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I just got out of a bad relationship and am afraid to date again due to the fact that I’m not a virgin anymore. I’m afraid that the next guy I meet won’t forgive me for my past mistakes.
Philippians 3:12-16
Paul reflecting on his life’s purpose even as a sinner:“Not that I have already obtained this or am already perfect, but I press on to make it my own, because Christ Jesus has made me his own. Brothers, I do not consider that I have made it my own. But one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus. Let those of us who are mature think this way, and if in anything you think otherwise, God will reveal that also to you. Only let us hold true to what we have attained.”
Some people won’t forgive. And that is their issue – NOT yours. You don’t want to be in a relationship with someone who lacks the grace and forgiveness we are shown by Jesus Christ.
That said, it is understandable that it might be hard for some guys when they first find out. He may show understandable grief, but you must be able to differentiate grief from lack of forgiveness.
What I hope you can remember, is that as Christians, we are only responsible for our own actions. You can’t control how your next boyfriend will respond, but what you can control is dealing with the choices you have made in the past and the effect they have on you. While past choices grieve you and the Lord, the Lord also says he can make you clean, new and use sin for good if you have genuinely sought His forgiveness and believe the Lord has a better way to live.
I pray you can trust that God’s design for us sexually is a way of freedom and protection. Hopefully you will be able to fully live in that grace and have a healthy understanding of God’s view of the sexuality that He created.
God sees sex as good. That is why he is so specific in how we treat the act of sex and our sexuality.
As I said, if you believe this and have asked the Lord to forgive you and change you, you are redeemed. A Christian man who understands this will be able to discern the new you from the old you. In that moment, you will see the face of Christ. I am confident in that.
Do not live in fear.
This doesn’t mean that a man who accepts your past will necessarily want to marry you, but my advice would be to flee from a man who holds your past over you or says lies about who you are that Jesus would never say.
Often times a man who cannot accept a truly transformed woman is a man who has his own skeletons in the closet.
From my heart,
Joy
p.s. On the flip side: If you are someone dealing with the grief of someone’s sexual past, here is a good article: CLICK HERE
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Love and Respect (Now) is a division of Love and Respect. Please be considerate.
Joy–the link at the bottom of this article is broken. Any ideas where it was supposed to go?
I’m in a serious, two-year (soon to be engaged) relationship with a wonderful man who loves the Lord and, when we began dating, had to confide something I really didn’t want to hear: Although I’m his first girlfriend, he had a sexual history. I was absolutely shocked, then enraged… then desperately sad. For some time. It wasn’t something I was able to come to terms with overnight. I chose to move forward with the relationship, while battling this and dealing with my own grief in prayer. The beauty of it is that he’s a man who deeply knows the power of the Gospel to forgive and redeem us… and God showed me (because looking back, I felt pretty self-righteous about my “purity”) that we both stand on the same footing before him as sinners without Christ’s righteousness. And my man? He’s a new creation. The old has passed away, and behold! The new has come. If I’d chosen not to be with him because of his past, I would have passed up a great love with an incredible, strong, tender, God-fearing man.
RK thinks...
Very wise advice Joy- I have a very “colorful past” for lack of a public listing in such a public forum… my awesome mentors have brought me to the same ending advice here. Nice job. Keep up the prayer for wisdom, God is using you.
=)
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