Learn from Adam.

Men’s Game blogs often advocate that a man not do what his wife tells him to do for fear of compromising his masculine authority and becoming less attractive to her as a result.

What most people don’t realize is that the Bible teaches the same lesson:  Eve tells Adam to eat the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, and like a good beta husband, he does.  Voila!  Sin!  Seriously, three chapters into Genesis, and we’ve already got Adam doing Eve’s bidding.  The results of such betatude?  Well, in addition to the aforementioned sin and therefore death (no more Tree of Life!), not to mention expulsion from Eden:

• Women experience pain in childbirth — this is an exclusively human trait; no other animals experience pain in giving birth
• Women are put under the authority of their husbands
• Men must toil to ensure they can eat
• Sinful nature is passed on through men

Lesson?  Don’t do what your wife tells you to do, or suffer the consequences.

(Probably the second-best “Don’t listen to your wife” Bible story?  When Sarah told Abraham to take her servant Hagar as a concubine.  The result of that union was Ishmael.  The Middle East thanks you, Abraham!)

Love vs. In Love

Readers, please weigh in.  I’ve heard more than one man pooh-pooh the idea of differentiating between loving someone and being “in love” with that person.  (Apparently, the idea of being “in love” with someone is a female thing, ergo entirely nebulous and more or less imaginary, whereas a man just simply loves.)

For my part, I’m not sure which side I come down on in this argument.  “In love” often seems synonymous with infatuation.  “Real” love, the kind of ongoing, day-to-day love that keeps a relationship alive for a lifetime, has little to do with the waves of emotional rollercoastering of infatuation.  Then again, we’ve all seen elderly couples who still look at each other with a touch of infatuation, so….?  Complicating the matter is the breadth of meanings of love in the English language.  (“I like my Sketchers, but I love my Prada backpack….”)

What say you?  Is there a difference between loving and being “in love”?  Can a person really be “in love”?

Why Christian girls have so few boyfriends.

I was reading the comments at another blog, and one commenter mentioned how “shocking” it is that so many cute Christian girls in their late 20s/early 30s have only had one or zero boyfriends in their entire lives.  Honestly, this kind of news is only “shocking” if you don’t know anything about conservative Christian culture.  Here’s how a reasonably attractive, non-psycho Christian girl of, say, age 32 can go boyfriend-less her entire life:

• Very poor male/female ratio of singles at church. If mating is a numbers game, women are on the losing side.  Most churches that are not specifically targeted to single professionals (a.k.a. “seeker churches”) have a low singles population.  Of the singles who are regular attenders, the majority of them will be women.  Of the men, a lot of them will be “old” or weird.
• Single men at church do not initiate. If there are any single men who pass muster, they often aren’t asking out the single women at their church.  Sometimes this is due to fear of social ostracism (i.e., ask out too many women and you get a rep of being an indiscriminate player who’s only looking for a warm body), sometimes it’s a lack of sexual interest…in general, sometimes it’s immaturity, sometimes it’s apathy, and sometimes it actually IS that all of the single women at church are fat and/or damaged.
• Refusal to date both non-Christians and nominal Christians. Most “good” Christian girls will not hang out at places where the average (non-Christian) man will go to meet women, such as bars, clubs, sporting events, house parties where alcohol is served, or the mall.  They are much more likely to be found in the church nursery, leading a youth group retreat, helping out at a women’s shelter, attending a small group Bible study, baby-sitting the children of married Christian friends, on a missions trip, hanging out with her parents and family, or at a game night sponsored by the college & career group at church.  Should a good Christian girl actually meet a non-Christian man who is attracted to her, she will most likely be very wary of him as a romantic prospect and will refuse to go on a date with him if he asks, due to the biblical command not to be yoked (married) to unbelievers (2 Cor. 6:14).  Ditto for a man who is nominally a Christian (i.e., claims to be a Christian yet doesn’t “bear fruit”).

Other factors can come into play as well — being too picky is a problem regardless of creed — but these three points cover the major reasons that Christian girls endure such long periods of singleness.  In the end it’s pretty much a numbers game, and the girls are losing it.

Aloof vs. So-Aloof-You’re-A-Jerk.

