Daniel and I have just finished a much needed vacation, hence the silence on the blog this past week! But I have been writing. This morning, Her.meneutics (the Christianity Today blog for women) posted something I wrote on a popular trend in Christendom--single women calling Jesus/God their boyfriend. I'm sure at some point you have heard someone say something along these lines, "until God brings me a husband, I am content to just have him as my boyfriend." Some have even gone so far as calling God their lover, as so many popular songs often do.
While a personal relationship with our Savior is crucial, it is not a personal romantic relationship. In fact, when we use earthly relationships to describe our relationship with Jesus we miss something really important, namely the fact that our earthly relationships (i.e. marriage) is meant to image his relationship with his Bride (the church). We are a collective bride, not an individual one.
In the post I say this:
Just as self-marriage misses the mark for what God designed marriage to point to, “marriage” to Jesus misses what his work accomplished. Marriage to Jesus while waiting for a husband can often trivialize our Savior in a way that makes him more like a sweet boyfriend who takes us out on dates, rather than the God-man who paid for our sin on the cross. Jesus did not accomplish redemption to marry us individually. He died for the church corporate, of which we are apart. His death accomplished something much greater than simply meeting our deep-seated desires for a significant other. That is what Paul is getting at in Ephesians 5:22–33 when speaks of the mystery of marriage.
Read the rest of the post here.
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2 comments:
I really liked both your blog post and your full post. You are very thoughtful and insightful in a way that I wish I could be. Or at least, I wish I could get my thoughts to my fingers in a way that would make sense to more than just me.
One of your commenters on the full post posed the question "What happens after the wedding with these girls does Jesus get dumped?" It was funny to me, but definitely worth considering, if Jesus is just a place filler before marriage, I would assume many would simply switch to worshiping their husband the way that the should be worshiping Christ. Relationships all out of their proper order.
Thanks, Halee. Keep writing! Practice is the best way to get your thoughts out!
Thanks for your comment. I just saw it and think it is a really insightful question. Thanks for pointing it out and for reading!
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