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What is good exhies? It's your boy Jacob
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Gooden. We are back for part three of
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the I Kiss Dating Goodbye series. If you
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missed parts one and two, go back check
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those out. But we are talking about
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probably the worst Christian dating book
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on the market. Uh thank God it's no
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longer on the market, but uh yeah, I
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Kiss Dating Goodbye by Joshua Harris.
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This is a terrible, terrible book. And
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today we're going to be covering part
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three of the book. So chapters 8 through
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11. And uh yeah, it's going to be all
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kind of like his practical tools for how
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we keep pure and uh live a a godly
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lifestyle in our romantic relationships.
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So yeah, without further ado, let's get
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into it.
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[Music]
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So chapter 8 is titled Starting with a
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Clean Slate: The Four Important Steps
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for Getting on Track with God's Plan.
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And like most of Josh's chapters, it
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starts off with a story and Josh tells a
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story of going to a birthday party for
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one of his buddies and uh as a part of
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his birthday. So it's all boys invited
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to this party and their dads are asked
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to come along with them. And they're
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their dads are also asked to bring along
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a tool that they use on the regular and
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a life lesson that goes along with it.
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And so they sit around and these dads
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bring these different tools. One of them
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brings him a really nice pen and talks
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about the significance of the pen.
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Another dad brings him a nail puller and
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talks about the significance of the nail
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puller and how in life sometimes, you
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know, you got to pull a couple nails uh
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and kind of restart uh so to speak
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instead of just like continually
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hammering nails into, you know, the two
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pieces of wood you're trying to connect
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or something like that. And so anyway,
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kind of an interesting thing. It's
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setting up this whole like life lessons,
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building a godly lifestyle, the tools
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you're going to need for that segment of
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this book. And there was a couple things
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I just found so interesting about this.
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One was that it's a gender specific
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birthday party. Uh no girls were
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invited. Um no moms were invited to
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impart their wisdom. And two, the thing
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that struck me was I went to a birthday
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party like this and it kind of unlocked
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this memory for me of going to my
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friend's party and I think he was
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turning 12 or 13, but kind of early
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manhood adolescence was taking place,
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right? And it was a little bit different
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in that I don't remember all the dads
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bringing a tool to give to their sons.
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But I do remember
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the the kid being given like a sword
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like Lord of the Rings style like broads
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sword kind of a thing. And there was a
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whole nighting ceremony. There was
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prayer that was involved with it. all
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these kind of things. The dad gave this
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longass speech um talking about what it
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means to be a man and stand up and and
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all all these different things. And then
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it went around the room and all of these
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fathers uh shared a piece of life advice
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with my friend. And on surface level, I
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don't want to say that this is like bad,
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okay? Like I'm not trying to sit here
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and say like, oh, I don't think dads
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should give advice because that's that's
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not true. It just felt like weird
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timing. You know, a birthday party is
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meant to be fun. Games, cake, presents,
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like that kind of a thing. We sat there
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for probably 2 hours listening to these
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dudes spew off stuff. And if you know
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anything about dudes and you know
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anything about dads specifically, a lot
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of times they have a lot of trouble
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getting right to the point and saying
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exactly what they mean. And so there's
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just a lot of rambling. And I remember
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as a kid just being like, "How long do
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we have to sit through this?" And even
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asking my dad, "This is not something
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we're going to do when I turn 12 or 13,
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right?" Um, and uh, I hope I didn't hurt
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his feelings when I said that. And I
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hope I didn't make him feel bad cuz
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maybe he didn't want to do that, but uh,
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I wasn't into it. So anyway, just kind
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of a weird story to kick things off. So
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right after this, we get right into the
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four steps for getting on track with
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God's plan. And those four steps are
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start with a clean slate, make your
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parents your teammates, establish
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protective boundaries, and check who's
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whispering in your ears. So, right off
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the rip, we're getting right into it.
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Start with a clean slate. Josh says this
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in the book. If I want to live a godly
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lifestyle, we must first repent of
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sinful attitudes and behaviors in our
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relationships. The Bible uses the word
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repent to describe turning from what's
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wrong and pursuing what's right.
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Repentance is a change of direction
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based on a change of heart. Have you
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practiced selfishness in your
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relationships? If so, consider admitting
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your selfishness and correcting it. Have
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you played loose and careless in the
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area of purity? Then maybe you need to
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ask God to forgive you and seek ways to
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reverse your course. Are you currently
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involved in a relationship that you know
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is wrong for whatever reason? Then ask
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God to give you the courage to do his
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will, which might include breaking off
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the relationship.
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Right off the rip, Josh is playing this
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sinful card. Again, if you didn't grow
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up in the Christian environment, this is
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something that is taught right from the
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beginning. I remember as a kid being
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single digits being told this like we
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are sinful, we are evil, without God, we
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can't do anything good and we need him
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uh to be perfect, right? And I think
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it's kind of a it's it's a very
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difficult thing now unpacking where I'm
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just kind of like
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it it sets in your mind this like well
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I'm just evil. I'm wicked. And so when
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sinful things happen it's just my nature
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being my nature. And it never allows for
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the fact of like looking at how does the
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human body react to things, right?
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Especially when we come to those teenage
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years, those hormone years, right? where
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where things are changing, uh,
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adolescence has kicked in, right? And we
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are finding things sexually attractive,
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we are turned on unexplicably.
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Um, that kind of a thing. And so Josh
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goes on to tell a story of a guy Danny
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who's like 18 and him and his girlfriend
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have been together for a couple months
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and their relationship is almost purely
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physical. And Danny feels like he needs
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to break it off because even though they
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set up they set up rules with each other
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and roadblocks and all of these things,
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their relationship inevitably turns back
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to being physical. And I find this
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really strange because I think, you
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know, I can sit here and say I think
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this needs to be a lesson of
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self-control.
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And that's coming from me now thinking
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that as humans we're not inherently evil
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or wicked. But Christians, we use that
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as a copout to basically be like, well,
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I have no control over my body. And
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specifically, guys get told this a lot.
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We have no control over our bodies. And
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that's why the physicality uh of stuff
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kind of escalates a lot of times. That's
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why guys tend to be the ones who push
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the physical uh side of romantic
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relationships, right? And so, but
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instead of just like running away from
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it and being like, I need to break up
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with this girl and I need to break her
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heart and all of these things, like why
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not actually like learn to have some
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self-control and learn to set up the
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correct kind of boundaries and get help
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where you need help, right? Maybe you
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need to have an older couple kind of
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walk you through some of the things you
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do or maybe maybe you do need to take a
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break, you know? And I do want to say
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this too, like if it's the physicality
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that made him uncomfortable and his
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partner was the one who was kind of
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pushing that on him, that's a totally
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different boundaries conversation. Uh
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that's a totally different scenario. But
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like that's not what really what we're
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being given. We're just being told like
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they're physical and in their
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relationship and they can't control
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themselves but be physical so they
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should break up because obviously
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they're not ready to get married. Okay.
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And I just think that that's that's
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kind of bullshitty. Jumping on to the
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next step along the path. We are looking
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at making parents your teammates. Here's
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what Josh has to say. You'll need two
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things as you live out a new attitude
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towards relationships. Wisdom and
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accountability. Ideally, both of these
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should come from your parents. You need
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your mom and dad. I realize that's not
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uh that not everyone has the opportunity
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to benefit from relationships with both
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their parents, but even so, I believe
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that you can gain valuable insights from
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whichever parent or guardian uh you most
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trust.
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Why do I say we need to gain wisdom and
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accountability from our parents? Because
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I can see how I shot myself in the foot
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by not trusting my parents in the past.
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When I was in high school, I hid my
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relationships from my parents. If I
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liked someone, I wouldn't let my parents
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know. I feared that if they got
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involved, they'd mess things up. What a
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mistake. By hiding my romantic life from
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my parents, I cut myself off from the
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God-given source of wisdom that could
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have saved me from making so many
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mistakes. I agree that I think having
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your parents or having trusted uh
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mentors, older figures in your life,
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being involved in your relationship, I
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think that can be really good. Okay?
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But one, I don't think it needs to
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happen immediately. Okay? I also think
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that there is
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this over um
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it can fall into this overprotective
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parent scenario, right? Where you have
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this kind of like helicopter parent
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scenario and they're with you on all the
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dates and they have to be at everything
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and they have to know everything that's
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going on in your love life at all times.
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Uh and nothing can be secret. And we'll
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see that more as we unpack more in the
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book. Uh Josh talks more about privacy
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or what he labels as privacy and um
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it's just an area that I think can get
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really muddy really quickly. And so he
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also goes on to talk about what
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qualifies someone to be like a proper
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mentor and the things that disqualify.
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He discounts divorced parents,
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non-Christian parents. Um, and I think
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that that also is a dangerous thing to
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play. Now, I know that Christians like
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to do this thing of like don't really
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get wisdom from people who are not
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Christian because
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who knows? It could be bad advice. It
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could be from Satan. It could be
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whatever. But I think when you discount
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that, especially like a divorced parent
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scenario, like they've learned a lesson.
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there's a reason they're divorced. They
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weren't compatible. Um, and there's
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something to be learned there, right?
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There's also something to be said for
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the fact that there's a lot of parents
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who stick together even though they
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probably shouldn't. So, there's a lot of
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toxic traits to be learned from that
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where you're putting up with things that
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you probably shouldn't be putting up
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with to be quite honest. And so Josh's
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kind of solution to that, he talks about
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introducing other mentors from inside
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the church, right? Maybe it's a youth
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leader, maybe it's a pastor. Um, you
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know, it's some other mentor that can
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give wisdom, accountability regarding
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your relationships from a godly
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perspective.
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Here's again where I'm going to take
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some issue with that.
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How many youth leaders and youth pastors
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have groomed young girls and told them
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to wait uh to wait to find the right guy
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and as soon as that girl turns 18, they
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snap them up, right? And they love bomb
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them and right convince them that God
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has given them this message that they're
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supposed to be together, right?
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It's kind of weird. And in the same way,
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I also know some pastors who, you know,
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would would kind of they would mentor
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relationships that were broken or or
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young people who were single or
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whatever, and then they would inevitably
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have an affair with that person, which
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would dissolve their marriage and create
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like a gigantic church scandal. Like,
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and I understand there's going to be the
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argument of like, well, that's just
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human behavior. That's just, you know,
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sinful human behavior. I get that. But
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why are we still continuing to push this
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idea that that's what you need in order
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to have a godly relationship, right? You
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need these mentor figures who are
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involved in your romantic relationship,
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who are speaking into it, who are
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telling you when to break up, who are
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giving you the the playbook, so to
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speak.
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uh when we have this history inside of
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the church of that not working out.
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Okay, maybe we shake shake things up a
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little bit. Maybe we try a different
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pattern. Okay, let's jump into step
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three, which is establish protective
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boundaries. Josh says this, after you've
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formed your team, you need to establish
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boundaries and guidelines for your
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relationship with the opposite sex. Sit
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down with your mom, your dad, your
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mentor. Ask them questions such as, what
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constitutes a romantic setting? What is
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going out with someone when not what
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when is going out with someone
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appropriate and when should it lead and
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when would it lead to pre-mature
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intimacy?
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Think about some of the situations that
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might arise. What do you do when someone
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feels attracted to you or vice versa?
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How much time should you spend on the
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phone with someone of the opposite sex?
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How much time should you have spent
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together even in group settings? Setting
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boundaries like these will allow you to
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respond with confidence in differenti
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situations. Uh yeah, and okay, a few
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things here.
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Again, I don't think that every piece of
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Josh's advice is completely god- aful. I
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think that it veers off into being
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really disgusting.
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But the overall idea of like establish
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protective boundaries around what you
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want a relationship to look like is
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valid, right? We all need that. What am
00:14:10
I looking for in a relationship? What do
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I not want to do? How quickly do I want
00:14:14
to move? All those things
00:14:17
are okay, right? We can do those things.
00:14:20
It's when we start getting into this
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like what constitutes a romantic
00:14:23
scenario and especially when we're
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talking about the purity culture realm
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where and we get into this in I I think
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it's in section four but he kind of has
00:14:32
the the ev not not the evolution but the
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step by step of here's the phases you go
00:14:38
through in a relationship casual friends
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to uh more serious friends to like a
00:14:45
courting scenario and then marriage. He
00:14:48
really emphasizes this like your
00:14:50
friends, your friends, your friends and
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then you know that that's the person you
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want to marry and so you marry them and
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then like the intimacy begins, the
00:14:57
romance begins like almost
00:15:00
at marriage. But like when you're
00:15:02
limiting what romance is and you're
00:15:04
limiting the time you can spend with
00:15:06
somebody and and not trusting yourself
00:15:07
around the opposite sex, that's another
00:15:09
issue. Not trusting yourself around the
00:15:11
opposite sex. Okay, I can't tell you the
00:15:14
number of times I hung out with somebody
00:15:15
of the opposite sex. It's literally just
00:15:17
a friendship thing. It's literally just
00:15:19
us getting coffee, going to the movies,
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having fun, doing something that's just
00:15:25
friends, okay? And there's no
00:15:27
stipulation of like this is a date or
00:15:29
this isn't a date or this isn't romance.
