wow.

So... profound thoughts from Vanessa. ;)

I was just writing my doctrinal paper, and came across Malachi 2 where God is rebuking the priests for breaking faith with Him and leaving the love of their youth (basically, the priests had left their role of honoring God only, and had moved on to other gods). God was saying to be faithful to their first love (Him), but was using marriage as a way to explain it. This happens in another passage in Ephesians (I can't remember precisely where), but it kinda made me remember what my professor was saying about how marriage is supposed to be a picture of Christ and the church (or God and the church) and how husbands are to love their wives as an example of how Christ/God loves His people (the church). And women are to love their husbands as God expects to be loved by the church.

It just kinda made me think that it's so sad that humankind has twisted God's design for marriage as a pleasurable, enjoyable relationship, representing our pleasure and joy in the Lord, to be a game of conquest or self-esteem.

When I look at it this way, I don't know why anyone would choose to 'play the game' of tiptoeing around borders and putting yourself in situations that would cause to profane the potential of this beautiful relationship. I know that when I'm in the situation, I definitely am not thinking about this, but maybe I should be... Maybe that explains the weird Christian culture of not really dating for fun or whatever - the idea of being careful to protect this relationship has become an extreme of not allowing anything to occur unless it's "serious". Or maybe that's just my skewed perspective... though I've had it confirmed by several others...

Hmm... just some thoughts... back to my paper now. :)