Christian Forums

Please forgive me if I'm intruding on what seems to be a fine message board (I usually do not use boards), but I am desperate for a little bit of advice and wish to poll a larger Christian community:

I am 18 years old and a boy and I have been dating for quite a while.  Naturally, as in any romantic relationship, there are sexual tensions.  While we work hard to combat these issues (currently through prayer and shared devotion/discussion), they still linger and there have been a couple of moments where we have been dangerously close to having sex.  We have discovered that it is easier to stay relaxed when we go on dates and stay out of our own houses; however we don't have the money to constantly be out and about and the weather has made it unbearable stay outside.  Since we are about to leave for college (though, albeit, different ones), this issue worries me more and more.

I guess what my question comes down to is this: how can a couple stay romantically involved, but not cross "that line

Vivamus, I am only a year older than you, but I have "been there, done that".  It sounds like you have gone farther physically in your relationship than I have with my girlfriend, but I know how you feel.  My girlfriend and I knew that we were gradually slipping into more physical acts, and we knew that God did not approve. God convicted us, and we prayerfully decided to make practical physical boundaries.

I think this is a very important thing to do.  You need to set boundaries that are specific, and do not try to find ways around them.  And make the boundaries one step stricter than what you think, just to be safe. After all, it doesn't hurt anyone if you stay "more pure", does it? 

For example, my girlfriend and I made a rule that we would not do any more open-mouth kissing. By God's grace, we have not broken this rule since we set it back in May. (We have also set many other rules, but I don't think I want to share them for privacy reasons.) 

Also, another wonderful thing you can do is to constantly be aware of God as you spend time with your girlfriend. When you two become physical at all, you should ask each other out loud, "Are we going to regret this? What does God think of this right now?"  This helps me and my girlfriend a lot.

I hope my advice can help point you in the right direction, and I hope others will chime in and give you even better wisdom!

In Christ,
Amherst

Vivamus,

  Although I have never "been there, done that" (Unfortunately, I was not walking a life with the Lord at that time in my life), I can offer a suggestion though.

I had a good friend who's sister and her boyfriend (and eventual husband) were in the same boat as you guy's. I am not sure how far they went, but they decided that it was to important for their relationship with each other and the Lord to allow that to happen. So, they made a deal with their families. They explained how they were feeling (the families respected their honesty). They both came from Godly families, so the families were more than eager to help once they were told. What they did was, they made a choice to not be alone in an atmosphere that would allow them to be sexual...They had a tremendous attraction for one another but their love of the Lord was stronger. So, with friend's and families help, they succeeded.

This may or may not be something you would do. But I see nothing wrong with it..It's a thought..


God Bless,
Mac

Thank you both for the suggestions, I have taken them to heart and will soon share them with my boyfriend so that we can discuss further what we think would work for us and what God wants us to do with our relationship.

Amherst: about kissing, you make me think.  I've wondered about the open-mouth limitation myself - and whether it is healthy or not.  Part of me is convinced that some level of intimacy is necessary for a relationship.  I'm sure you've wondered this yourself, can you tell me what has led you to believe that this is a healthy limitation?  I suppose I need some persuasion and I want to hear it.

Mac: I love the advice, but I'm just worried about the practicality of it.  At my house, this suggestion works fine.  However, at my boyfriends, he has a dog that won't let me stay in the main house rooms! (this poor puppy just doesn't like anybody) And so we are almost forced to retreat to the privacy of a basement so the dog can roam the main floors.  Do you think we should learn to avoid his house (after all, we're about to leave for college, so situations will change fast)?

Sorry, guys, if I seem critical of your advice, your words of wisdom are wonderful to my ears! it's just that, well, now that I have someone else to talk to, it if nice to hear what you think.

by the way:
I'm sorry if I made anyone nervous by asking for advice from someone who had "been there, done that" it's just that I have have been sometimes been told things by others who (and, Mac, I am not talking about you when I say this, you said very kind words) just tell me "just be good, that's that" and I'm tired of such impractical advice.

I applaud your decision to give yourself fully to your husband. Trust me , it's not something that should ever be regretted. You should really try to find others who are striving to do the same before you crack under the pressure that you seem to be under. Perhaps go to websites of different musical artist who openly proclaim to wait such as the christian singer Rebecca St.James and that American Idol winner from a couple years ago..Jordin Sparks. Perhaps finding a support group of like minded people will solidify you to continue on in this life choice. Don't look for excuses to go ahead and burn in the passion of the moment, or to tempt that desire or fuel it just because you feel like you are the only ones out there trying not to. Life happens and you don't want to look back on your good intentions only to be left with a chain of compromising that will leave you with life long baggage and a feeling of dirty regret. Keep fighting for what is good and right for the greater good of a life long love and commitment.