00:15:31
We read the we read the room and we
00:15:34
figured out what was going on. And what
00:15:35
was going on was we were just being
00:15:37
friends with each other. Okay? We didn't
00:15:39
need a third party there. Nothing bad
00:15:41
was happening. We had self-control over
00:15:44
our own bodies. We weren't jumping each
00:15:46
other's bones in the car. Like, we
00:15:49
just inherently understood what was
00:15:51
going on. And I think, again, this goes
00:15:54
back, and I'm going to continue to put
00:15:56
this on the guys specifically.
00:15:59
We as men are not taught
00:16:03
that like where those lines lie, right?
00:16:06
We just anytime we get horny, we view
00:16:08
everything as this like sexual
00:16:10
experience and this like we have this
00:16:13
just utter desire for everything to be
00:16:15
sexual almost. And it's it's really
00:16:17
pathetic and disgusting. And we need to
00:16:20
get out of that mindset and understand
00:16:22
that there is a time and a place for
00:16:23
that and there's a way to communicate
00:16:26
that that's what we're interested in
00:16:28
pursuing with somebody.
00:16:30
It's not all the time. It's not every
00:16:32
place, okay? And it's not something that
00:16:35
we should just expect that everybody is
00:16:37
anticipating that we are romantically
00:16:40
interested in them. I also wrote this
00:16:42
down in my notes and I wanted to share
00:16:43
this. I said, I have come to the
00:16:45
realization that I believe Josh left
00:16:48
sexual sin ambiguous in this book to
00:16:51
sell more copies. I think if he had
00:16:53
truly spelled out exactly what he
00:16:55
believed was right and wrong, this book
00:16:57
would have been met with a ton of
00:16:59
criticism.
00:17:01
I mean, throughout the book and his
00:17:03
follow-up book, Boy Meets Girl, he talks
00:17:05
about what is appropriate for him and he
00:17:08
places himself on a pedestal above
00:17:10
everyone else who chooses differently.
00:17:12
Right? We just read it in the book. What
00:17:16
is right? What is wrong? How much time
00:17:18
should you be spending with the opposite
00:17:19
sex? He then goes on, for example, and
00:17:22
he says, I have committed to avoiding
00:17:23
situations that could lead to
00:17:25
temptation. Being alone with a girl in
00:17:26
an empty house is one such situation.
00:17:29
So, I've created a boundary about this
00:17:31
issue. I will not go to a girl's house
00:17:33
if no one else is there. If a girl calls
00:17:35
me, invites me to come over, and me
00:17:37
mentions in passing that her parents
00:17:38
aren't home, I don't have to weigh the
00:17:41
situation or pray about it. I already
00:17:43
know that I won't accept the invitation.
00:17:45
Rules by themselves won't change our
00:17:46
hearts, but once we've taken on a new
00:17:49
attitude, protective boundaries can help
00:17:51
keep the course. Again, boundaries are
00:17:54
important. I understand he doesn't want
00:17:55
to go over to a girl's house.
00:17:58
This is also written, like I said, from
00:18:00
a 21-year-old man who at 21, most people
00:18:03
are in college or starting to move out.
00:18:06
They don't live with their parents
00:18:07
anymore. And so that gave it away to me
00:18:09
that he wrote this for high school kids.
00:18:11
He wrote this so that high school kids
00:18:14
would feel this need to not be alone
00:18:17
with the opposite sex. I have had
00:18:19
experiences in my life. I also set
00:18:21
boundaries like these things in my life
00:18:23
for periods where I didn't always feel
00:18:25
comfortable being alone with the
00:18:27
opposite sex alone at a house. Uh I
00:18:30
didn't maybe always feel comfortable. It
00:18:32
was it was easier for me to be in public
00:18:34
with them. We talked about last week the
00:18:36
the Billy Graham kind of mindset of
00:18:38
like, you know, never let the door close
00:18:40
if you're in an office with someone of
00:18:42
the opposite sex because, you know, you
00:18:45
just want there to be no question about
00:18:47
it. And I think it kind of comes down to
00:18:50
the fact that like
00:18:53
if guys were actually taught
00:18:55
self-control, if we were taught about
00:18:58
understanding
00:18:59
the appropriate time and place for
00:19:01
things, that would never be an issue.
00:19:04
There would never be a question.
00:19:07
Bad stuff's still going to happen, of
00:19:08
course, but like it would become less
00:19:11
and less of an issue that those things
00:19:13
would happen. Moving on, last step. Step
00:19:16
four, checking who's whispering in your
00:19:19
ear. This is what Josh has to say about
00:19:21
that. He says, "Finally, keep an eye on
00:19:23
your influences. Who and what you listen
00:19:26
to, listen to, read, and watch will
00:19:29
encourage or conflict with our
00:19:30
commitment to pursue God's best in
00:19:32
relationships."
00:19:35
He goes on to talk about some girls in
00:19:38
his church who always feel like
00:19:40
dissatisfied
00:19:41
um after watching romantic movies. It
00:19:43
makes me wonder uh why doesn't that
00:19:46
happen to me? Does anything in your life
00:19:48
cause that kind of discontentment? If
00:19:50
so, then maybe you need to consider
00:19:52
cutting out some things. Maybe you need
00:19:54
to stop reading romance novels, watching
00:19:56
soap opers because they encourage
00:19:58
ungodly longings within you. Perhaps you
00:20:00
need to turn off the radio because much
00:20:02
of today's music exalts a false
00:20:04
definition of love. You might need to
00:20:06
tune out some of your favorite TV shows
00:20:08
because they mock your beliefs about
00:20:10
purity. Whatever e whatever uh tempts
00:20:14
you towards discontentment or
00:20:16
compromise, don't put up with it. Tune
00:20:18
it out. Turn it off. Here we go again.
00:20:21
Josh criticizing the media. He's
00:20:23
criticizing pop culture and the things
00:20:27
that people consume. He's claiming that
00:20:29
again it paints this unrealistic
00:20:31
picture, expectations of love and
00:20:33
romance. And he's doing the classic
00:20:36
Christian culture war argument uh that
00:20:38
they love so much, right? The media is
00:20:41
bad. They are promoting bad things and
00:20:46
we should steer clear of that. That's
00:20:48
why we have people who argue today that
00:20:50
like Disney's gone woke, right? Or they
00:20:53
don't allow them their kids to watch
00:20:54
like the Cartoon Network or Nickelodeon,
00:20:58
things like that. Uh I'm going to get
00:20:59
into that in a new in a soon to come
00:21:02
episode about the things we weren't
00:21:03
allowed to do as homeschoolers. that
00:21:05
like that's part of the reason that
00:21:08
certain things are are hindered from
00:21:10
people. And it's not always the reason,
00:21:13
but a lot of it is. Something that I
00:21:17
learned, I want to say maybe around
00:21:20
18ish, was learning to to
00:21:24
differentiate between reality and
00:21:27
fantasy.
00:21:30
And this came about a couple different
00:21:31
ways. one. I mean, I grew up reading a
00:21:33
lot of fantasy novels, a lot of fiction,
00:21:36
and that's pretty cut and dry. That's
00:21:38
make believe, right? We don't believe
00:21:40
these things actually happened, but it
00:21:42
makes for a good story, right? Doesn't
00:21:45
leave me discontented because I know I'm
00:21:47
not I don't have the magical powers of
00:21:49
somebody in the Chronicles of Narnia.
00:21:51
Uh, right? I don't believe that, you
00:21:54
know, I can travel across the galaxy in
00:21:56
a spaceship and, you know, go a million
00:21:59
par sex and go to visit this new planet
00:22:01
with all these new aliens and, you know,
00:22:04
whatever. I just don't believe that's
00:22:06
fantasy. That's made up. And and then we
00:22:10
have the stuff that maybe is a fiction
00:22:12
book, but it's written in a way that can
00:22:15
convey some more
00:22:18
seriousness to it. And I talk a lot
00:22:21
about the Da Vinci Code and reading that
00:22:23
book with my dad. And one of the reasons
00:22:27
I always go back to that example was the
00:22:29
fact that for a lot of people that book
00:22:32
was an instant no because they heard
00:22:34
someone talk about it and how it was bad
00:22:35
and how it uh portrayed Christianity in
00:22:38
this negative light and it told lies and
00:22:40
it was coming for your faith.
00:22:44
When you open the book, the first little
00:22:47
synopsis thing in the book literally
00:22:48
says, "This is a work of fiction,
00:22:50
historical fiction." And while a lot of
00:22:52
the elements are pulled from
00:22:56
real stories, real historical uh like
00:23:01
evidenced things.
00:23:04
It's makeelieve. They've been twisted.
00:23:06
They've been altered, right? It's like
00:23:08
national treasure. No one thinks that
00:23:10
there's a treasure map on the back of
00:23:12
the Declaration of Independence, right?
00:23:14
We pretty much all know that's fake.
00:23:17
And so
00:23:19
learning to differentiate between the
00:23:21
reality and the fantasy has helped me a
00:23:25
lot because it's helped me in consuming
00:23:28
a lot of media because I know when I can
00:23:32
turn that on and turn that off. And
00:23:35
that's a skill that I think a lot of
00:23:37
people need to start working on in in
00:23:40
their lives of where do those lines
00:23:43
where does that line lie um for you and
00:23:47
what is you know convincing you of
00:23:49
something that is not actually happening
00:23:52
uh but you're taking it to be real and
00:23:55
again I see that in Josh's argument here
00:23:57
who's whispering in your ear goes after
00:24:00
media right he goes after the movies you
00:24:02
watch the books you're consuming Right?
00:24:04
Especially like the romance genre of
00:24:06
stuff. Romance is super spicy right now.
00:24:09
I just read my first spicy book this
00:24:11
summer and spoiler alert, it wasn't that
00:24:13
spicy. But there was elements to it that
00:24:15
I was like, "Okay, yeah, this is a fun
00:24:18
fantasy. This is a fun
00:24:21
fake reality, you know, but that's what
00:24:24
it is. I can't do everything that's in
00:24:27
that book. A partner can't do everything
00:24:29
that's in that book. It's fantasy. It's
00:24:31
makeelieve." That's okay. But it's a lot
00:24:34
of fun still. And that's I think where
00:24:38
Christians get it wrong is they act like
00:24:41
the media is portraying everything as
00:24:43
reality when it's not. A lot of it is
00:24:45
just fantasy. Okay, let's move on.
00:24:49
Chapter nine. It's called Just Friends
00:24:52
in a Just Do It World. Uh it's keeping
00:24:56
relationships out of the romance zone.
00:25:00
I'm going to read this first section of
00:25:01
this chapter again. He kind of tells a
00:25:03
story or it's a a scenario and I think
00:25:06
it just it just helps kind of paint the
00:25:09
picture for what this chapter is going
00:25:10
to be about. So, he says this. He says,
00:25:13
"You meet someone of the opposite sex.
00:25:14
He or she really catches your eye.
00:25:16
Uh-oh." Then you get to know this person
00:25:19
and you find out he or she has a great
00:25:21
personality as well. Double uh oh. To
00:25:24
top it all off, this person sends you
00:25:26
that I'd like to get to know you better
00:25:28
vibe. Major uh oh, if you've decided to
00:25:32
put romance on hold until you're ready
00:25:34
for marriage, what do you do in a
00:25:36
situation like this? If you're not going
00:25:39
to play the dating game, what's the
00:25:41
plan? The simple answer is to just be
00:25:43
friends. Easy, right? Not quite. Maybe
00:25:48
we wouldn't struggle with the scenario
00:25:50
if God created us without hearts, devoid
00:25:53
of emotions and immune to attraction.
00:25:56
But he didn't. Most of us have to deal
00:25:58
with all three as we stumble through the
00:26:00
confusing process of finding balance
00:26:02
between two extreme options. Jumping
00:26:05
headlong into romance with everyone who
00:26:07
catches our eye or running in fear from
00:26:10
all members of the opposite sex. Finding
00:26:12
that balance is anything but easy. The
00:26:15
middle ground can often feel more like a
00:26:17
tight rope stretched over a gaping
00:26:20
chasm.
