You make it look all cool and decorated and put it on your mirror. You remind yourself each day that you’re supposed to hurt because that’s how you know things matter.

And, I kind of think that’s bogus and dangerous–especially the more I think about it.
It’s not supposed to hurt…. even if it does sometimes. Pain shouldn’t be the norm, it shouldn’t be what we settle for, it shouldn’t be what we expect. It’s okay (and I think good) for us to believe that sometimes the people we love/love us won’t hurt us, that sometimes we won’t have to say good-bye, that sometimes we can do the things we love for the rest of our lives.

I think this kind of quote enables me to feel sorry for myself and brings out my inner drama queen. It causes me to think more about my current circumstances and forget about the eternal and the joy I have in that….all the time. A place where I’m reminded that there’s no pain, no suffering, no tears.

Do the things that matter most hurt most?
Maybe sometimes.
But not all the time…
And pain should never be our gauge for how much something/someone means to us.

It’s not supposed to hurt.
It can still mean something even without the pain.

Be wary of the words that can so easily be written on our hearts if they are not truth….even if it sounds catchy and witty and, well, true. Dig deeper.

We must.

There’s no telling what’s going to flow from my fingers tonight.
There’s no agenda. There’s no plan.

I continue to wonder how honest I am with this online community. How well do you feel like you really know me? How much do you trust me? Am I more concerned with the amount of hits I receive each day over the quality of what I’m writing? Probably sometimes, unfortunately.

I sometimes want to write about things that I’m too scared for you to see. Controversial subjects–things that may sway you to never read my blog again. Things having to do with sex, and image, and God, and doubt, and fear, and hopelessness, and hopefulness, and love. Things that are raw and honest. Things you might disagree with. Things that might make my mother cringe.

I don’t think we’re open-minded enough though. I think we, all too often, walk around too confident in what we believe to be true, without allowing ourselves to consider that something else might actually be true. To some extent this can be good–being firm in our beliefs. But, sometimes…. sometimes I think that our inability to even hear others out without judgement and condemnation makes us hateful and more self-righteous than ever.

I feel like I know less than I did ten years ago. I feel like I’m less sure of things…but, simultaneously more confident. It’s a great paradox, I realize. Maybe it’s because before I was claiming to believe things without taking the time to really know why or if I even did. Now, I’d rather tell someone I don’t honestly know before taking a stance on something. Now, I’d rather hear someone else out and what they think before projecting my own thoughts and opinions on them.

For the last year I’ve longed to be absolutely stripped of what isn’t true. To be shed of the things within me that I’ve ignorantly believed because it’s what I was told to believe. Some of those things are true…and I cling to them. Some of them are not…and I want nothing to do with them any longer. I don’t want to exist in a place where I am solely defined by American Christianity…because sometimes I think we’ve just completely missed the mark. Because sometimes (ironically so), this Christianity seems void of Christ….which makes me realize how, as I sought to be a ‘solid Christian girl’, that there are parts of me void of Him too. My strife was more about achieving a great Christian status over being more in love with Jesus.

We care too much what people think.
I care too much what you think.
I care about disappointing you.

But, I know I will. I hope you know that, too.
I hope that no matter what I post and no matter what I think, that you would be willing to hear me out. That you would be willing to consider a view that might be different than yours. That you wouldn’t hesitate to challenge me or tell me your own thoughts/opinions on any subject.

I hope, in the end, that you trust that my desire is to unveil truth and to stop living according to the lies…whether that’s found in the religion or in the profane. It’s a journey that I’m constantly inviting you to join me in…as I hope to be constantly different, better, more in love with Jesus and who He really is.

I want to be stripped.
May everything else fall away other than what is true, and good, and pure. In the process, I pray that I learn the fullness of what it means to love and what it means to truly follow Jesus. Because, in my heart, I fear I have yet to know the magnitude of how much this changes everything.

I want to be more raw and real with you than ever before. I want the same from you.
I’m a little scared.
Maybe you are, too.
So… what do you say? Can I be honest with you?