Quote from: Vivamus on Tue Aug 05, 2008 - 09:04:12
Mac: I love the advice, but I'm just worried about the practicality of it.  At my house, this suggestion works fine.  However, at my boyfriends, he has a dog that won't let me stay in the main house rooms! (this poor puppy just doesn't like anybody) And so we are almost forced to retreat to the privacy of a basement so the dog can roam the main floors.  Do you think we should learn to avoid his house (after all, we're about to leave for college, so situations will change fast)?

If I understand you correctly, you are forced to move to the basement because the dog doesn't like it...Right???  Easy remedy for the dog issue.  LOCK THE DOG UP WHEN YOU ARE THERE... He will survive for a couple hours in a bedroom, bathroom, etc....If that seems to be out of the question, I would have to ASK the question; "Who's comfort should mean more in this situation?" If the answer is, "Well, I don't know..", you may need to rethink your plans... Your comfort should "pull rank" on the dogs. Plain and simple.

Quote from: Vivamus on Tue Aug 05, 2008 - 09:04:12
Sorry, guys, if I seem critical of your advice, your words of wisdom are wonderful to my ears! it's just that, well, now that I have someone else to talk to, it if nice to hear what you think. 

No problem. Didn't take it that way.

Quote from: Vivamus on Tue Aug 05, 2008 - 09:04:12
by the way:
I'm sorry if I made anyone nervous by asking for advice from someone who had "been there, done that" it's just that I have have been sometimes been told things by others who (and, Mac, I am not talking about you when I say this, you said very kind words) just tell me "just be good, that's that" and I'm tired of such impractical advice.

I understand your feelings there. It is easy to say, "Just don't do it." But the reality of it is, it is different for each person. One thing though, through the Lord all things are possible. The Lord already knows your issues in this time of your life. Do not hesitate to go to him in prayer...Ask him to clarify and show you a path. He will. But it will be difficult if you continue to put yourself into "compromising" positions...Good luck.

God bless,
Mac

Quote from: Vivamus on Tue Aug 05, 2008 - 09:04:12
Amherst: about kissing, you make me think.  I've wondered about the open-mouth limitation myself - and whether it is healthy or not.  Part of me is convinced that some level of intimacy is necessary for a relationship.  I'm sure you've wondered this yourself, can you tell me what has led you to believe that this is a healthy limitation?  I suppose I need some persuasion and I want to hear it.

Vivamus, I am glad to hear that you are thinking about the advice given here instead of blindly accepting or rejecting it. 

In my case, my girlfriend and I came to the conclusion that we shouldn't do certain things that stir up our passion too much.  This decision will differ for everyone, because we all have different thresholds for how passionate we can be without going overboard.  Regarding the "no open-mouth kissing" rule, we came up with that because we got along fine without it for 6 months when we first started going out.  We found plenty of intimacy in other things, such as cuddling and kissing with our mouths closed. 

After enforcing our limits for a couple months, we discovered that there was so much more to our relationship than just physical attraction.  We were able to connect deeper emotionally and spiritually, and believe me, a lot of intimacy can come from that!  We feel that we are still very satisfied physically.  We can still kiss very passionately with our lips closed. (It actually surprised us how intimate it can be!) 

When we cut back physically, we were able to connect with each other in many different ways, which is essential in a committed relationship.  And we are still very satisfied with our physical intimacy.  The great thing about it is that we know before God that we are being pure in His sight.  We never have any guilt or misgivings about our actions, and it is such a wonderful feeling! 

My girlfriend and I want to save so much more than just sex for marriage.  That way, after we get married (in a few years at the earliest), we will have so much to discover physically.  We don't want sex to be the only unknown experience in our relationship at this point.  By saving more than just sex, we feel that we are creating a more interesting and physically fulfilling marriage in our future.

I hope this helps you understand our reasoning for setting certain limits such as "no open-mouth kissing".
If you have any other questions about this, or if I wasn't clear on something, please let me know.