I meet weekly with a group of single women from my church for a combination Bible study/fellowship group.  Yesterday since only three of us showed up, discussion was firmly in the “fellowship” camp.  One of my friends shared the story of what had happened when she went on a date with a younger guy from church.  He was a guy she had gotten to know, who constantly said to her that they should hang out.  Because he was several years younger, she was hesitant but felt that she should go in with an open mind.  So, she accepted.

They went to a movie.  Afterward, he did not make any conversation.  They also met up with his friends (I think?), and he sat on the opposite side of the table from her and also talked about another girl he was interested in.

Needless to say, my friend was not impressed…but what do you know, the guy called the next day to say that he’d had a great time and that they should do it again.

Men, if you’re going to single a woman on a date, then that date really needs to be exclusive.  Don’t bring your buddies along, do be the leader in making conversation, and by all means DO NOT EVER talk about another woman you’re interested in.  You may think that you’re being cool and aloof and demonstrating higher value (i.e., non-neediness) as well as self-social proofing, but all this does is make the woman deeply uncomfortable and confused, and possibly embarrassed.

The disappointing thing about this is that this young man is otherwise a stereotypical “great guy” treading in Youth Group Guy territory.  All he did on this occasion was disappoint my friend, as well as hurt his own reputation (which is now “nice guy but too immature and not ready to date”).

Being a little aloof on a date is good.  You don’t want to come across as overly attentive; that’s a big turn-off.  But going in the opposite direction to the extreme is a huge mistake as well.  You’ll just end up on a date with a woman who is wondering why you even bothered to ask her out.

Where the boys are…I think.

One of the big frustrations of single Christian women is that single Christian men are scarce.  By “single Christian men,” I mean men who are active, practicing, unmarried Christians who attend church regularly, not Chreasters or “I go to church when I remember…once every three months…if I’m not too hungover.”  (It seems silly to have to qualify this, but based on the adventures of one of my friends with eHarmony, it’s necessary.)  I was going to write up a post discussing where the boys might be and all of the related pros and cons, but then I figured that a table would be far easier to digest.  (Plus, I love tables.)

LOCATION	PROS	CONS
The church you attend	Preselection/social proof Likelihood of agreement on core beliefs	Fierce competition Overfamiliarity Post-college, usually all the “good ones” are taken
Another church	Fresh dating pool	Lack of social proof/preselection unless you commit time to small group/social events Fierce competition Post-college, usually all the “good ones” are taken
Christian organization	Fresh dating pool Preselection/social proof	Male Christian workers are almost always married or already in a relationship leading to marriage Fierce competition Post-college, usually all the “good ones” are taken
Random encounter	Intrigue of new/unknown	Lack of social proof/preselection “Good ones” not a very large percentage of population, decreasing likelihood of random meeting Post-college, usually all the “good ones” are taken
Christian blog comments	Can get to know each other through the exchange of ideas without bringing looks into the equation Already have a common interest	May be separated by a lot of physical distance Willingness to relocate could be an issue Person’s real-life personality might be different from online personality Person’s looks might kill all of the attraction
Friend and relative network	People already know you and (hopefully) what would make a good match for you Familial/friend-based preselection/social proof – person is already vetted Person will actually be single and available	People may not know you and your preferences well enough Pressure of expectations Family and friends lack connections

LOCATION	PROS	CONS
The church you attend	Preselection/social proof Likelihood of agreement of core beliefs	Fierce competition Overfamiliarity Post college, usually all the “good ones” are taken
Another church	Fresh dating pool	Lack of social proof/preselection unless commit time to small group/social events Fierce competition Post college, usually all the “good ones” are taken
Christian organization	Fresh dating pool Preselection/social proof	Male Christian workers are almost always married or already in a relationship leading to marriage Fierce competition Post college, usually all the “good ones” are taken
Random encounter	Intrigue of new/unknown	Lack of social proof/preselection “Good ones” not a very large percentage of population, increasing unlikelihood of random meeting Post college, usually all the “good ones” are taken
Christian blog comments	Can get to know each other through the exchange of ideas without bringing looks into the equation Already have a common interest	May be separated by a lot of physical distance/willingness to relocate may become an issue Person’s real-life personality might be different from online personality Person’s looks might kill all of the attraction

Don’t be these guys, Vol. 1.