I went to youth group last night.
It’s been a while…and it wasn’t my youth group, and it was comprised of strangers. But, I went. I was a judge for a pumpkin carving contest. I also helped lead a brief discussion with some teenager girls. It was a little awkward.

The topic? Feasting.
What does it mean to really taste and see that the Lord is good…in conjunction with the things we actually feast upon in our day-to-day life. We talked about food. We talked about eating disorders. We talked about going from one extreme to another and forgetting balance and moderation. We talked about how this isn’t just applicable to food.

Mostly, my sister-in-law and I talked. It was a weighty subject for only a few minutes of time and when you’re a newly-introduced, temporary person… I found myself struggling in how to relate. How much do I share of my own story? How directly can I ask them questions? What can I possibly say in these fifteen minutes to establish that this is a safe place, that there’s no judgment, that there is hope?

I don’t know how successful any of my attempts with them were, but I’ve been thinking a bit more about this idea of feasting…and just how much food actually consumes us. It’s everywhere. My sister-in-law and I joked today about the commercials that attack us on television. Every other one is sending an opposite message and we’re caught in a bipolar whirlwind of seduction. It’s as though our subconscious is screaming, ‘Eat more! You’re fat! Eat more! You’re fat!’ as we go back and forth between delicious food opportunities and dieting ads.

How could we ever fully break away from the things our world tells us? How could we, when we are fully inundated by everything around us, be convinced that image doesn’t matter? Doesn’t it? Doesn’t it sometimes matter what we wear? Doesn’t it sometimes matter how much we weigh? Doesn’t it sometimes matter whether or not we fix our hair? Doesn’t it sometimes matter how active we are?

There has to be something to recognizing what ultimately matters…and still existing in the world and not being of it. We still have interviews, we still have jobs, we still have health to maintain. I think this is where moderation has to come in. I don’t think women need to feel guilty about caring about how they look. I think the problem comes when it turns into something that is obsessed over. There’s nothing wrong with looking presentable, with putting on make-up, with shedding some excess weight.

It’s when we become all-consumed with what we look like…it’s when our worth comes from how we appear to others that problems arise. It’s when we lose sight of what really matters.In the grand scheme of eternity, how we look doesn’t matter. I don’t think we can ignore that it matters here though.

It’s tricky.
It’s tricky because it requires us existing in a place of uncertainty, a place where it’s easy to waiver too far in one direction. It almost seems more straight-forward to simply abstain from anything having to do with your external appearance–because then you’re not getting sucked into temptation and obsession over how you look. How do you concern yourself far more with matters of the heart while simultaneously tending to the outside in such a way that you are not solely driven by it?

Honestly-working at a camp made it easier to avoid this struggle. In an environment where it is acceptable to roll out of bed, throw on some shorts and a t-shirt, brush my teeth and walk into the office there wasn’t as much pressure to look a certain way. Now that I’m entering the ‘real’ world, I find myself longing to live within this balance of looking good without letting it consume me. Rather than hiding behind what I’ve always known and staying away from fashion, I think I’m moving into circumstances where I’ll need to put more effort into all of it.

But, there’s a greater confidence in who I am beyond what I look like.
I hope that’s true for you, too. As you figure out for yourself what your own boundaries are in terms of how much effort you can place into your appearance without letting it become all-consuming… I pray that you don’t ever lose sight of what matters. I pray that as you dress, as you apply make-up, as you purchase new things, as you freak out about grey hairs and wrinkles and a few extra pounds… that you would remember that there is more than this.

Live, remembering what fades away.
Be in the world, but not of it.
Find moderation in the things you live too excessively in, or too absently from.

Every good and perfect gift is from above.
Taste and see that the Lord is good.
He has invited us to feast.
Shall we?