00:26:22
I put down in my notes, I said, "Uh oh,
00:26:24
I found you attractive and now I'm
00:26:25
sinning."
00:26:27
I said, "Good Lord, Josh." He just
00:26:29
doesn't want people to feel any type of
00:26:31
way. He's denying the reality that the
00:26:34
human body creates hormones and has
00:26:36
emotional responses to people we find
00:26:38
attractive.
00:26:40
I'm going to take back a little bit of
00:26:42
that statement and say I think he does
00:26:43
recognize that. Uh
00:26:46
but again, I think he's pushing people
00:26:49
to kind of the wording of his books
00:26:54
lends themsself to needing to be this
00:26:57
perfect thing. this person who's kind of
00:27:00
devoid of romantic feelings and romantic
00:27:03
attraction and all of those things until
00:27:05
they're ready to get married. Flip a
00:27:08
switch, turn those things on, find a
00:27:10
partner, get married very quickly, and
00:27:13
then in marriage flip the switch of sex
00:27:16
is good. And that's just not how things
00:27:20
work, unfortunately. That's just not how
00:27:23
the human body operates. It's not how
00:27:25
our minds work. All that kind of stuff.
00:27:27
Hey, I went on to say, "Even with my
00:27:30
friends, I sometimes find myself
00:27:32
thinking about them and wanting to spend
00:27:34
time with them, fantasizing about the
00:27:36
next time we're together. That's normal
00:27:38
for humans to do. We're allowed to feel.
00:27:40
It's chemical." And now, I don't mean
00:27:42
that I find my friends romantically
00:27:44
attractive, although I do have some
00:27:45
attractive friends, much more attractive
00:27:47
than me. But
00:27:50
what I mean is it's very normal as a
00:27:53
human being to get to know somebody, to
00:27:55
meet somebody and want to spend time
00:27:57
with them. That's what we do. We're
00:27:58
we're creatures of connection, right? We
00:28:01
need that. We long for that. That's
00:28:04
something that is just part of our DNA
00:28:06
is community. We need that. When we live
00:28:09
in isolations,
00:28:11
uh we don't we can't be our truest,
00:28:14
fullest, most fulfilled person, right?
00:28:17
uh co should have taught us that uh at
00:28:20
this point the next kind of bulleted
00:28:22
section in this chapter is called just
00:28:24
plain confusing and he goes on kind of
00:28:27
this
00:28:29
statement of being just friends is plain
00:28:31
confusing in all honesty I haven't
00:28:33
completely figured it out okay and he
00:28:36
goes on and he talks about the Tootsie
00:28:39
Pop ad right everyone knows this right
00:28:42
how many licks it's the kid with the owl
00:28:44
how many licks does it take to get to
00:28:45
the center of the Tootsie Pop Right? He
00:28:47
licks once, he counts one, right? He
00:28:49
licks again, two, licks again, three,
00:28:52
looks a fourth time, he crunches down on
00:28:54
it, skips the whole line. We never know
00:28:57
how many licks it actually takes to get
00:28:59
to the center of a Tootsie Pop. So, he
00:29:01
goes on to say this after that. When I
00:29:03
consider my friendship with girls, I
00:29:04
feel like that boy, the one from the ad,
00:29:06
right, who wants to know how many licks
00:29:07
to get to the center. I don't want to
00:29:09
reach the chewy center of romance. I
00:29:11
just want to be friends, but I don't
00:29:13
know how much attention a friendship
00:29:15
between a guy and a girl can handle
00:29:17
before crunch. We've crossed the line
00:29:20
from friendship into more than
00:29:21
friendship.
00:29:23
I put this in my notes. I said Josh
00:29:27
seems to turn every interaction with
00:29:29
girls into a sexual situation. We just
00:29:31
talked about this. I think that's a him
00:29:34
problem. Like, dude, chill out.
00:29:38
And again, every time he talks about
00:29:42
someone of the opposite sex, because
00:29:43
again, we're talking in a very
00:29:45
heterosexual space, right? Christianity,
00:29:48
heterosexual space, one man, one woman,
00:29:51
no room for anything else. Every
00:29:53
interaction that Josh has with a girl
00:29:55
has this grain of sexual tension to it,
00:29:59
right? Will they, won't they? I find
00:30:01
them attractive,
00:30:04
you know, should we kiss? All those
00:30:06
types of things. is this the person I
00:30:08
meant to to be with? And you see later
00:30:10
on even like the way he views his quote
00:30:13
unquote friendships with girls when they
00:30:15
start to pair off, there's jealousy
00:30:17
involved for him.
00:30:19
And again, we talked about it.
00:30:23
It's okay to be friends with someone of
00:30:25
the opposite sex. It just is.
00:30:28
I have plenty of friends. You've met a
00:30:30
lot of them on the show. Friends of mine
00:30:32
who are of the opposite sex. They're
00:30:34
beautiful young women and like I love
00:30:37
them dearly. But am I romantically
00:30:39
attracted to them? No. They're just my
00:30:42
friends. We have a great time when we're
00:30:44
together. We go get a beer. We go to the
00:30:46
movies. We go mini golfing. We go
00:30:49
rollerblading. We have fun. We do fun
00:30:52
adult friend things,
00:30:55
but there's nothing sexual there
00:30:58
because you can have that. Not every
00:31:00
scenario with someone of the opposite
00:31:02
sex has to be sexual. And that's
00:31:04
something we need to start teaching our
00:31:06
young people. Not every interaction with
00:31:09
someone of the opposite sex is sexual.
00:31:12
And we need to not be sitting there
00:31:13
wondering, "Do they like me? Do they not
00:31:15
like me? Is this a romantic thing? Is
00:31:17
this not a romantic thing?" Okay? We
00:31:20
have to get over that. We have to get
00:31:21
over that hump. I'm going to jump
00:31:24
forward just a little bit. There's a lot
00:31:25
of things I could continue to unpack in
00:31:28
that last section, but
00:31:30
I feel like I'd be going in circles,
00:31:32
right? It's kind of all pointing back to
00:31:34
the same thing of guys and girls can
00:31:36
have friendships. It's okay.
00:31:39
But let's jump into this next section,
00:31:41
which is understanding the difference
00:31:42
between friendship and intimacy. Okay,
00:31:44
Josh has this to say about this. He
00:31:46
goes, "We can more clearly see the
00:31:48
elusive line between friendship and more
00:31:51
than friendship when we understand the
00:31:53
difference between friendship and
00:31:55
intimacy. Friendship is about something
00:31:57
other than two people in the
00:31:59
relationship. Intimacy is about each
00:32:02
other. In a true friendship, something
00:32:04
outside the two friends brings them
00:32:06
together." CS Lewis wrote this. "We
00:32:09
picture lovers face to face, but friends
00:32:12
side by side. Their eyes look ahead. The
00:32:15
key to friendship is a common goal or
00:32:17
objective on which both companions
00:32:19
focus. It can be an athletic pursuit, a
00:32:22
hobby, faith, music, but it's something
00:32:24
outside of themselves. As soon as those
00:32:27
two people involve focus on their
00:32:29
relationship, it has moved beyond
00:32:32
friendship. I think it's really weird. I
00:32:35
think Josh's definition of intimacy is
00:32:37
wrong because if you look up the Webster
00:32:40
definition of intimacy, intimacy is a
00:32:43
close familiarity or friendship. It's a
00:32:45
closeness with somebody. Okay? And so my
00:32:49
understanding of intimacy has always
00:32:51
been that there are different types of
00:32:53
intimacy. There's friendship, there's
00:32:55
romantic, there's uh there's a a
00:32:58
parental uh intimacy, there's all these
00:33:01
different things. And and so I think
00:33:05
it's I I I
00:33:08
think we need to reexamine
00:33:10
what Josh is trying to say here, right?
00:33:12
Of friendship has this component of you
00:33:15
guys looking to something else, right?
00:33:17
Whether it's a hobby, whatever it is,
00:33:20
you can also have friendships that are
00:33:23
about each other
00:33:25
like and that you don't share passions
00:33:28
that you don't like you can just be
00:33:30
friends. You know what I mean? Um, and
00:33:33
so, but I think about like
00:33:37
my my relationships with people, right?
00:33:40
And I think about my dear friends and
00:33:43
how I would tell them anything,
00:33:47
anything they want to know, my deepest,
00:33:48
darkest secrets, they ask, they're
00:33:50
theirs to have. And like that is a very
00:33:55
deep level of intimacy. It's a closeness
00:33:58
with that person where I feel
00:33:59
comfortable, right? It's a comfort thing
00:34:02
with them. With my parents, there's a
00:34:04
lot of things that I'll share with them.
00:34:05
There's a lot of we we have this bond
00:34:10
because they've been there my entire
00:34:11
life, right? They've seen me grow up.
00:34:13
They know me probably better than most
00:34:16
people know me. Um,
00:34:19
and
00:34:21
you know, so we have this this
00:34:22
closeness. We have an intimacy. Now, my
00:34:25
wife and I, we also have an intimacy,
00:34:27
not only as friends and the closeness
00:34:30
that comes with that, but also romantic,
00:34:32
right, in nature. And so, there's
00:34:35
different ways to look about it. But I
00:34:38
think just lumping the word intimacy
00:34:40
into sex and into romance is a bad it's
00:34:46
a bad game to play because
00:34:50
again we talked about or I mentioned how
00:34:54
purity culture and the Christian culture
00:34:56
I grew up in, there was a lot of things
00:34:59
there was a lot of media and a lot of
00:35:00
books that were kind of these like
00:35:01
instant nos. And
00:35:06
it it's interesting because even still
00:35:08
I'll pick up a book and I'll read the
00:35:10
back, right? Or I'll flip through a
00:35:11
couple pages of it and I'll see
00:35:13
buzzwords that I go that's associated
00:35:16
with this, right? And I remember picking
00:35:19
up this book, I'm totally spacing on
00:35:21
what the book was titled, but it was
00:35:22
about um building intimate
00:35:25
relationships. And I picked it up being
00:35:27
like, "Okay, interesting romance book.
00:35:31
Here we go. relationship, you know,
00:35:33
we're going to talk about sex, we're
00:35:34
going to talk about romance. That's what
00:35:35
this book's about. No, this book had
00:35:37
nothing to do with that. This book had
00:35:39
everything to do with building closeness
00:35:41
with people, right? Setting correct
00:35:43
boundaries, understanding, you know,
00:35:46
this person kind of fulfills this need
00:35:48
in my life and I share this with them.
00:35:50
The levels of intimacy and how you get
00:35:52
to that, right? How you build that trust
00:35:54
with people, all those types of things.
00:35:57
And and so as I flipped through that, I
00:35:58
was like, this is really interesting.
00:36:00
this is a different way to view this.
00:36:02
And so again, I think we just need to
00:36:05
take certain words and redefine them uh
00:36:09
or look at maybe actually define them
00:36:11
and take out the Christian definition
00:36:13
that people like Josh continuing to put
00:36:15
on these things, right? That maybe we
00:36:19
don't agree with uh and and actually
00:36:23
look at what they truly do mean. Okay, I
00:36:26
had this in my notes too that I wanted
00:36:30
to share was that I have not always been
00:36:35
uber close with every friend, even the
00:36:36
people that sometimes I would label my
00:36:38
best friends. And I was thinking, as
00:36:41
I've been prepping and rereading this
00:36:43
book and because even though I read it
00:36:45
and I took all these notes, like it's
00:36:47
been a little while, so I'm kind of
00:36:48
rereading it as we're going through it.
00:36:50
But I had this thought and I was
00:36:54
thinking about
00:36:57
holding certain people at arms length
00:36:59
growing up. And as I've unpacked my
00:37:02
religion,
00:37:04
I've really started to realize that a
00:37:07
lot of my youth leaders and a lot of my
00:37:10
friends who were Christians, I held them
00:37:13
at this arms length because
00:37:16
I didn't have the closeness with them to
00:37:20
always share
00:37:23
all of the maybe the the things that I
00:37:25
believed were sinful in my life, right?
00:37:28
or the degree to which I was struggling
00:37:30
with them. And the reason I didn't do
00:37:32
that was because
00:37:35
especially with the leaders, I was
00:37:36
looking for someone
00:37:39
who was going to help guide me and point
00:37:43
me in kind of a direction of like here's
00:37:45
the steps to take to get better. So, I'm
00:37:49
going to use porn as an example, okay? I
00:37:51
grew up believing porn was sinful. It
00:37:53
was wrong. It was evil.