In Christ,
Amherst

I've got many thoughts whirring now on this subject and I would love to share them with you guys soon.  However, my family is leaving for a quick trip and I won't have computer access until Saturday.  Thank you all so much for the words of wisdom, some of which we (my boyfriend and I) are already trying to implement in our own relationship.  God bless.  I'll talk more later.

For a woman, being a virgin until her wedding day is a wonderful gift for your husband and yourself, and will still be wonderful after many years.  Knowing that you did not share yourself with him or any others is something you can take righteous pride in.  "Testing the waters" so to speak before marriage makes the act of sharing yourself with your man somewhat less exciting. And what if you have sex but break up afterwards? Both parties will come away from that experience bitter, and the next man you will be with will consider you used goods.  I'm saying it as delicately as possible, and hope you are not offended.

love,

Sopranette

Modified:  I have been there.  My soon to be husband at the time was on the opposite coast for a year.  During that time I was faithful and did not date or "cheat" on him, and he did the same.

I suppose I have much to share right now.  Some of this might appear to be babbling, but primarily I'm asking for advice from others, to know if I'm heading in the right direction.

A couple of days back (Tuesday?) my relationship with my boy seemed to have a shift in it.  It, I suppose, was a momentary breakdown.  While we have been much better on our physicality issues as of late, we still show some of the scars from previous misdeeds.

((As a bit of background: For a while, I had been praying for some guidance from God -- on the whole going to different colleges situation along with fixing the whole physicality problems.  I have also been reading "He Loves Me, He Loves Me Not" by Trish Ryan (which is a woman's memoir of her own search for a Godly relationship) and discussing physicality issues on this site.))

And, suddenly, it all seemed to make sense to me: God still wants us to be together, but we need to make some dramatic changes to our relationship.  And so, we have implemented the following change: as Amherst had suggested, we aren't going to open mouth kiss until we know it is right for us to do that again.  As far as changing our social confines at the moment, it is hard to do too much (we leave for school in a week) but for the next week we plan on spending more time in public places (as to how we'll treat our physicality issues at school, we're clueless -- but we can claim ignorant freshman to that account.  I don't know where people even chill once they're at college...haha).

But all these decisions have been mutual and I truly am hoping for the best. We have only seen each other a little (since I've been traveling)  since establishing these changes, but for the time we have shared, it went very well indeed.  Our conversations ran much closer to the way we were able to communicate freely at the begging of our relationship.  I know that it won't stay easy, but I am thankful to be a fresh start and really hope that I don't screw up this time around.

Any thoughts on all that?  I still am desperately fond of advice from others who might know a little more from me.

(lets see if I can do this quote thing correctly)

Quote from: Mac on Tue Aug 05, 2008 - 20:00:42
I understand your feelings there. It is easy to say, "Just don't do it." But the reality of it is, it is different for each person. One thing though, through the Lord all things are possible. The Lord already knows your issues in this time of your life. Do not hesitate to go to him in prayer...Ask him to clarify and show you a path. He will. But it will be difficult if you continue to put yourself into "compromising" positions...Good luck.

Thank you for being so understanding 

Quote from: Amherst on Tue Aug 05, 2008 - 22:30:25
In my case, my girlfriend and I came to the conclusion that we shouldn't do certain things that stir up our passion too much.  This decision will differ for everyone, because we all have different thresholds for how passionate we can be without going overboard.  Regarding the "no open-mouth kissing" rule, we came up with that because we got along fine without it for 6 months when we first started going out.  We found plenty of intimacy in other things, such as cuddling and kissing with our mouths closed. 

After enforcing our limits for a couple months, we discovered that there was so much more to our relationship than just physical attraction.  We were able to connect deeper emotionally and spiritually, and believe me, a lot of intimacy can come from that!  We feel that we are still very satisfied physically.  We can still kiss very passionately with our lips closed. (It actually surprised us how intimate it can be!) 

I want to thank you for sharing so well on something that is a little intimate to share.  I know that, for me, I need to cut back my physicality spectrum because I become passionate easily and it is very encouraging to hear first hand from someone that limiting phsicality does not injure a relationship.  Thank you.

Quote from: sopranette on Wed Aug 06, 2008 - 08:00:13
I'm saying it as delicately as possible, and hope you are not offended.

No offense taken.  Those are good reminders to hear.

Vivamus, I am so glad to hear about your decisions with your relationship!  Keep focused on God and stay in prayer about all this. I am praying for you and your boyfriend, that you will stick with your convictions and that God will bless you tremendously for it! 

In Christ,
Amherst