There are a couple of message boards that I skim read pretty regularly that are mainly populated by women in their 20s-40s.  This means that there tends to be a fair amount of relationship talk.  For anyone with traditional values, most of it is a little depressing since most of the women are feminists (or are brainwashed by feminist principles) who have not yet hit the Wall and are clearly operating under the assumption that they will always be able to attract men as easily as they do now — therefore their feelings take utmost precedence in their decision-making.  I was skimming reading today and came across a couple of relationship threads that made me shake my head regarding both the men who are discussed and the OPs’ treatment of them.

Guys, don’t be these guys.

THREAD 1:

OP brags advertises in the subject line that her boyfriend asked her to marry him but she said no.  In the post she says that she feels “horrible” about it but that it had nothing to do with her boyfriend, plus he knew beforehand that she never wanted to get married.  Despite this apparent knowledge, he proposed anyway and then seemed “disappointed” when he got rejected.  The rest of the posters divide into two groups, one in support of the OP, the other warning her that this could be the beginning of the end, but most of them congratulate the OP for her honesty and agree that not only does marriage have little significance in the area of commitment (this despite the documented increased volatility of non-marital unions), no one should stay in a marriage if she is “unhappy.”  The posters generally agree that there will always be “someone else” if the boyfriend walks.

Later the OP returns to the thread to inform everyone that she and her boyfriend “talked” and that the boyfriend apologized to her for assuming she would say yes.  Yes, he APOLOGIZED.  OP reports that this “talk” lasted TWO HOURS.

I feel like the takeaway lessons from this story should be obvious, but anyhow:  Men, if you want to get married, then don’t date a woman who says she NEVER wants to get married and believes her feelings love for you is equivalent or even better.  Sure, you might be the superhero to change her mind…but you might not.  Why waste your energy on a woman who’s a tough sell as opposed to a woman who really does want to be married?  Second, NEVER APOLOGIZE FOR PROPOSING.  My goodness.  If you want to marry someone, then I very well hope that you are prepared to lead in all aspects of the relationship and won’t wither in the face of a woman’s disgruntled vanity.  Third, never discuss a woman’s feelings with her for any amount of time over, say, thirty minutes, tops.  What could the OP and her boyfriend possibly have discussed for that long without running around in circles with the woman continually gaining momentum against the man?  The longer you let her run on, the less authority you have in the relationship.  Probably what happened here is that the OP browbeat her boyfriend for well over an hour for disturbing her feelings.  No wonder she doesn’t want to marry him.  The real question is why he wanted to marry her.

THREAD 2:

OP is a med student who has been pining away for a guy in her program for the past two years.  She deeply regrets not telling him that she’s in love with him.  They are on the verge of graduation and will soon be going their separate ways, so OP asks for advice about how to tell this guy about her feelings.  (Anyone who’s read my blog lately knows my feelings on the topic.)  Of course, in a show of female wishful thinking solidarity, the other posters rally around her, telling her to invite him out for dinner, get some drinks in her, and spill her guts.

Later in the thread, OP reports back, saying that she did exactly as the posters suggested and…drum roll, please…their advice WORKED.  (Hey, it happens every once in a blue moon.)  After exams, she and her friend went out to a “nice steakhouse” where she worked up the courage and blurted out her feelings to him.  The guy then admitted that he’s been feeling the exact same way.  OP says that they concluded that they both used their coursework as a reason not to take a risk and that each other was the reason they hadn’t dated anyone else in the entire time of their program.  OP then says that the evening went perfectly and hints that they slept together because she had just arrived home (and apparently sprinted to the computer) and the timestamp was in the morning.  Plus, they found out that they would be doing residencies in the same city.  Much cheering from the peanut gallery commences.

On its face, this is the kind of story that makes women swoon because it is very much like something out of a movie where you’ve been pining and pining and pining and the guy actually reciprocates your feelings.  But what is ennobling about this story from the man’s point of view?  What kind of man hides behind coursework as an excuse not to date anyone for two years?  Especially when the woman is a close friend and others have pointed out that they should date?  What kind of man lets the woman take all the emotional risk in the relationship?  It seems to me like this dude would have been content to let the relationship simmer in sexual frustration indefinitely if the OP hadn’t taken the reins.  At the beginning of the story, the OP didn’t even know if they would be assigned to the same area for their residency — it sounds like this guy was willing to let the OP drift out of his life without even once making a move.  That’s not love.  That’s ambivalence at best and cowardice at worst.