00:37:55
And
00:37:58
but I never wanted to talk about it with
00:38:00
my youth leaders because at youth group
00:38:02
whenever it would come up of course
00:38:03
every teenage boy for the most part was
00:38:06
struggling with looking at porn. We were
00:38:09
struggling with that. And or we were
00:38:12
quote unquote struggling with it. But
00:38:16
if I went to them and said, "I have this
00:38:18
problem where I'm looking at it four
00:38:20
times a day. I can't turn it off. It's
00:38:23
all I think about. that I close my eyes
00:38:24
and I see it, right? I do believe
00:38:26
personally I probably had
00:38:30
a low degree of addiction to this at
00:38:32
different points in my life. But I was
00:38:35
looking for steps to get out of that.
00:38:38
Okay. And so even when I would bring it
00:38:40
up kind of subtly to test the waters of
00:38:42
like, oh yeah, like I've just been kind
00:38:43
of wrestling with this or I I
00:38:47
essentially I was being like I want to
00:38:49
get clean, right? I want to get sober uh
00:38:51
from that. It was always met with pray
00:38:54
more, worship more, serve more.
00:38:58
Now, those are definitely things that
00:38:59
you can do. However, they're not steps
00:39:03
to actually break the addiction, right?
00:39:05
And I was maybe looking for something
00:39:07
that was like, here's the seven steps,
00:39:09
right? Here's what we're going to do.
00:39:10
We're going to put this protection on
00:39:12
your computer. We're going to have you
00:39:14
text so and so at this time. And so
00:39:16
because I didn't get when I would test
00:39:18
the waters, I didn't get maybe the steps
00:39:22
I felt like necessary to take a to take
00:39:25
some some movement forward in my
00:39:28
struggle. I wouldn't trust him with
00:39:30
anymore because I was like, you gave me
00:39:32
bad advice. You gave me advice that's
00:39:34
not working. I can pray a whole bunch,
00:39:36
but then I just feel really guilty. I I
00:39:38
can serve in church and feel like, okay,
00:39:41
I'm paying penance for what I'm doing,
00:39:43
but like
00:39:45
I needed actual practical advice and
00:39:48
step-by-step things that were going to
00:39:51
get me to where I wanted to be, and I
00:39:53
wasn't getting that. So, I didn't build
00:39:54
an intimate connection with any of those
00:39:56
people because
00:40:00
they weren't there wasn't we couldn't
00:40:02
have that closeness because there wasn't
00:40:05
a trust there because I was continually
00:40:07
worried that if I did tell them, I was
00:40:09
going to just again be told here's what
00:40:11
you do and then I was going to be
00:40:13
watched like a hawk and constantly told
00:40:15
like, "Hey, did you look at porn today?
00:40:17
Hey, did you do this today? Hey, did you
00:40:19
do that today?" You know, and but I was
00:40:21
never going to be given the tools. So, I
00:40:23
was going to continue to fail, but then
00:40:24
I was going to be made to feel bad about
00:40:27
it the entire time. Okay, does that make
00:40:29
sense? Moving on. Next section.
00:40:33
Being inclusive, not exclusive. So,
00:40:37
we're jumping to page 130.
00:40:41
And this is what Josh has to say. The
00:40:44
second step in being just friends with
00:40:46
the opposite sex is to include others
00:40:49
instead of isolating ourselves with just
00:40:50
one person. We don't want dating's
00:40:52
mindset of being alone to carry into our
00:40:55
friendships. We can avoid this by going
00:40:58
out of our way to involve friends,
00:41:00
family, and maybe even strangers in our
00:41:03
lives. Kind of a weird take, but okay.
00:41:06
This is again so weird. We kind of
00:41:07
talked about this already. This whole
00:41:09
idea of like just don't be alone with
00:41:11
someone of the opposite sex. And what
00:41:12
does even alone mean, right? Like if I
00:41:14
go out with a friend of the opposite sex
00:41:17
and we go to dinner, we're not
00:41:19
technically alone. there's other people
00:41:21
there, right? In the Christian
00:41:23
worldview, that would be like a date,
00:41:26
right? Um, I don't know if I've told
00:41:28
this story on the show before. I know
00:41:30
I've brought it up with friends before,
00:41:32
but when I was in high school, um, I was
00:41:35
friends with a lot of people. And one of
00:41:38
there was a couple of girls that lived
00:41:42
uh in this one part of town and I would
00:41:43
go hang out with them and we would
00:41:45
inevitably end up at Starbucks. And
00:41:48
usually I would hang out with them solo.
00:41:51
We would just go do something fun and it
00:41:53
wasn't a big deal. My parents were cool
00:41:54
with it. Their parents were cool with
00:41:56
it. And for whatever reason, we would
00:41:58
end up at this Starbucks. And there was
00:42:00
a homeschool mom who continually ran
00:42:02
into me at this Starbucks with all of
00:42:04
these different girls and made comments
00:42:08
about the fact that she thought that I
00:42:10
was seeing all of them and being a
00:42:12
player.
00:42:15
Now, like I get it. Like, actually, no,
00:42:19
I don't get it. I was wanting to feel
00:42:21
bad there for a second for this person.
00:42:25
Without asking us anything about what
00:42:27
we're doing, why we're hanging out,
00:42:29
nothing, she assumed that I was
00:42:32
romantically entangled with all of these
00:42:34
people, and that I was like basically
00:42:38
going behind every one of their backs to
00:42:41
date somebody else, right? And so I had
00:42:43
all of these girls all at my fingertips
00:42:45
to my play things so to speak. And like
00:42:51
that was hurtful when that came out that
00:42:53
like she was accusing me of that because
00:42:55
that's not how my friends felt. That's
00:42:57
not how I felt about the situation. And
00:42:59
it made me really self-conscious about
00:43:02
where I go and how I go and how I
00:43:03
conduct myself and all of these things.
00:43:05
And I didn't feel like I could be around
00:43:06
her daughters at all. And I didn't feel
00:43:08
like I could be around those girls for a
00:43:11
little while. uh without having a
00:43:13
conversation and setting
00:43:15
setting this expectation, right, of like
00:43:19
we're just friends, right? Like we're
00:43:21
just this. I think that's what's so
00:43:24
harmful about like this book and this
00:43:27
idea of like we can be nothing more than
00:43:29
friends until we're certain that we are
00:43:32
meant to be together. And
00:43:35
it played into this like idea that like
00:43:39
we're like siblings. we are. That's
00:43:42
like, you know, romance is like a no no.
00:43:45
And it never let anything evolve
00:43:47
naturally because even if one of us was
00:43:50
feeling a romantic inkling towards the
00:43:53
other person, why would you ever say it?
00:43:55
Because the other person's probably
00:43:57
going to say, "No, but like we're just
00:43:59
friends, right? They're going to shoot
00:44:00
you down." And so it led to a lot of the
00:44:04
homeschool group just not dating, right?
00:44:06
We didn't date each other. We didn't we
00:44:10
for sure didn't have sex but like there
00:44:12
was no romantic anything amongst any of
00:44:16
us even though maybe internally we felt
00:44:18
that way but we couldn't because it
00:44:21
would be crossing this line and sinning
00:44:24
right and that was a big no no. So, I
00:44:28
just think
00:44:30
I don't know. I just hated this idea and
00:44:32
it got continually pushed by if anyone
00:44:35
ever watched like the Duggar family. I
00:44:37
don't remember what their show was
00:44:38
called. It was like 18 and counting or
00:44:41
something like that, but like their kids
00:44:43
would go on dates and they would have
00:44:45
chaperones which were usually the
00:44:46
siblings and they would, you know, do
00:44:48
all these different It's just weird. It
00:44:50
was just weird. And that was the reality
00:44:52
of what I grew up inside of, of these
00:44:55
people who even if my parents had said,
00:44:57
"Well, dating looks like this and this
00:44:59
is acceptable and this is okay and you
00:45:01
can do these things." There were other
00:45:03
people in the homeschool group who would
00:45:05
have frowned upon that, right? So, I
00:45:09
want to move on. I got a lot to cover.
00:45:11
We're only like halfway done. Let's look
00:45:13
at this next part, which is seek
00:45:14
opportunities to serve, not to be
00:45:17
entertained. And he goes on, he says,
00:45:20
"The late Kirk Cobain captured the
00:45:23
attitude of today's culture with the
00:45:25
line," here we are now. Entertain us. I
00:45:28
believe that unfortunately many
00:45:30
Christians have made Cobain's line the
00:45:32
refrain um for of their friendships. In
00:45:36
my opinion, our cultural obsession with
00:45:38
entertainment is really just an
00:45:40
expression of selfishness. The focus of
00:45:42
entertainment is not producing something
00:45:44
useful for the benefit of others, but
00:45:46
consuming something for the pleasure of
00:45:48
self of self. Number one thing, just got
00:45:52
to point. It's not in the book. They
00:45:53
spelled Kirk Cobain's name wrong.
00:45:55
Spelled it with a C instead of a K. So,
00:45:58
it's Kurt with a C. Um, yeah. So,
00:46:01
whoever also edited this book, um, you
00:46:03
messed up. Obviously, they were not
00:46:06
enjoying today's entertainment. But
00:46:08
here's what I wrote down about this.
00:46:10
Christians really get caught up in the
00:46:12
servant attitude and forget about the
00:46:15
self. Even Jesus took time for himself,
00:46:18
right? He went out in the wilderness for
00:46:20
40 days, but we're not allowed. We must
00:46:23
always be giving, be serving, be
00:46:25
stacking chairs, be worshiping, uh be
00:46:27
serving on the worship team, uh teaching
00:46:29
Bible study or Sunday school. I
00:46:32
understand that we can get to know
00:46:34
people better by doing something
00:46:35
constructive, but I was never taught the
00:46:38
part about being selfish for a second.
00:46:41
As I got older and I burned out in
00:46:45
college or church, it was because of
00:46:47
this reason.
00:46:49
I was always looking for opportunities
00:46:51
to serve other people, right? I worked
00:46:53
at other church where I would get up at
00:46:55
[ __ ] 5:00 a.m. in the morning on
00:46:56
Sundays. I go set this thing up and
00:46:59
stack chairs and be on the worship team
00:47:01
and run sound and do all of these things
00:47:04
um that were just like insane behavior
00:47:06
for a college kid to be doing. Um and I
00:47:09
did that every week for like 6 months.
00:47:12
And in addition to that, I was part of
00:47:14
Bible studies. I went to other chapel
00:47:17
services. I did all these other things.
00:47:19
I looked for any opportunity to serve to
00:47:21
serve to serve to give of myself. And I
00:47:23
burned out because you have to take time
00:47:25
for yourself regardless of if you're
00:47:28
Christian or not. Like regardless of if
00:47:30
you want I still love to serve people. I
00:47:32
do. Like that's what I love to do.
00:47:34
That's what I do for the clients I work
00:47:37
with. That's what I do with some of you
00:47:39
guys even like of like the connections
00:47:41
that I can build with people and
00:47:43
connecting the dots and putting you guys
00:47:45
in scenarios with other people hopefully
00:47:47
or helping you with something or
00:47:49
whatever. Like I love to do those things
00:47:51
because that's a part of who I am. I
00:47:53
love the opportunity to serve. Um,
00:47:55
that's what this podcast is meant to do.
00:47:57
It's meant to be of service to you guys,
00:48:00
right? To talk about things, to share
00:48:02
stories. Um, there's a selfish component
00:48:06
to it, but it's selfish in the sense
00:48:09
that I also really like to do that. I
00:48:12
just do, right? And so, I get a kick out
00:48:13
of it. But I've learned as time has gone
00:48:16
on to be selfish. that it's okay to take
00:48:19
a day where I just do what I want, where
00:48:21
I just chill, where I relax, where I eat
00:48:24
the thing I want to eat, and I play the
00:48:26
video game I want to play and I read the
00:48:28
book I want to read and I don't worry
00:48:30
about anybody else because I've already
00:48:31
given so much of myself to other people
00:48:34
and I just need a minute to refuel,
00:48:36
right?
00:48:38
We're not taught that in church. I
00:48:40
wasn't taught that at church. If you
00:48:42
were, congratulations. Awesome. But if
00:48:44
you weren't taught that in church,
00:48:46
please remember to do that, okay?
00:48:49
Because otherwise, you become a shell of
00:48:51
the person who you really are. We need
00:48:53
time to fill the tank back up. We need
00:48:56
that time. Take that time. It's okay.