The comment:

Maybe there’s a part of me that doesn’t actually want to stay single forever. But it sounds easier, for sure. How can I relinquish control of that area of my heart without doing a 180 and turning into one of “those” girls who is obsessed with finding a husband? I don’t even want that – I just want a person to do life with, to have adventures with. I just want a normal, jesus-loving, awesome dude who happens to fall in love with me. How can I find that without settling for a “normal” relationship, am I allowed to maintain my creative, independent, stubborn nature while simultaneously hoping God will send the perfect guy my way who loves me for all that i am? And what if He doesn’t… what then?

I think there’s always something to being really honest with the Lord and with yourself. It’s often easier for us to deny things that we feel, think, want because we don’t want to face the reality of what that could mean for our life.

In your instance, admitting that you might not want to be single forever means that you’re opening yourself up to a lot of risk…and perhaps the biggest risk of all is choosing to believe that God might actually be good and give you something that you want, and then not having it happen, for whatever reason. Then what happens…? So, rather than face all of that, it always seems easier to deny that there are parts of you that may want something different for yourself.

It also sounds as though you live in extremes. You’ll either want nothing to do with the prospect of marriage or you’ll become obsessed with the very thought of meeting the right guy. Instead of maintaining a balance (which is attainable), you jump from one extreme to the other. I think this is where one of the first steps is just admitting to yourself and the Lord that you might not want to be single forever. I think this allows you to open your heart to the idea. Not become obsessed…but to be open to the idea that it is possible.

I suppose I don’t know what you mean by a ‘normal’ relationship. There’s probably the reality that at the end of the day, if you find someone who is ‘normal’ (does that exist?), Jesus-loving, and awesome that you’re probably still going to have conflict and challenges. There will be moments when life might be mundane or tedious. Ultimately, I think choosing to live life with someone means choosing to love them and you’ll have to let that look however that needs to look. At some point you’ll have to shed expectations of your ‘normal’ relationship and allow the relationship to take it’s own form, knowing that two people coming together are bringing two very different things into the equation.

I think you’re always allowed to maintain pieces of who you are… as long as they are in line with who God says that you are. Some of the independence and stubbornness that you cling to might actually be some of the very things that the Lord longs to chip away at. Would you be open to that? Would you be open to the Lord using a partner in life to help with that refining process?

One of my favorite Oswald Chambers quotes is below:

“When He [God] talks of their losing their selves, He means only abandoning the clamour of self-will; once they have done that, He really gives them back all their personality, and boasts (I am afraid, sincerely) that when they are wholly His they will be more themselves than ever.”

It’s kind of this beautiful reminder to me that the more pressed into Christ we are (which always means the shedding of our flesh and sometimes the very things we tend to cling to about ourselves) then we will actually be more ourselves than ever before.
So, with that, I guess my question to you is are you willing to abandon aspects of your nature that might need to be abandoned? Not for the sake of marriage, but so you might find a better version of yourself for the sake of Christ? Could there ever be the possibility that a partner in life might help bring you into this place as you are being sanctified daily?

I guess all I’m trying to say is that I’d urge you toward openness… in your own heart, in your conversations with the Lord, with possibilities of what could be, with what a relationship can look like, with what a man you could spend the rest of your life is like, with what being single on this earth could look like. Openness toward yourself being refined, changed and growing and becoming more yourself than ever (which might be very different from the girl you remember being) and letting that be okay. Openness that the unknown to all your questions could even be better than denying a desire that might exist.

And ultimately?
Ultimately trusting in the Lord’s goodness and sovereignty and being willing to trust that when it looks different than anything you might have imagined–it’s always better.

Be open.
Trust.

Someone recently reminded me that I’m not the hero.

A gentle prompting to never forget that as I tell stories and share my heart, that it’s not me who is to receive any credit for the change, for the good, for….well, anything. While my first response was to want to argue and defend myself, to ensure that that was never my intent… I realized it didn’t matter. Regardless of intent or not, regardless for my reasons for telling stories the way in which I do… if, in the end, it’s me who comes out looking like the hero, I’ve done something wrong.

With that in mind, I want to apologize to all my readers if that’s ever been the thing taken away from a post. I acknowledge that any good that I have to offer or give is solely because of Jesus. It’s only by His blood that I am redeemed, that I am counted as worthy, that I have hope. It’s only through Him that I can boast about second chances.