It’ll be interesting to see (if we ever get to find out) how this relationship progresses once the OP and this guy are out of the med school bubble and are working long hours at different hospitals.  My guess is that once the initial relationship euphoria wears off, the guy’s natural reluctance to lead will start to kill off the OP’s attraction to him.  Pining from a distance and actually being involved in a relationship are two different things.

Dating: payment optional?

Thanks to the sexual revolution, it’s nearly impossible to determine who pays for a date.  Traditionally, it was the man — but that was also a time when men were the only ones doing the asking for dates in the first place.  Now that it’s socially acceptable for women to ask, everyone’s all confused.  When a woman asks for a date and then offers to pay, you get one of four outcomes:

1. Man accepts and feels emasculated.
2. Man declines and after much tussling, pays for both.  Man’s dignity is intact, woman is secretly relieved/impressed but now feels robbed of the power she had when she did the asking out.  (If the woman really likes the man, this is usually good.  If she’s on the fence or not sure, this is awkward and uncomfortable.)
3. Man declines and woman refuses to take no for an answer.  See Outcome #1.
4. Man and woman decide to go dutch.  Both feel a measure of relief/awkwardness/disappointment.

A lot of this awkwardness can be avoided if women just let men do the asking for dates, but women sometimes will try to pay for their share even if the man does the asking.  Usually the reason for this is that the woman doesn’t want to feel obligated to put out for the man at the end of the night (MAN:  “You got a burger, now I get to put my tongue down your throat!”  WOMAN: “That’s why I ordered all the onions.”), or she isn’t that interested in the man and doesn’t want to give him the impression that she likes him (i.e., she will make a show of independence to decrease his attraction to her), or she wants to make a good impression and show that she’s a contributor, not a taker (i.e., not a dinner whore).

I think the best solution to these issues is not to go on expensive dates.  The issues mainly arise at the very beginning of a relationship, so why invest a lot of money to begin with?  The point at this stage of the game is to get to know each other better in a one-on-one situation; you don’t need to go anywhere fancy to do that, and a casual environment will also relieve some of the getting-to-know-you pressure.  Additionally, most women will feel petty or silly if they try to force a man not to spend $10 or less on her.  If they put up [token] resistance (“Oh, you don’t have to pay for me, I’ve got it”), a man should just say, “I asked you on a date.  I’m paying for you,” and let that be it.  If she presses the issue (“Are you sure?”), reply “What did I just say?” firmly but with a little twinkle in your eye.  Whatever you do, do not get into a debate/back-and-forth on the issue.  Settle it calmly and decisively with your manly authority.  If a woman really puts up a fuss, don’t ask her out again.

“But what if she thinks I’m cheap?”  If a woman is expecting an “experience” for a first or early-relationship date, you probably don’t want to be dating her in the first place.  A good rule of thumb, though, is that the inexpense should be proportional to how much you earn.  If you’re a pauper, she’ll understand that all you can afford is the value menu.  If you’re making six figures or more, the value menu will seem cheap so aim a little higher than that.  A good option for a wealthier man is to go somewhere with no cost at all, like a park or museum, or a fun, interactive, inexpensive activity such as miniature golf, or someplace that seems rich but won’t cost you much overall (like window shopping at an upscale mall but eating at the food court).

A couple of final comments:  one, a date should always obviously be a date.  Say the word “date”; this will eliminate a lot of confusion.  Also (men), reach for the check right away when it comes out.  This assures the woman that you do intend to pay.  The longer the check sits there unattended, the more she will wonder if you want her to offer to pay her part, and fret about what to do.  If you’re at a restaurant where you pay at the time you place your order, just get in line ahead of her, tell the cashier that you’re together, and then ask your date to order.

Scenario: when phone calls don’t turn into dates.

Scenario*:

You are a twentysomething single woman.  You attend a weekly activity with other single young people.  One of those other young people is a young man.  (Let’s call him Flint.)

Flint sends you a lot of messages over Facebook, and you reciprocate.  You find yourself developing feelings for Flint.

You and Flint graduate to phone conversations which run long.  Flint expresses interest in you.  You invite Flint to a backyard barbecue with your family.  Flint attends and is a perfect gentleman.

You continue to have long phone conversations with Flint.  Finally you ask Flint what’s going on – is he ever going to ask you out like he’s been talking about?  You are abashed when Flint sounds genuinely taken aback and answers, “Eventually.”