00:48:59
Call it selfish, but you need it. It's
00:49:01
okay to be selfish sometimes. The last
00:49:04
piece of this chapter that I want to
00:49:05
talk on is this section called brotherly
00:49:07
love. He has this quote in here and he
00:49:11
says, "What's our relationship with each
00:49:12
other? We're brothers and sisters in
00:49:14
Christ. How do we view and cheat treat
00:49:17
each other with honor? Um, and what's
00:49:20
the secret of our zeal service side by
00:49:22
side for God's glory? I wrote this in my
00:49:25
notes. I said the brother sister thing
00:49:28
really threw me off for a really long
00:49:29
time. Okay, again, I talked about
00:49:32
growing up in the homeschool community.
00:49:34
We were all told for so long, these are
00:49:36
like your brothers and your sisters. and
00:49:38
we would go to each other's houses all
00:49:39
the time and we would, you know,
00:49:41
sleepovers and we were with these people
00:49:43
a lot and so they became those things to
00:49:46
us. It's also really weird to have
00:49:48
romantic feelings about your brothers
00:49:49
and sisters. Just going to put that out
00:49:52
there.
00:49:53
And so we were primed not to be romantic
00:49:56
with each other, right? Because that's
00:49:57
weird. That's like incest, right? It's
00:50:01
just weird. And so if you look at the
00:50:03
homeschool group I grew up in, there's
00:50:05
not that many homeschoolers who married
00:50:07
homeschoolers that we knew. There's just
00:50:10
not. So even if you did marry a
00:50:12
homeschooler, a lot of times it's from
00:50:14
some other group or some other, you
00:50:16
know, scenario where we weren't there
00:50:19
wasn't the closeness, there wasn't the
00:50:21
sibling uh attitude. But for the rest of
00:50:24
us, we all still look at each other. I
00:50:26
mean, maybe I I'm going to speak for
00:50:27
myself, but we look at each other and
00:50:29
it's like that's my sibling, right? We
00:50:31
went on vacation together, we did this
00:50:32
thing together, we, you know, whatever.
00:50:35
And so there was never space for there
00:50:37
be anything of romance.
00:50:41
And so if you had a crush,
00:50:43
no. And I think about the experiences I
00:50:47
had with prom and this constant needing.
00:50:51
I mean, the first prom I went to, I was
00:50:53
the one invited, uh, but was very clear
00:50:55
on the phone, but we're just going as
00:50:57
friends. It's like, well, yeah, for
00:50:59
sure. Um, the next year when it was my
00:51:03
senior prom and I invited my date, uh, I
00:51:06
called Julia and I remember being like,
00:51:08
"But just friends and there needing to
00:51:10
be this stipulation of us just being
00:51:12
friends." Uh, because we're we're not
00:51:16
romantic. And again, the media playing a
00:51:19
role in when you go to prom with
00:51:20
somebody, there's this expectation of
00:51:22
you're going to you're going to kiss or
00:51:24
you're going to hook up or something
00:51:25
like that is playing this role. again,
00:51:28
fantasy reality, right? Um, type of
00:51:31
thing. And one of the things about this
00:51:34
whole scenario of the brother, sister,
00:51:37
love
00:51:39
fiasco, I'm just going to call it. But
00:51:41
this kind of
00:51:43
not allowing us to have romantic
00:51:45
feelings towards each other is that when
00:51:47
I got to college, it made me really
00:51:49
awkward at dating because I had never
00:51:50
done it before. It was my first time.
00:51:52
And not that there's anything wrong with
00:51:54
that, but it would have been nice to go
00:51:57
into it having had my heart broken a few
00:51:59
times, right? Having just maybe a little
00:52:03
experience under my belt, you know, of
00:52:05
of anything, of knowing what the pain
00:52:07
felt like when it didn't work out. Um, I
00:52:10
think that those little pieces like that
00:52:13
would have been helpful. And so I wanted
00:52:16
to to also put this in here that said,
00:52:19
"Stop teaching kids that their bodies
00:52:21
are being s are um are being sinful by
00:52:24
having natural reactions to things. Uh
00:52:27
penis habers get boners. Vagina owners
00:52:30
get wet. It's normal. Your body is
00:52:32
reacting." And I wrote that because as I
00:52:36
thought about
00:52:39
this these feelings that we had growing
00:52:41
up and how we were siblings,
00:52:44
we were denied our natural reactions to
00:52:46
things, right? We were never it was
00:52:48
never put in the correct context of what
00:52:51
we were feeling. And so there was lack
00:52:53
of sex. There was lack of us talking
00:52:56
about these things. And if your parents
00:52:58
talk to you about these things, kudos to
00:53:00
your parents. But like it felt awkward
00:53:03
and weird. Again,
00:53:06
all of these buzzwords, intimacy,
00:53:08
romance, kissing, all of these things
00:53:10
were bad. They were they were negatives
00:53:12
in our life because you were not
00:53:14
supposed to do them. They are saved for
00:53:16
marriage. That is what Josh Harris is
00:53:18
telling you throughout this whole book.
00:53:19
All these things are saved until
00:53:21
marriage. They're saved until marriage.
00:53:22
They're saved until marriage. And when
00:53:25
you're telling a kid that, you're
00:53:26
telling them to go against the natural
00:53:28
urges that their bodies are having. And
00:53:30
I'm not saying that's not to say that we
00:53:32
should just let high schoolers and young
00:53:34
adults just do whatever they want. And
00:53:36
you know that's also a recipe for
00:53:38
disaster. But what I'm saying is that we
00:53:40
have to start having these
00:53:41
conversations. We have to start talking
00:53:43
about these things. Why is your body
00:53:45
reacting this way? Why are you feeling
00:53:47
this way when you see that person? Why?
00:53:49
Why? Why? Asking those questions and
00:53:51
being okay with the awkward
00:53:54
conversations, right? Being okay with
00:53:56
talking about these things. being okay
00:53:58
saying it is perfectly normal for your
00:54:01
body to be reacting that way. Now, what
00:54:04
are we going to do with that? Right?
00:54:06
That's where again we it all connects to
00:54:08
each other, right? I talked about guys
00:54:10
not understanding the correct the
00:54:12
correct con um context for sexual
00:54:15
situations. We need to be having those
00:54:18
conversations with people. What is the
00:54:20
context of this scenario? Do we need to
00:54:22
be doing that? No. Okay. When is the
00:54:24
appropriate time to do that? here's the
00:54:26
appropriate time. Those types of things.
00:54:29
And so we set these young adults, we set
00:54:32
these young people up for success when
00:54:34
it comes to their body and understanding
00:54:36
and listening to their body as opposed
00:54:38
to continually denying themselves and
00:54:40
ending up like somebody like me who
00:54:43
still wrestles with understanding that
00:54:45
my body tells me things, right? My body
00:54:48
tells me when it's tired and I need to
00:54:50
listen. It tells me when something feels
00:54:52
good and I need to not feel ashamed for
00:54:54
that. It tells me when I'm hungry. It
00:54:56
tells me all of the things I need to
00:54:58
live. I have denied myself that for so
00:55:02
long. I'm 28 [ __ ] years old. I'm
00:55:05
about to be 29 by the time this comes
00:55:06
out. I'm probably 29. Okay,
00:55:09
29 years old.
00:55:12
I still don't get it always. Okay, these
00:55:16
things have lasting impacts. these
00:55:18
things that Josh are talking is talking
00:55:19
about the the concepts and the way that
00:55:22
he he words it and it's it's um
00:55:26
ambiguous and it's it's not clear,
00:55:28
right? It creates this distrust in your
00:55:31
body. It creates this like
00:55:35
icky feeling
00:55:37
that we're dealing with a decade out, a
00:55:40
decade away from learning these things,
00:55:42
from having these things implanted in
00:55:44
our minds. Okay, this is not just a flip
00:55:46
the switch kind of scenario. These are
00:55:48
things that go that last for a long,
00:55:51
long time and take a lot of work, a lot
00:55:53
of effort to get over them. All right,
00:55:57
we got to move on because I've been
00:55:59
rolling for way too long.
00:56:02
Chapter 10, guard your heart. Okay, main
00:56:05
theme of this one, fighting off lust,
00:56:07
infatuation, self-pity. Here's how this
00:56:10
chapter starts. Emily sprawled lazily on
00:56:12
the bed as she watched Jessica pack. I
00:56:14
bet I know what'll happen when you get
00:56:16
to school, she said suddenly. Oh,
00:56:18
really? Jessica replied distractedly.
00:56:21
She was more concerned now with how to
00:56:23
organize the mess of clothing, shoes,
00:56:25
and makeup that covered her bedroom
00:56:27
floor. "Yeah, really," Emily said as she
00:56:29
threw a pair of socks at Jessica. "You
00:56:33
uh" she could tell when she wasn't being
00:56:35
taken seriously. "You're going to get
00:56:37
there, meet some guy, and fall in love.
00:56:40
Then you'll have to crawl back on your
00:56:42
knees and beg me to forgive you for all
00:56:44
the hassle you've given me about dating.
00:56:46
Oh, I can't wait until you have a
00:56:48
boyfriend. If anyone besides Emily had
00:56:51
said this to Jessica, she would have
00:56:53
been angry. But coming from her best
00:56:55
friend, infuriating though it was, uh,
00:56:58
Jessica had to smile. Emily, I've told
00:57:01
you before that it's not a matter of not
00:57:04
wanting to fall in love, Jessica said as
00:57:06
she crammed another pair of jeans in the
00:57:07
suitcase. I'm just not interested in
00:57:09
playing games and chasing after
00:57:11
pointless relationships like some people
00:57:14
I know. Wink.
00:57:16
That was a terrible wink on my part. If
00:57:18
you're listening to audio, be thankful
00:57:19
you didn't see that. So, again, this
00:57:22
chapter, we're talking we're talking
00:57:24
lust. We're talking infatuation.
00:57:28
Right off the rip, we're still with this
00:57:31
rhetoric of pointless dating, pointless
00:57:34
relationships, right? Like there is no
00:57:37
value in dating, right? There is no
00:57:40
value in it because it's just setting
00:57:42
you up for failure after failure after
00:57:44
failure. There is value in friendship.
00:57:47
There is value in building relationships
00:57:51
with people, romantic and not. Okay,
00:57:53
there's value in that.
00:57:56
They might not all pan out, but saying
00:57:59
that they're pointless is just kind of
00:58:01
dumb. And you know, I think I would hope
00:58:05
that at this point Josh Harris kind of
00:58:07
understands that. He talks about in
00:58:09
these books multiple times how he had a
00:58:11
lot of girlfriends before he swore off
00:58:13
dating and he kissed it goodbye. Uh and
00:58:16
then he had one more uh relationship
00:58:19
that he married and unfortunately
00:58:21
they're no longer together. But
00:58:25
I I find it really interesting and I
00:58:28
would love to ask him personally, what
00:58:30
did you gain out of the relationships
00:58:32
that you had before um the woman that
00:58:35
you married? Because I'm sure that
00:58:37
there's life lessons that he learned.
00:58:39
Now, I understand there's an imparting
00:58:41
of wisdom, right? That's where we go
00:58:44
back to the mentor thing. We go back to
00:58:47
having parents involved. We go back to
00:58:48
older siblings being involved in our
00:58:50
romantic relationships. Of course, they
00:58:52
can help steer us in the right direction
00:58:54
and tell us this is worth it. This is
00:58:56
not worth it. They're they're not a good
00:58:58
for you, right? We need those things in
00:59:00
our life sometimes.
00:59:02
However,
00:59:04
it's also very human nature that we just
00:59:06
sometimes have to learn it on our own,
00:59:09
right? We got to break some eggshells to
00:59:11
make an omelette kind of a thing. So,
00:59:13
let's keep moving on right into the next
00:59:15
section of this book. When the rules
00:59:17
don't fit the game. Okay, now we're
00:59:20
still talking about Jessica and not so
00:59:22
much Emily cuz Emily was the friend, but
00:59:24
Jessica is now at college and she gets
00:59:27
there and has what she calls her rules
00:59:30
of romance. Like modern-day Moses
00:59:32
descending from Mount Si with the Ten
00:59:34
Commandments, she felt sure that her
00:59:36
list of dos and don'ts would solve the
00:59:38
world's relational problems or at least
00:59:40
keep her from experiencing them. First,
00:59:43
Jessica wouldn't allow herself to get
00:59:44
bogged down in short-term relationships
00:59:46
until she felt she could pursue
00:59:48
marriage. Dating was out. She would only
00:59:50
go out with guys in groups. Um, at that
00:59:53
point, at the point when romance was
00:59:55
appropriate, a guy who showed interest
00:59:57
in her would first talk with her
00:59:59
parents. From this point, Jessica had a
01:00:02
very deta every detail of the courtship
01:00:04
process planned, like a carefully
01:00:06
written screenplay. After checking out
01:00:08
the prospective suitor, mom and dad
01:00:10
would give the young man permission to
01:00:11
woo her, and the two of them would fall
01:00:13
hopelessly in love, and the sun would
01:00:15
shine on their outdoor wedding.