I hope by now that you’ve realized that I don’t have it all together, that I’m far from perfect, that I have the tendency to make more mistakes than do anything right. In the process of me sharing and writing, I sincerely desire that you walk away hopeful for better…that you might be willing to challenge and prod at the things you’ve claimed to believe without even knowing why. And, ultimately, that you would always be drawn back to Jesus.

I may not do that so visibly every time, as I fear becoming my own montage of cliches that continue to drive people further from truth. There may be traces of me needing to choose Jesus all the time, and my battle with not always wanting to. But, in the end, it is always He who is faithful, He who is good, He who loves first so I can also love. Without Him, I am nothing.

Thanks for journeying with me through my imperfections and struggles.
I’m so sorry for any narcissism, for any impression I may have given that I hold the key to all the answers. Most times I feel like I’m barely hanging on myself.

I want to serve you, to lead you toward better, to offer you an abundance of hope through second chances…and ultimately that comes through Christ, as He is the sole provider of forgiveness, grace, love and mercy.

It’s only by His blood.
And it’s only He who is the hero.

This summer there was a trial.
It involved a conniving man who had committed murder and a high school girl who had stolen medicine to keep her dying sister alive. The campers were the jury.

It was a simulation of a trial that we put on every Monday night at camp. It gave the campers a chance to decide for themselves who was guilty and who was innocent.

I acted the part of the girl on trial. Every week I gave my testimony to hundreds of campers and let them decide my fate. Every week, while there were a few groups that proclaimed my innocence, the majority condemned me. While I was a good person, I had still broken the law. While I was going to church, sacrificially giving my money to people in need, breaking the law only because I was desperate to keep my sister alive and in the spur of the moment, when I didn’t have the money, I took the medication and ran…I was still guilty.

The other guy on trial, one of the guys I worked with, was a jerk. He was clearly guilty and clearly an idiot (especially when he attempted Aussie accents). He was a murderer- there wasn’t ever a question in any camper’s mind.

We both stood on stage, waiting to hear the camper’s verdict. This was the point during the night where I would try to muster up tears. Oftentimes, the large fan overhead in the pavilion would hit my eyes at just the right angle and cause my eyes to tear up a little. This helped, but it wasn’t yet believable that I was a high school girl in terrible distress. Groups would trickle back in and hand their verdicts in. There was always laughter, pointing, casual discussion and, usually, a jeer or a comment in our direction about how guilty we were.

While, yes, the trial was fake and everyone in the room knew it, I couldn’t help but think that it wouldn’t be much different if it was real. I remember being astonished at how quickly these campers were to judge us, to decide our fate…based on only a few facts. I remember being thrown off by the cruelty of their words and the disapproval in their eyes.

Ashamed I hear my mocking voice, call out among the scoffers…

These words would run through my mind every time at this point in the evening. I wasn’t any different from these campers. I felt like I had caught a glimpse of what it was like to be Jesus on trial. Only He had done nothing wrong. In the crowd there was accusation, judgment, scorn, ridicule…and I can’t help but think my voice would have been one of them.

The tears flowed easily at this point. For as much as I felt the scorn of others from some silly simulation, I knew it was only a taste of what Christ had endured for me…for us.

The verdict was in. We were always guilty. *applause, cheering*
The punishment? Death.

For the murderer, this sentence was met with more applause and cheering. When my sentence was read, there was often a shout of disapproval. I was dragged off stage, weeping and begging for my life.

The whole idea was to paint a picture for these campers that no matter how good we are and no matter how bad we are, we are all deserving of death…we are all sinners.  It’s only because of the blood of Jesus Christ that our sins have been atoned for. It’s only through grace that we have been saved.

I think I forget this sometimes.
I think I forget my depravity and my absolute need for Jesus.
I think I forget that no matter how good I am, no matter how bad I am… Jesus still takes me back.
I think I forget that there’s nothing I can do to earn salvation.
I think I forget that it’s already been done.