Your friends advise you to cut off communication with Flint and go fishing in better waters, but you see Flint every week at your regular activity which you are very committed to.

What’s your next step?

(*This scenario is based on a real life situation where the single young people activity is a Bible study.  However, I think that has little bearing on what’s going on overall and the dynamics apply to any sort of regular coed group activity, Christian or not.)

How many chances are enough before giving up?

Scenario:  Duke, a single man from your church, asks you on a date.  You note that Duke is neither physically off-putting nor a psycho/stalker/rapist/killer/child molester/creeper so, despite not having any pre-existing interest in him, you accept.  You haven’t been on a date in a while, and you have taken to heart the admonition to give decent men a chance.  Duke takes you to Johnny Rocket’s and doesn’t chew with his mouth open, talk about himself the whole time, or forget about the biblical prohibition against fornication.  In fact, he is well-spoken and gracious, and he even leads in prayer as he asks God to bless your cheeseburgers to your bodies.  You find out during conversation that Duke has a stable, well-paying job, owns his own house, has a good relationship with his parents and siblings, has interesting, non-weird hobbies, and desires marriage and children.  Even better, there are no awkward pauses; the conversation flows with relative ease.  Still, while there’s nothing wrong with Duke, you don’t feel excited about being with him.  As the date progresses, this feeling nags at you.  He is a great guy, so why isn’t any adrenaline flowing?  You try to figure it out, but no answer presents itself.

When Duke asks you to go out with him again, you say yes.  But then you go on your next date, and you still don’t experience a single tingle of excitement, even though Duke is undeniably a wonderful man.  This time when he asks you for another date, you hesitate.  Do you give him another chance?

This is a question that ties single Christian women in knots.  How many chances do you give a man before you decide that not only is the magic not there, it’s never going to be there? You’ve been told over and over in your women’s group at church that you need to be receptive and encouraging to young men who have taken the risk of asking you out.  So what if you don’t feel anything right away?  Sometimes the best love is gradual…like an iceberg!  It’s better to get to know each other first; that way you don’t have any pesky desires for sex feelings getting in the way.  Besides, if he’s the right one, God will turn your heart toward this man and you will be able to entertain all of your new, married friends with stories about how you once wondered if you could ever love your dear, darling hubby.

You agree with this advice…at least you do in theory.  You do want to give men a chance, and you don’t want to be the worldly fool who threw away a great opportunity and spends the rest of her life lamenting her Greatest Mistake.  Plus, you haven’t been on a date in quite some time, and you’re grateful that you’ve caught someone’s eye.  However, none of this can change the reality that you just can’t get excited about Duke.  You enjoy spending time with him, but you don’t miss him when he’s not around.  You don’t check your phone, hoping he’s left a message or a text for you.  You don’t wait by the computer for an email or Facebook note.  You don’t wonder what he’s thinking about or doing, at least not in more than a detached sort of way.  In short, you don’t feel the thrills that girls are supposed to feel when they’re falling in love with someone.

Unfortunately, there’s no clear-cut answer to the question of how long is long enough.  It’s different for everybody, and it’s true that a lot of women have grown to love the men they eventually marry but weren’t initially attracted to.  I think, though, that there are some principles you can apply to help you figure out if you should cut bait.

First – do you respect him?  If you already want to make fun of something about him or roll your eyes, you probably don’t have enough basis of respect to build a relationship on.

Second – do you admire anything about him?  A woman who loves a man will always admire something about him.  Usually it’s a character trait (kindness, honesty, fairness, determination, etc.) or a talent (music, technology, sports, humor, intelligence, handiness…).  If you can’t think of one thing that makes you say “wow” even at this stage of the game, that’s not a good sign.  Also, if the only thing that makes you say “wow” is his looks, RUN AWAY.  It’s not going to end well.

Third – do you feel comfortable sharing things about yourself with him?  If you don’t feel that you can trust him with more personal details of your life, or you feel that he won’t understand you, it will be very hard for you to build the kind of emotional intimacy that leads to and sustains love.

Fourth – does the idea of ever having sex with him make you want to recoil, or does it make you want to rejoice?  If it’s “recoil,” the likelihood is not high that you will ever completely reverse your feelings on this matter.  If it’s “rejoice,” or at least “I don’t think it would be all bad,” then you probably have sufficient basis of physical attraction, even if your heart’s not beating a mile a minute presently.  The thing is, if you marry this guy, he’s going to want to do it with you all the time.  It’ll be helpful if you think you’ll be enjoying doing it right back to him.