01:00:18
So, Jessica wants to wait until she's
01:00:20
ready for marriage before dating and
01:00:23
sets all these rules in place. Okay,
01:00:27
setting up rules for your relationship
01:00:30
might not seem like the worst idea, but
01:00:33
it puts a lot of pressure and a timeline
01:00:36
on stuff. And if you've ever watched
01:00:38
Summer House, we know that timelines are
01:00:41
bad and they fall through. Okay, if you
01:00:44
don't get that reference, watch Summer
01:00:46
House. Okay. Um,
01:00:50
the second thing that I find
01:00:53
so interesting about this, and this is
01:00:55
going to come up again and again,
01:00:57
asking for parents' permission to date
01:01:00
the daughter.
01:01:03
I've always found this kind of stupid
01:01:06
and
01:01:08
I don't know, this is kind of a debate.
01:01:09
I mean, tell me in the comments, I
01:01:12
guess. Like, let me know. Like, if
01:01:13
you're
01:01:15
do you want your parents approval to
01:01:16
date somebody? Do you want them to go I
01:01:18
don't know. But here here's why I find
01:01:21
it personally stupid. I knew a girl in
01:01:24
college who that was one of her one of
01:01:26
her deals. You wanted to date her. You
01:01:28
had to call her dad. You had to convince
01:01:30
him why you were a good guy to date his
01:01:33
daughter. I straight up to her face was
01:01:36
like, "That's stupid. and if I ever
01:01:37
asked you out, I would not be asking
01:01:40
your dad."
01:01:42
And she was like really taken aback by
01:01:44
that. And she's like, "Why?" And I was
01:01:45
like, "Well, I think you should be
01:01:47
trusted to make your own decisions."
01:01:50
And I told her, I was like, "I
01:01:53
understand maybe asking parents
01:01:55
permission when it comes to marriage.
01:01:57
Even that I still kind of find weird. I
01:01:59
did that technically. U my mother-in-law
01:02:01
was like, why are you even asking me?"
01:02:04
Um, but like
01:02:09
this kind of like sheltering again of
01:02:13
specifically women, but
01:02:16
that sheltering is kind of again
01:02:18
reinforcing this idea of like we can't
01:02:20
trust ourselves. We can't trust our
01:02:22
body. We can't trust, you know, what
01:02:24
what it's telling us, right? And so I
01:02:27
just find that such like a it's it's
01:02:30
just a really
01:02:32
it's a bad rule in my opinion. Like
01:02:34
again, you are your own person. You have
01:02:37
agency over your body. Make your own
01:02:39
decisions. If you want to go out with
01:02:40
me, great. If you don't, that's fine,
01:02:43
too. Like, I'm not going to be butt hurt
01:02:46
over it. You know what I mean? But me
01:02:48
having to jump through hoop after hoop
01:02:50
after hoop after hoop to like get you to
01:02:52
go out with me is like not attractive,
01:02:55
right? It makes you th this is going to
01:02:58
come off sounding like just pathetic
01:03:00
manosphere [ __ ] but like it makes you
01:03:03
unattractive to me as a man because I
01:03:06
don't see you as somebody who is
01:03:08
independent and can think for themselves
01:03:10
and that's attractive to me. And so it's
01:03:13
my own opinion, that's my own what I'm
01:03:15
attracted to, but you know,
01:03:18
it is what it is. Okay, let's move on.
01:03:21
Next up, the deceitful heart is this
01:03:23
next section. Oof. God. Josh says this.
01:03:27
The human heart doesn't like taking
01:03:28
orders from the mind. The time will come
01:03:31
for all of us when we don't feel like
01:03:32
doing the godly responsible thing we're
01:03:35
we've resolved to do. The question is,
01:03:37
how will we respond when our hearts lead
01:03:39
a full-scale rebellion? If we don't
01:03:42
prepare ourselves for an uprising,
01:03:43
you'll feel tempted to abandon our
01:03:45
principles and standards.
01:03:49
Okay, here we go again with the wicked,
01:03:52
deceitful, ugly, reprehensible heart.
01:03:56
Right? The core of any good Christian
01:03:58
argument. We are so inherently wicked
01:04:01
that we need Jesus because we can't be
01:04:04
trusted to do anything right because our
01:04:07
own evilness gets in the way.
01:04:10
We must wait. I was a little heated when
01:04:12
I wrote this, but this is what I wrote
01:04:14
in my doubts. We must wait for Daddy God
01:04:15
to show us the way. like grow up people.
01:04:18
We can make decisions on our own.
01:04:22
Um, and it all ties back to purity
01:04:24
culture because how can we be trusted to
01:04:25
date when we can't even be trusted to be
01:04:27
a good person.
01:04:30
That again ties back into daughters
01:04:33
being like, "You have to get my dad's
01:04:35
permission." They don't trust
01:04:36
themselves, right? And uh but never have
01:04:41
I ever heard a guy tell a girl, "Well,
01:04:44
you have to call my parents and ask if
01:04:45
you can ask me out." Never. Never have
01:04:48
we seen that. I have this additional
01:04:51
note that I kind of put in asterisk
01:04:53
because it pertains to everything we're
01:04:56
talking about, but it says this. I
01:04:58
genuinely think the peer culture was
01:05:00
pushed solely as a way to control kids
01:05:02
from dating. uh relieving parents from
01:05:04
having to have the sex talk or
01:05:06
relationship talks with their kids. It
01:05:08
set such a high expectation that it was
01:05:10
impossible to accomplish, right?
01:05:14
We lived in shame and doubt and fear
01:05:17
that we were going to get it wrong, so
01:05:19
we would never participate in it.
01:05:24
That's the reality of what it felt like.
01:05:27
All of us were being pushed to to not do
01:05:31
this thing because if we messed it up,
01:05:33
it would be not only detrimental to
01:05:35
ourselves, but detrimental to another
01:05:38
person or other people.
01:05:41
Like crazy. Okay, we got to keep going.
01:05:44
We got to keep moving. The cheating
01:05:46
boss. Oh my god, this story was insane.
01:05:49
So, he tells this story in the book of
01:05:52
Julie, who's a 19-year-old. She gets a
01:05:54
job as a receptionist and she finds her
01:05:57
boss attractive. She's attracted to him.
01:06:00
He also shows some attraction to her and
01:06:04
he is married. Um I believe it says he
01:06:07
has kids or whatever, but um yeah, he's
01:06:11
in a fully committed relationship and he
01:06:13
puts the moves on her and so she is like
01:06:17
convicted, leaves her job kind of a
01:06:20
thing.
01:06:22
What I find crazy is he goes on in the
01:06:24
story to to talk about Jessica
01:06:27
confessing her sins uh for finding a
01:06:30
married man attractive. And I was like,
01:06:35
is that a sin?
01:06:37
Like
01:06:38
is it? I I had I would never have
01:06:42
thought of it that way, right? Like I
01:06:44
look at people all the time and I go,
01:06:46
that's an attractive person. I don't act
01:06:48
on it, but it but I can see somebody and
01:06:50
go that's an attractive person. I don't
01:06:52
think that that's wrong, right? I don't
01:06:54
think that that's sinful behavior. Even
01:06:56
when I was a Christian, I didn't think
01:06:57
that that was sinful behavior to just
01:06:59
find somebody attractive. So, I find it
01:07:01
crazy that he's talking about this girl
01:07:02
needing to confess her sin of finding
01:07:05
her boss attractive when she did nothing
01:07:07
wrong. Her boss is the one who
01:07:08
instigated
01:07:10
an inappropriate relationship with her.
01:07:13
And so, her reaction is to say no. She
01:07:16
says no, she leaves. She quits her job.
01:07:20
Who's in the wrong here? It's not her.
01:07:22
She has nothing to apologize for. Like,
01:07:25
what are we talking about? Yeah. Crazy
01:07:28
crazy [ __ ] Okay. It this all plays into
01:07:32
this narrative again that like women
01:07:35
carry so much more of the burden of
01:07:37
purity than men do or men ever will, I
01:07:40
guess. Like it's this just kind of like
01:07:45
uh like I I don't like I'm sure we're
01:07:47
going to get into clothes at some point
01:07:48
in here. Um but like it it again is this
01:07:52
like why is it only their responsibility
01:07:56
and the men have no responsibility right
01:07:59
we are continually told
01:08:01
uncontrollable hormone monsters sex
01:08:04
drives crazy all of these things do
01:08:06
nothing about it it's the woman's job to
01:08:09
dress modestly uh to you know to
01:08:12
basically put us in our place
01:08:15
[ __ ] [ __ ] people it's [ __ ]
01:08:17
[ __ ] All right, got to keep moving.
01:08:20
Got to got to keep moving. All right,
01:08:22
here we go. The pure springs. So Josh
01:08:24
then goes on to tell this proverb and he
01:08:27
talks about this story of a quiet forest
01:08:32
dweller who once lived high above an
01:08:35
Austrian village um along the eastern
01:08:38
slopes of the Alps. Wow. And this guy
01:08:42
had one job and it was to come down into
01:08:45
this village and into the surrounding
01:08:47
area and he would clean these pools. He
01:08:49
would clean these, you know, just
01:08:50
natural springs kind of a deal and that
01:08:53
was his one job and he was paid to do
01:08:55
that. Now city council gets together and
01:08:59
they decide that hey there's this guy he
01:09:02
just comes down and his job is to
01:09:04
maintain the springs.
01:09:07
Why is he doing that? It's a waste of
01:09:08
our money. Right? And so they do away
01:09:10
with it.
01:09:12
And uh a few days later the water's like
01:09:14
all nasty, right? It's got like foam on
01:09:16
it. It's like disgusting.
01:09:18
And uh he says in the end, right, they
01:09:21
like, you know, they had they enjoyed
01:09:25
this thing and then they basically like
01:09:27
voted against their own interest in
01:09:29
getting rid of this guy. And um he said
01:09:32
we make the same mistake in our own
01:09:34
lives. Like the keeper of the spring who
01:09:36
maintained the purity of the water, you
01:09:38
and I are the keepers of our hearts. We
01:09:39
need to constantly evaluate the purity
01:09:41
of our hearts in prayer, asking God to
01:09:44
reveal the little things that
01:09:45
contaminate us. As God reveals our wrong
01:09:48
attitudes, longings, and desires, we
01:09:50
must remove them from our hearts. The
01:09:53
constant evaluation
01:09:56
of like our hearts and needing to check
01:09:59
the purity is like exhausting. Okay. It
01:10:03
it's part of what like led to me burning
01:10:05
out. Like in addition to the servitude,
01:10:08
it's this constant like
01:10:11
am I sitting? It's just this constant
01:10:13
checking of like am I doing wrong? Am I
01:10:15
doing wrong? Am I doing wrong? Am I
01:10:17
doing wrong? And living in this
01:10:18
perpetual fear of like I am doing
01:10:20
something wrong and that God is going to
01:10:23
be angry at me for it.
01:10:26
I can't tell you the number of times
01:10:28
I've like cried on the mats at church.
01:10:30
like we had these carpets in the front
01:10:32
and you could go kneel before God and
01:10:35
I've cried and I've sobbed and I've been
01:10:37
like I'm just a wicked evil person
01:10:39
because like I did this thing
01:10:43
and if you believe in Christianity I
01:10:45
understand there is going there
01:10:47
sometimes needs to be repentance of sin
01:10:50
uh within
01:10:52
that religion
01:10:54
but what I don't understand is that
01:10:58
Christianity teaches that we are given
01:11:00
this gift of
01:11:03
forgiveness, right?
01:11:06
Man fell short. We couldn't cut it. God
01:11:09
had to send his one and only son to come
01:11:11
and pay the ultimate price, which was
01:11:12
death on a cross. And if we believe that
01:11:15
and we ask him to come live inside of
01:11:17
us, uh, you know, we're forgiven and the
01:11:21
Holy Spirit comes and lives inside of us
01:11:23
and makes us better people. and
01:11:26
statements and stories like this, right,
01:11:28
that end with this kind of telling of
01:11:30
this like you have to constantly be
01:11:31
evaluating your heart and are you doing
01:11:33
something wrong, I think it diminishes
01:11:36
the power of what Christians believe God
01:11:39
is, what God did for them because if he
01:11:41
forgives you, he forgives you. That's
01:11:44
it, right? He knows that you're going to
01:11:47
mess up. And I don't know that there's a
01:11:49
necessity to constantly be living in
01:11:51
this state of I am wicked. I am evil.