This must matter above all else.
There can’t be anything else that gets in the way.
The gospel must be the centrality from which everything flows.

It’s time we start living that way.

Tonight feels important. 

The comment:

We had a lot of serious convos and had fun too, but every time we hangout like this I always end up wondering if I should have even gone in the first place. It’s not that I don’t care about him or like being around him, because obviously I do but if it’s also making it harder, do I just stop? I don’t want to be the one to say anything first but I also don’t want to keep waiting. Do I try distancing myself from him and if so how? Like I don’t even know what that looks like. And at the same time I don’t want to because we do have so much so I feel like I would be missing out if I did.

This is every single girl’s perpetual nightmare, it seems. Meet guy, become friends with guy, hang out with guy often, realize that you like guy (a lot), never really know how guy feels about you. I probably can’t even recall the number of times I’ve been in this scenario…but, I think the number is too many.

How to proceed when you find yourself in the midst of this situation is always a tough decision. One never intentionally puts themselves in this spot, I don’t believe…but, inevitably, it happens. I think that maybe females are incapable of getting close to men without developing some sort of intimate connection to them. When we form the intimacy, our hearts automatically link that to romance and love.

Can we be incredibly close to men without wanting to date them? Probably sometimes, but (at least in my experience), there seems to always be a moment where we at least question and wonder about the possibility of being more. We may not even be physically attracted to the guy upon first meeting him, or even for months into our friendship, but when we’ve shared our heart with them and they’ve shared theirs with us we wake up one day and suddenly see them a bit differently. Before us is no longer our best friend, but a man that we could envision spending the rest of our lives with. It’s someone that we are real with, comfortable around, knows us and likes us. It’s a the type of thing they make movies out of, right?

Guys don’t seem to follow the same patterns as girls, though. They can genuinely be close to a girl on an emotional level and never even go there on the romantic level. It doesn’t even cross their mind. They care deeply for you, they are there for you…but it’s platonic. Not always, but, a lot of the time.

So, I guess the tough decision comes back to you. In my experience, and in my conversations with guys, I’ve found that if a guy is interested in you he will do something about it. He may not be super speedy about it, but he will let you know if he’s interested. My guess is that you aren’t being super secretive about your feelings toward him, either. Meaning, you probably don’t need to do or say anything to make him aware that you’d be interested in more. He knows. And, if he doesn’t know, it’s probably because he just hasn’t thought about it before because he’s not interested in you as anything more than a friend.

Sucks, I know…
BUT, here are a few questions you need to ask yourself:

• Are you in this friendship solely because you want to date him? Or, do you genuinely care about him and care about being his friend? If your end goal (be honest about this) is to date him, you should back off immediately. If you’re in it because you care about him, then here’s where your first sacrifice comes in. Regardless of how you feel and what you hope for, I’d urge you to keep being his friend without ever letting those romantic feelings interfere with your friendship. 
• Can you be okay just being his friend? You may really care about him and his friendship above a romantic relationship, but it doesn’t mean that you’re able to be his friend. If it’s become something that’s all-consuming and distracting, if it’s become something that stirs up insecurity and self-destruction…you should back off. If your emotional and mental health are suffering so much that it affects your entire life, you should reevaluate the friendship. He should not be your number one priority. To figure out if he might be, mentally walk through your life without him… would you be okay if that happened? 
• How much can you handle? You may care about him, you may be okay without his existence in your life…and so you may think you can proceed in simply being friends with him. Maybe you can. Only you can really decide how much you can handle. Only you can decide how much time you should spend with him and how much of that time is spent causing more harm to your heart than good. Be willing to set up boundaries for yourself, if necessary. Don’t initiate hanging out with him, don’t initiate texting conversations…and even beyond initiating, you also hold the power to not hang out or to not text back. If you have to see him at various functions, enjoy the time you see him there, but be careful about extra time you spend with him-especially time alone together. This is one that requires major self-discipline because, like you said, you want to hang out with him and be close to him. So- this one is your call!