When God Writes Your Love Story

I want to begin sharing some thoughts with you guys about the books that I'm reading as I finish them (of course I'm still working on my thoughts about the Voyage of the Dawn Treader, but that is coming).

Today, I finished reading the book, When God Writes Your Love Story, by Eric and Leslie Ludy.  I'm thinking that I have already lost some of you, just with the title. A little cheesy, right? Normally, I would agree, I hate cheesy. I'm sure you all are thinking that this is another I Kissed Dating Good-bye talking about how guys and girls should never talk to each other before getting married. I promise you, it is not that kind of book.

Here's what I absolutely love about this book that I think sets it apart from some of the others that I have heard about (I haven't read to many) or at least from what I hear a lot of people talking about. Most people take the issue of relationships and start with setting guidelines and rules for how to behave. Boundaries are good, but they are not where to begin. The Ludy's start their book with several chapters talking, not about relationships with each other, but with their relationship with God. In telling their story, they make it very clear that when their relationship with God is right and the forefront of their lives, everything else falls into place.

Instead of setting rules for dating, they focus on following God. Instead saying that this specifically defines purity, they somewhat leave it up to you and God, asking instead- Are your actions glorifying God? And they don't just apply this to relationships with your significant other, but with all relationships. Because how we love others will be how we love our future spouses.

Second thing that I love, they put everything in perspective. Again, they don't set specific boundaries for dating relationships, but simply ask- If your future spouse walked in right now, how would they feel? Would they know that you are keeping you heart pure for them, or would they be hurt and angry watching your interactions with other people/ especially in your relationships? It may sound really stupid to say this, but until reading this book, I never really thought about the fact that, if God does plan for me to be married, that man is alive today, somewhere. I don't know who he is, but he's there. What would he think if he saw my life right now?

Third, although this book focuses on relationships, the chapter that Leslie writes about singleness is absolutely fabulous! She talks about using singleness as a time to truly devote yourself to God and His work and allow him to mold you into He wants you to be. She tells the story of her sister-in-law, Krissy, who followed God with extreme faithfulness, only caring about serving God, not trying to attract every man on earth because she was lonely. Here is a paragraph that Leslie wrote about her, it was very convicting and encouraging to me.

"When Krissy was in her late twenties and still with no prospects for marriage, her younger brother Mark asked her one day if she was "called to singleness." She pondered the question for a minute, then replied, "Today I am." What an incredible response! She knew that no matter what God had planned for her future, He would give her the grace she needed to live as a radiant, fulfilled, Christ-honoring single woman today. She didn't worry about being single for the next twenty years; she simply trusted God for the grace to be single one day at a time."

I love that response, but I never would have said it myself. I freak out about whether or not I'll get married in 5 or 10 years and worry about what he'll be like, where we'll live, etc... but forget about the fact that no matter if I'm supposed to be married in 10 years, I'm supposed to be single right now. And so I need to take advantage of where I am right now and serve God the best that I can with my singleness right now. Who cares if I'm going to get married in 10 years, does that change what I'm able to do now? No.

Of course, being single right now inevitably leads to feeling lonely and Leslie acknowledges that. Here's what she says about loneliness, I love it, "Don't despise loneliness. Instead, allow it to chase you into the ready arms of your King. If you turn to Him instead of trying to fill the void with other things, you will find that He is ready to meet your every need." A lonely single person becomes a lonely married person. But if I learn to turn to God in my loneliness now, then I will continue to do that when I'm married. And then, when my husband inevitably lets me down, instead of feeling like my world is ending, I will know to turn to my loving Father God and lean on him, not a man.

Finally, Leslie tells a story that has been passed through the church about the apostle Peter. The story says that whenever a rooster would crow, Peter would weep. People finally asked Peter why he wept so much and he responded with, "I dearly long to be with my Lord." He would weep out of longing to be reunited with Jesus, to see His face, and touch His scars once more. I have never once wept out of a longing to see Jesus. I think about Him and get excited about the idea of seeing Him, but honestly, I would say I'm not in that big of a hurry to see Him. I want to live a good life here first, and then meet my Jesus. I have cried out of loneliness, out of a fear of never being loved. Why do I care so much more about meeting a man than meeting my Savior? That just doesn't seem right. I want to desire Jesus that much, because otherwise, my entire life will always be off balance. Jesus has to be right smack in the middle, no one else can be, because my life is not designed to revolve around anything else. Think if the solar system suddenly began to revolve around the moon, not even the earth, the moon. That would not work. Christ has to be the center, or everything will fall apart.

Clearly, I have a lot to digest and sort through after reading this. I would suggest that everyone of you read it, especially us crazy single girls with overactive imaginations and dreams because of too much Twilight and Nicholas Sparks. What the Ludy's repeated over and over again is that God is the creator of romance and if we let him take control, he will write us a better story than we, or Nicholas Sparks, could ever dream of.