I would say that if you don’t see any of these points emerging after two or three dates, it’s probably time to part ways.  If at least two of these characteristics start kicking in, though, I’d say go on some more dates and see if you don’t get all four points starting to happen.  (Anything less than all four, though, probably means you’re destined to be Just Friends, especially if point 4 is missing.)

Ladies, stop blaming “the world” for men’s taste in women.

Oh, Boundless, you never disappoint me:

Are your standards of beauty hindering your path to marriage? If you have an expectation in your mind of what your future wife or husband should look like, you may be passing up on a lot of prospects who possess true beauty. And true beauty isn’t always visible at first glance.  On this week’s Roundtable, Lisa, Candice and Sarah not only discuss true beauty but also talk about being good stewards of the beauty that God gave you.

During the podcast, Lisa, Candice, and Sarah offer up a bunch of overspiritualized pap as they explain why looks are an issue between the sexes.  First, Candice, who at least has the sense to admit that no one is blind to looks, tells listeners to stop expecting their future spouses to look like their favorite movie stars.  In a beautiful show of misandry, after telling female listeners not to keep looking for a “Christian Brad Pitt,” she tells male listeners who have “held on this long” not to look for “Christian Barbie.”  In other words, women are attracted to real, albeit exceptionally beautiful, men, whereas men are attracted to unrealistic plastic fantasy women, a.k.a. something that doesn’t even exist.  Nice.  Candice talks about how Pierce Brosnan was her physical ideal during her younger years.  Seriously, though?  This isn’t really the problem.  Candice inadvertently proves this in her next statement — that even while Pierce Brosnan was her ideal, in her everyday interactions with men, she was attracted to a much broader variety of looks.  The idea that Christian young people are so inflexible on specific physical attributes such as hair color and height (e.g., “my husband must be 6’2″ and blond”) is ridiculous on its face.  A preference isn’t a standard.  To imply that this is a widespread phenomenon that is impeding marriage is seeing a tree and deeming it the forest.

Sarah chimes in that a good personality and character are what’s most important.  No shocker there — except that everyone already knows that looks alone will not sustain a relationship.  That’s why so many women date bad boys but ultimately settle down with a nice guy, and vice versa.

Lisa then brings up the concept of “points” — that a male friend told her that men assign points to women based on various characteristics.  Women can lose points for bad personalities, etc., but they will never go beyond that initial threshold.  It’s obvious from Candice, Lisa, and Sarah’s tones of voice that this is Bad.  Lisa then points out that for a woman, men can gain points as a woman gets to know them.  This has a much more favorable reception.  Keep beating the feminist drum, Boundless:  women good, men bad!

Sarah then gives female listeners a pep talk:  it’s not you, it’s God’s will. Yes, she actually tells young women that if a man doesn’t think you meet his attractiveness standards a man isn’t interested in you, then it’s not God’s plan for your life.  This way, instead of feeling that you don’t measure up, you can just understand that it’s not God’s will and remind yourself that you are valuable and worthy in God’s eyes and that’s what really matters.  In other words, the man’s disinterest has nothing to do with the woman!  It’s actually God’s intervention in the woman’s life!  Lisa and Candice then reverently praise her for being so “healthy.”

Lisa, Candice, and Sarah go on to discuss stewardship of looks, i.e., things a woman can do to maximize her looks.  Lisa and Candice talk about how terrible they looked in the ’80s — as if ’80s fashion is what prevented them from being considered attractive.  Except, you know, everyone else was dressing just as badly at the time, yet I’m sure some women were thought attractive then.  Oh, who are we kidding:  those were probably just flukes of lighting or angles.  Sarah says that she asks her sister for advice about hair and clothing and remarks that women can do things like shower, “not smell,” and wear perfume.  Not once did any of these women bring up diet and exercise as the first line of offense in women’s attractiveness — even though a perusal of any men’s blog will reveal repeated statements that a healthy figure is crucial to men’s attraction.  But I suppose any man who brings this up will just get shouted down by Christian women who have been taught to believe that men’s non-interest is God’s will and that men need to accept “true beauty” instead.