01:11:54
I'm all these things. When you accept
01:11:56
that gift,
01:11:58
doesn't that transform you then into a
01:12:00
new person?
01:12:02
Just something to think about. Next up
01:12:05
in this book is the pollutants of the
01:12:07
heart. Okay? And there's three of them.
01:12:08
There's infatuation, there's lust, and
01:12:10
there's self-pity. Okay? We're going to
01:12:12
rip through them real quickly. Anytime
01:12:13
we allow someone to displace God as the
01:12:15
focus of our affection, we've moved from
01:12:17
innocent appreciation of someone's
01:12:18
beauty or personality to the dangerous
01:12:20
realm of infatuation. Instead of making
01:12:23
God the object of our longing, we
01:12:25
wrongly direct those feelings towards
01:12:26
another human. We become idoltors,
01:12:29
bowing to someone other than God, hoping
01:12:31
that this person will meet our needs and
01:12:33
bring fulfillment. Here's what I wrote
01:12:36
again with the possibility of knocking
01:12:39
God off their pedestal for infatuation
01:12:41
with a person. Like, is it not normal to
01:12:44
think about someone we find attractive?
01:12:46
Is it not normal for our minds to flash
01:12:48
to positive memories of that person?
01:12:50
This book seems to indicate that God
01:12:52
must always be top of mind. Earlier in
01:12:54
the book, Josh talked about the couples
01:12:56
that only wanted to spend time with each
01:12:58
other. Um, and they wanted to sherk the
01:13:00
responsibilities of their lives. It
01:13:02
seems like he wants to sherk the
01:13:04
responsibilities of his life to only
01:13:06
hang out with God. I know that some
01:13:08
people are going to be like, "But
01:13:09
there's nothing better than God. Like,
01:13:11
there's nothing better. If I could just
01:13:13
spend all my time with God, I just
01:13:14
would." That's not the reality of life,
01:13:16
right? But also, if you believe that God
01:13:20
put us here for a reason and purpose,
01:13:24
look at what that purpose should be.
01:13:27
Okay?
01:13:29
As someone who
01:13:32
for a long time
01:13:35
was a Christian, I I kind of believed my
01:13:37
purpose was to do what what Jesus did,
01:13:40
right? It was to to live in community
01:13:42
with people, to have fun, to mourn
01:13:46
together, to live life together. That
01:13:48
was like my purpose on this earth. Uh
01:13:51
and and I felt like through doing those
01:13:53
things with people, I would exhibit
01:13:56
god-like behavior and it would open
01:13:58
possibilities to have conversion talks
01:14:00
with people.
01:14:04
But I'll tell you what's not attractive
01:14:05
to a lot of people who aren't
01:14:07
Christians. somebody who only ever
01:14:10
[ __ ] talks about God.
01:14:12
It's boring. It's not interesting. It's
01:14:15
like, and if you have any preconceived
01:14:18
notion about Christianity, it's not
01:14:20
going to be attractive. It feels very
01:14:22
much like when you have the Jehovah's
01:14:24
Witnesses come knock on your door and
01:14:25
everybody groans and they go, "Oh, these
01:14:28
guys again. Like, I don't want to listen
01:14:29
to this spiel." That's how it feels when
01:14:31
somebody makes their whole entire
01:14:33
personality about God and it's just
01:14:36
that's all they want to talk about. It's
01:14:38
all they want to do. It's all their
01:14:40
Instagram is good for is these weird
01:14:43
like messages, prophesizing, preaching
01:14:48
tidbits. Like be a normal human being
01:14:50
for once in a while. Get a hobby that's
01:14:53
not God related and like be interesting.
01:14:57
It's not that hard. We all have things
01:14:59
we like to do. I like to read books. I
01:15:02
like to play with Lego. I play video
01:15:04
games. I really enjoy sci-fi movies and
01:15:07
sci-fi books and all this kind of stuff.
01:15:09
Those are things I'm interested in. I
01:15:11
have interest in old cars. I have
01:15:14
interest. I have a ton of interest. It's
01:15:15
crazy. Probably way too many. But
01:15:19
there are things that give me
01:15:21
opportunity to start conversation with
01:15:23
people, right? I know about certain
01:15:24
things. I know about music. I know about
01:15:26
this, right? and we can have a
01:15:28
conversation about those things
01:15:31
and it maybe gets us to a point in our
01:15:33
friendship where we can actually then
01:15:35
have a conversation about our belief
01:15:37
system and God and all of these things,
01:15:39
right? And so I just
01:15:43
I just get so frustrated with this
01:15:45
constant talk of like God is always
01:15:48
number one. Okay. Yeah, if you're a
01:15:50
Christian, I believe that he can still
01:15:52
be number one
01:15:54
and you can actually be an interesting
01:15:56
person who does other things. That's my
01:15:58
point that I'm gonna make there. Moving
01:16:00
on, let's talk about lust. Okay. Lust.
01:16:03
Lust. Lust. Lust.
01:16:06
The second poison that often threatens
01:16:07
the purity of our hearts is lust. To
01:16:09
lust is to crave something sexually that
01:16:11
God uh has forbidden. For example, when
01:16:14
I, as a single man, look on a woman who
01:16:16
is not my wife, which right now means
01:16:18
every woman, and immorally fantasize
01:16:21
about her, I'm lusting. I'm setting my
01:16:23
heart on something God has placed off
01:16:25
limits. Sexual desire within marriage is
01:16:27
natural and appropriate and an
01:16:29
appropriate expression of sexuality.
01:16:31
After all, God gave us sex drives. But
01:16:33
God also gives us specific commands
01:16:35
forbidding us to indulge in those
01:16:36
desires before we marry. This is my
01:16:40
issue with that last little bit. Sexual
01:16:42
desire inside of marriage is normal, but
01:16:44
sexual desire outside of marriage is
01:16:46
not. Again, it's this light switch idea,
01:16:50
right, of you flip it on and off. Okay,
01:16:52
so so when you're not married, it's
01:16:54
flipped off. Sex equal bad. And some
01:16:57
people will say it's not. You can't
01:16:59
generalize it quite like that. I I'm
01:17:01
going to Okay, I'm going to Sex equal
01:17:03
bad, right? We don't do sex because
01:17:05
we're not married. Get married, put a
01:17:08
ring on it, sign a piece of paper
01:17:09
legally saying we're married. light
01:17:11
switch turns on, we're good to go. Brain
01:17:14
doesn't work that way. Humanity doesn't
01:17:16
work that way. He's ignoring again what
01:17:19
our bodies are saying. He's shoving
01:17:21
those things deep down, right? He's
01:17:24
saying we don't touch them. Like those
01:17:27
are, you know, those are the nos, right?
01:17:30
He's telling us to ignore the things
01:17:32
that our body is telling us. And in
01:17:35
addition to that, we have to repent of
01:17:37
feeling that way. We have to repent of
01:17:40
having sexual attraction towards
01:17:41
somebody, right? Because it's sinful.
01:17:43
It's wrong. Here's what else I want to
01:17:45
talk about with the with the lust thing.
01:17:47
He attributes lust specifically to being
01:17:50
like a sexual thing, right?
01:17:53
As being this like uber strong like
01:17:57
desire, right, to crave something. And
01:18:00
you know, but people could also say
01:18:02
like, I lust after ice cream. Like,
01:18:03
right, I'm craving ice cream like so
01:18:05
bad. And so my question really is like,
01:18:09
is lust really all that bad or
01:18:14
is it what we do with
01:18:18
lust
01:18:20
that is bad? And maybe as I'm as I'm
01:18:23
talking about this, I'm thinking to
01:18:24
myself like maybe lust is bad because
01:18:27
maybe lust is a bigger version or a
01:18:30
stronger version of just attraction or
01:18:34
wanting, right? I can want somebody
01:18:37
sexually. I can find somebody sexually
01:18:38
attractive, right? I can want a bowl of
01:18:40
ice cream.
01:18:42
How do I act on that? Right? And maybe
01:18:45
lust is more of the like I fantasize
01:18:47
about it. I can't get them out of my
01:18:49
mind, right? And it it leads itself into
01:18:51
infatuation, which can be a negative uh
01:18:54
type of thing. I don't know. You let me
01:18:56
know. Is lust good, bad? Let me know.
01:18:59
Okay. Lastly, we're going to talk about
01:19:01
self-pity. So, this is the last
01:19:03
pollutant of the heart.
01:19:06
In a sense, self-pity is the worship of
01:19:09
our circumstances. When we indulge in
01:19:11
feeling sorry for ourselves, we turn our
01:19:12
focus from God, his goodness, his
01:19:15
justice, his ability to save in any
01:19:17
circumstance. And we when we turn away
01:19:19
from God, we cut ourselves off from our
01:19:21
only source of hope.
01:19:24
We can easily allow self-pity to se uh
01:19:26
to seep into our hearts when we feel
01:19:28
lonely or crave someone to love and be
01:19:31
loved by. It seems we have every reason
01:19:33
in the world to complain, to sulk
01:19:35
angrily because we've received a bum
01:19:38
deal. I just put this in my notes. I
01:19:40
said, "Quit feeling bad about yourself,
01:19:41
man. Don't you know that God died on the
01:19:44
cross for you and that should be
01:19:46
enough?"
01:19:49
Self-pity is it's an interesting one
01:19:52
because I think that
01:19:56
it's one thing to wallow in it for a
01:19:58
long period of time, right? And to be
01:20:00
like, oh, wo is me and I never get a
01:20:02
boyfriend or I never have a girlfriend
01:20:03
or I never d right wo is me, right? To
01:20:07
exist in that is probably detrimental. I
01:20:10
would I would agree with that.
01:20:14
But I would also argue that like there
01:20:18
is a level to which it's like okay to
01:20:20
sometimes feel sad, right? It's okay to
01:20:22
sometimes be like, "Man, I really just
01:20:24
wish I had somebody to hug. I really
01:20:26
wish I had someone to cuddle with at
01:20:28
night. I really wish I had somebody to
01:20:30
go to the movies with, to go to date
01:20:31
night with, to take to this restaurant
01:20:33
that I really love, to do all these
01:20:34
things that I I enjoy, right? It's okay
01:20:37
to feel that way because that's normal,
01:20:40
right? We crave connection. We're human.
01:20:45
So, I'm going to leave it at that. We
01:20:47
have one more chapter to get through. We
01:20:51
are now on to chapter 11. So, our final
01:20:53
chapter. It's called You Don't Date.
01:20:57
What are you nuts? And uh subtitle is
01:21:00
what do you do when people ask why you
01:21:02
don't play the dating game? Now, I'm
01:21:04
going to jump pretty much into the
01:21:05
middle of this chapter because he kind
01:21:07
of says the same thing over and over and
01:21:10
over again. And so, I'm going to jump to
01:21:13
what he's calling what he labels the
01:21:16
Sunday afternoon dilemma. And it's
01:21:18
basically this story that after church,
01:21:21
um, this boy named Paul is hanging out
01:21:23
with his friends and they all are like,
01:21:25
"Hey, we're going to go do this thing,
01:21:27
you know, we can give you a ride." And
01:21:29
this girl at church is like, "Yeah, like
01:21:30
I can give you a ride. We'll go back to
01:21:32
my house, get changed, we can, you know,
01:21:34
eat something quick and then we'll go do
01:21:36
whatever kind of a thing." And Paul's
01:21:38
really uncomfortable because he knows
01:21:40
that this girl, um, her mom works on
01:21:43
Sunday, so nobody's going to be at the
01:21:44
house. and he also knows that this girl
01:21:47
is kind of into him and rather than
01:21:49
communicate that he's just like, "Oh,
01:21:51
like no, like or figure out a ride with
01:21:53
somebody else, like he just kind of runs
01:21:55
away from the situation." He uses his
01:21:57
parents scapegoat to kind of be like,
01:22:00
"Oh, well, like my parents really like
01:22:01
when I'm at home on Sundays and like all
01:22:03
this stuff." And so he denies himself
01:22:05
the fun of like going out with his
01:22:06
friends because he doesn't want to deal
01:22:09
with this awkward situation with this
01:22:11
girl that he doesn't have romantic
01:22:12
feelings for. Uh but he knows she does
01:22:15
and also puts him in a compromising
01:22:17
position. And I wrote in my notes I was
01:22:20
like I really wish that he would have
01:22:25
talked. I wish that Josh would have
01:22:26
said, "No, it's okay to communicate."
01:22:28
And I understand not wanting to hurt
01:22:29
someone's feelings, but it's also okay
01:22:30
to communicate that you're not very
01:22:32
comfortable in that situation, right? Or
01:22:34
you don't want to do that or you want to
01:22:36
figure out a different ride situation or
01:22:38
maybe you meet up with them later or
01:22:39
whatever, he just encourages them to run
01:22:43
away. And so even if that is your
01:22:45
boundary, right, we talked about like
01:22:46
listening to your body and what your
01:22:47
body is telling you and like if your
01:22:49
body is telling you you don't want to do
01:22:50
this, like you don't want to do it,
01:22:51
right? Or you want to figure out a
01:22:53
different path. I'm guilty of this too.
01:22:55
Like my my parents let told me that I
01:22:58
could use them always as the scapegoat.
01:22:59
If I didn't want to do something at a
01:23:00
friend's house, I could always be like,
01:23:01
oh well my parents need me at home, you
01:23:03
know, because sometimes it was easier to
01:23:05
say that than to say like I just don't
01:23:07
want to hang out with you cuz that was
01:23:09
sometimes the reality too or I don't
01:23:11
want to do this thing. I had one
01:23:12
particular set of friends where their
01:23:14
parents made us do chores at their house
01:23:16
which I thought was kind of [ __ ] So
01:23:19
I hated going to their house um for that
01:23:22
reason. And so I would always figure out
01:23:24
a way to show up late and not have to do
01:23:26
anything. Um, and I could use my parents
01:23:28
as a scapegoat for that. But like
01:23:30
looking back on it, I'm like I do wish
01:23:32
that there were circumstances in which I
01:23:34
had been more forced to kind of be
01:23:37
honest about the way I felt about
01:23:39
things, right? And be able to say like
01:23:41
in this circumstance, be able to tell
01:23:43
this girl, "Hey, I don't really feel
01:23:44
comfortable like going to your house.
01:23:46
You know, maybe a couple more people
01:23:48
could come with us." That kind of a
01:23:50
thing. turn it turn the scenario into
01:23:52
something else or just say, "Hey, look,
01:23:54
I'm not really comfortable with that.
01:23:56
I'll just catch up with you guys next
01:23:57
week or something like that, but stick
01:23:59
up for yourself as opposed to kind of
01:24:01
using your parent as a scapegoat." I
01:24:03
think it's just it would have been a
01:24:05
cool learning opportunity. This last
01:24:08
section of this chapter is called
01:24:11
running out of excuses, right? And so
01:24:13
he's talking about there's only so many
01:24:15
times you can kind of like basically
01:24:18
lie about like not going on a date or
01:24:22
all these things, right? Because this
01:24:23
whole chapter is about these awkward
01:24:25
situations, right? Of you've decided not
01:24:27
to date at this point. And you know,
01:24:31
people are going to ask you, why don't
01:24:33
you date somebody? Why don't you have,
01:24:34
you know, for me it would have been why
01:24:36
why don't you have a girlfriend already?
01:24:38
And all these things, right? And it's
01:24:39
like, oh well, I've decided not to. Uh,
01:24:41
I always just said I just haven't met
01:24:43
the right person yet. But one of the
01:24:45
things that Josh kind of advocates for
01:24:48
here at the end of the book
01:24:50
is
01:24:52
sometimes communicating our beliefs on
01:24:55
dating or his beliefs on dating to
01:24:57
somebody, right? And he says this, our
01:24:59
primary purpose for communicating with
01:25:01
others should be their uh encouragement
01:25:03
and their growth. And so throughout this
01:25:06
chapter, he kind of he he gave all these
01:25:08
scenarios and he talked about, you know,
01:25:10
sometimes you need to explain to the
01:25:12
this person like I don't date for these
01:25:14
reasons, XYZ. Other times you just kind
01:25:16
of come up with more of an excuse of,
01:25:19
you know, I don't do this or I don't do
01:25:21
that, you know, or I just like I said, I
01:25:23
haven't met the right person kind of a
01:25:25
thing.
01:25:26
He then goes on later in this to talk
01:25:29
about an example from his from his own
01:25:32
life where he said, "I once made plans
01:25:34
to go to a movie with a group of
01:25:35
friends. At the last minute, everyone
01:25:37
backed out except for one girl, but
01:25:39
because she knew me and that I avoided
01:25:42
one-on-one dates with girls, uh, she
01:25:44
called to say we needed to reschedule.
01:25:46
Her feelings weren't hurt and I didn't
01:25:48
have to go uh into major explanation.
01:25:50
She respected and worked with my
01:25:52
beliefs."
01:25:54
So, at this point, he's advocating for
01:25:56
my friends all know I don't date. They
01:25:58
know my structure. They know my
01:26:00
boundaries. All these types of things.
01:26:01
Well, I think it's kind of stupid in
01:26:04
that Josh canceled plans with a group.
01:26:06
Uh, you know,
01:26:09
because like he just doesn't do
01:26:11
one-on-one dates. Like, I do think it is
01:26:15
important that if you do decide like
01:26:17
your dating rules that your friends
01:26:19
understand what those are, right?
01:26:20
They're not encouraging you to go down
01:26:24
a path that you're not comfortable with,
01:26:26
right? They're not telling you to hook
01:26:27
up with somebody. They're not telling
01:26:28
you to make up make out with somebody.
01:26:29
They're not telling you to do this,
01:26:30
that, or the other with somebody if
01:26:32
that's not within like your group. But
01:26:35
again, this is just movies. This is just
01:26:37
hanging out. It goes back to Josh can't
01:26:40
handle a situation in which like someone
01:26:43
of the opposite sex and himself are
01:26:45
alone, even though they're not alone.
01:26:47
They're at a movie theater where other
01:26:50
people exist. And I know they don't know
01:26:52
that, you know, these other people in
01:26:54
this scenario don't necessarily know
01:26:55
them. And so if they did start making
01:26:57
out or they did, people wouldn't
01:26:58
probably bat an eye at it. They'd think
01:27:00
it's normal. But I again find it so
01:27:03
weird in this book that Josh throughout
01:27:05
this whole last segment of this book, he
01:27:08
keeps talking about you can be friends
01:27:10
with the opposite sex, you can do all
01:27:11
these things with the opposite sex, but
01:27:12
then anytime that there's an opportunity
01:27:16
to do that, he like shuts it down and
01:27:18
runs away from it. Like
01:27:22
I just I just don't get it. The last
01:27:24
little bit of this book, he talks about
01:27:27
the key motivation for communicating our
01:27:29
beliefs about dating should be to serve
01:27:30
others. We want to promote peace, love,
01:27:32
and righteousness that will bring glory
01:27:34
to God. I put in my notes like it's kind
01:27:36
of like the invitation to the cult. And
01:27:39
I think one of the things that I think
01:27:41
Josh is guilty of a lot in this book and
01:27:44
in his own life is probably this better
01:27:47
than thou
01:27:49
situation of like creating all these
01:27:51
rules that he follows and makes himself
01:27:53
the golden boy by being like I'm doing
01:27:55
all these things and this is the godly
01:27:57
way to be and like if you don't do it
01:27:59
this way like you know he'll kind of
01:28:01
argue that like oh well you know maybe
01:28:04
it's okay maybe that's okay between you
01:28:06
and God but that's not how I interpret
01:28:08
God, right? And so it's like we have
01:28:10
been set up to believe that Josh Harris
01:28:13
is an anointed person by God to deliver
01:28:16
this message about dating. And if we
01:28:19
don't follow his rules to a tea, we are
01:28:21
dishonoring uh and going against God's
01:28:23
plan. That's how this book is painted
01:28:26
out to be because even though he won't
01:28:28
say you're doing it wrong, he's going to
01:28:31
heavily heavily imply it. It's no wonder
01:28:33
that this book caused so much pain in in
01:28:37
the [ __ ] Christian dating world
01:28:41
because like
01:28:44
imagine being 14 and reading this book,
01:28:46
being given this book, okay? Being told,
01:28:49
"Hey, read this book on dating."
01:28:52
And you open it up and you read it and
01:28:54
it reads as if this man is the authority
01:28:56
on this subject, as if he has years and
01:28:58
years and years of training and
01:28:59
knowledge and experience among these
01:29:01
things. And so, you know, he's the guy.
01:29:04
He's the guy we trust. You know, all
01:29:06
these things. And so, you set yourself
01:29:08
up to do exactly what this book says, to
01:29:11
follow all of the rules, right? To
01:29:12
remove the pollutants of your heart, to
01:29:15
follow the the the standards, right? And
01:29:17
all these things. And like, and then
01:29:20
it's just not fun. It's just not
01:29:24
good because you end up
01:29:28
hating yourself. You end up feeling
01:29:30
shame and guilt for anytime you get it
01:29:32
wrong. You feel uh you feel disconnected
01:29:37
from your body, right? Because you've
01:29:38
been taught to not listen to your body.
01:29:41
This book is brutal. I have to say this
01:29:43
book has been brutal to read and to
01:29:46
relive and to think through some of
01:29:47
these things. And I'm so happy that I'm
01:29:50
a healthier person, but I know that I'm
01:29:51
not a perfectly healthy person. But I
01:29:53
look at this and I read this and I just
01:29:54
I'm like blown away that so many parents
01:29:59
just willingly handed this over to their
01:30:01
child and said here and those kids read
01:30:04
this book and they implemented these
01:30:05
things and these parents walked away,
01:30:09
you know, wiping their hands of having
01:30:10
to have the sex talk of having to have
01:30:12
any conversations about relationships
01:30:14
with their kids and thinking I did the
01:30:16
right thing. When in reality you set
01:30:19
your kids up to fail. You set your kids
01:30:21
up to be ashamed of themselves, to be
01:30:23
ashamed of their bodies, to not know
01:30:26
what actual healthy relationships look
01:30:28
like. And so
01:30:31
it's it's just brutal. Like it's it's it
01:30:34
just is. And the fact that it's still
01:30:36
even happening to this day, I know this
01:30:38
book doesn't isn't in current uh print,
01:30:41
but like these teachings are things that
01:30:44
continually play out in the home school
01:30:47
world, in the Christian world. like we
01:30:49
are seeing them with young people today
01:30:53
and we need to push back. We need to we
01:30:55
need to help change the trajectory of
01:30:59
what that is. So that's what I'm going
01:31:00
to say on this section of the book. I I
01:31:03
hope you stuck with me. I know it was
01:31:06
long. I know I went all over the place
01:31:09
with this one, but we're almost there.
01:31:10
We got one more section left to go. The
01:31:12
next part of this book, I think, is the
01:31:15
marriage section. It's called Now What?
01:31:17
and it's going to talk on
01:31:20
those final steps, right? Knowing that
01:31:22
it's time, you're ready to get married.
01:31:24
And so, yeah, I hope this this series I
01:31:28
don't know, it's some it's my opinions.
01:31:30
It's some dude on the internet's
01:31:31
opinions on this book uh with having my
01:31:34
own life experience now and exiting
01:31:36
purity culture and exiting religion. And
01:31:39
so, I don't know. I hope it was helpful.
01:31:41
Uh, if you've got questions, if you got
01:31:43
comments, if you got concerns, if you
01:31:45
got push back on any of this stuff, you
01:31:47
can comment it down below or shoot me an
01:31:49
email. [email protected].
01:31:51
Shoot me a DM. Exhub on Tik Tok,
01:31:55
Instagram. Threads now has a DM feature.
01:31:58
So, those are the places I'm most active
01:32:01
uh for this. But yeah, all that's going
01:32:02
to be linked down in the show notes as
01:32:04
well. The stuff that is in this book,
01:32:07
the brainwashing that took place,
01:32:10
it doesn't just go away overnight, okay?
01:32:12
It takes years and years and years of
01:32:14
working really hard to get rid of it. I
01:32:16
hope we can change that in the future. I
01:32:18
hope we can open up the conversation
01:32:20
around these topics around dating to be
01:32:23
more inclusive and less rule follow,
01:32:29
you know, less of like this is the
01:32:31
perfect way to do it and more of we're
01:32:33
humans. we're going to mess up, right?
01:32:35
We're going to do things wrong. We're
01:32:37
going to get hurt along the way. We're
01:32:38
going to hurt people along the way. It's
01:32:40
what we do with all of that. Um, and how
01:32:42
we move forward from that that defines
01:32:44
who we are as people. So, with that, I'm
01:32:46
going to let you go. I hope you enjoyed.
01:32:48
Like, subscribe, do all the internet
01:32:50
things you know how to do. Uh, and I'll
01:32:52
see you next time. All right. Peace.
01:33:01
[Music]
01:33:07
[Music]