But that’s not the end:  Lisa compliments herself on having an open mind about men’s looks but then is honest about being inflexible on a few specifics, such as height.  Then Candice says that she “feels bad” for Lisa for having some inflexible standards!  What if a short man who is otherwise great comes along?  Candice reminds her that there are not enough tall men to go around for all the women who desire tall men and that she may have to compromise.  After all, she has seen short men with taller wives.  Lisa then says that if it’s the Lord’s will, she’ll fall in love with some other guy and carry him over the threshold, women’s lib-style.  Lisa and Candice chuckle.  Women’s lib.  As if!

So, what are the takeaway lessons for young women from this podcast?

1. Men desire unrealistic fantasy women that they’ve seen in the media and shun the “true beauty” being offered to them on silver platters by single Christian women.
2. A man’s non-attraction is God’s will and no fault of the woman’s.
3. Fashion, not figure, is the first thing young women can work on to improve their chances with men.

IS IT ANY WONDER GENDER RELATIONS IN THE CHURCH ARE CRIPPLED????

And there is no better example of this brainwashing line of thinking than this comment left on the post:

I have to say, Candice and Lisa, that I appreciated this topic. Last year, a guy that I dated for about 8 months finally told me that he wasn’t overly impressed with me on our first date (this guy did have a point system, like you said!), and he had never been able to get over the negative first impression. (No more points for me!)

Then he told me that I just didn’t measure up to his preconceived standard of beauty. Now, I’m no model, but I’m not overweight, I’m healthy and attractive and dress “up” and wear a nice amount of makeup.

As hurtful as that (last conversation we ever had) was, what really makes me mad is that the world has destroyed this good Christian guy’s sense of true beauty. I know I’ll never compete with the magazine model. And sadly, that’s what the standard is.

Sarah’s comments to the ladies were right on in the podcast, but I hope that Christian guys can learn to embrace and accept true beauty, too, in the women they know.

What do we have going on here?  Well, the simple explanation is that this woman is a 5 and the young man she was dating is a 7, and her ego is deeply wounded that eight months of her Truly Beautiful personality weren’t enough to overcome her looks deficit.  But let’s break it down from her point of view:

1. Man has developed an unrealistic standard of beauty due to exposure to the media.
2. His non-attraction is not her fault.
3. Her fashion sense inexplicably did not overcome his objections to her face and/or figure.

Hmm, where have I seen these ideas before….?  Yes, I’m sure the reason this relationship didn’t work out is that this young woman’s ex-boyfriend had viewed the Victoria’s Secret catalog and if not for visions of Adriana Lima pouting in a push-up bra, he would not have found this young lady’s looks lacking.  I’m sure he didn’t once offer a prayer to God, asking God for guidance for the relationship or for more physical attraction to this girl who had given him such a negative initial impression.  Let’s all offer a prayer for him right now, that he would get over his worldly, entitled view of women and start developing a love for “true beauty.”  Perhaps someday the Lord will change his heart, and he will become attracted to women he’s not attracted to.  In the meantime, we can clutch our pearls and lament over all the young men who could have good Christian wives, if only they hadn’t bought into the World’s Agenda.  (NOTE:  The only instance in which this young woman could be right is if she were the 7 and the young man were the 5.  In that case, the man would do well to reassess his sexual market value and the resulting caliber of woman he could reasonably hope to attract and keep attracted.  I know the idea of sexual market value is offensive to Christians because it implies that we’re not all on an equal playing field in the mating game, but it exists.  Otherwise we would see a lot more good-looking men married to homely women, especially in the Church.)

The thing is, if Christians want to press the idea that God created men and women and sexuality, then they have to accept the whole kit-and-kaboodle.  This means accepting — yes, in the face of both secular and Church culture — God’s design for sexual attraction.  Women are attracted to leadership, purposefulness, strength, and stability.  Men are attracted to physical beauty, loyalty, gentleness, and grace.  To deny any one of these characteristics is to deny God’s design for sexual attraction.  No amount of cultural pressure or indoctrination will change this design any more than introducing a chicken to a lake will make it interested in swimming.  The best way to capitalize on this design is to recognize that we all bring a certain amount of goods to the mating table and to look for someone who brings a similar amount of goods and understands this concept.  Trying to get more than what you bring only leads to instability and insecurity, because the person who brings less will always have to work harder to make up for the deficit.