Sheila Wray Gregoire's Blog, page 36
March 19, 2021
How Has Evangelical Teaching about Sex Contributed to Horrific News Stories?
First, before I delve into this too much, these shootings were racially motivated. He killed mostly Asian women; he went to places Asian women worked at; he was reported to have been heard saying he was trying to kill Asians.
As I read the news unfold, I thought to myself, “I know what kind of porn he watches.”
To paraphrase Michael John Cusick in his excellent book Surfing for God (about defeating pornography addictions), he said that part of the allure of porn is that it makes you feel strong without actually having to be strong. You can “use” other people, and then when you’re feeling insecure, rejected, lonely–really anything negative–you can turn to porn to make you feel strong and like a real man again. And we can’t get away from the fact that many men feel strong by degrading others (which is what porn does). And it often degrades those who are seen as “less than”. That’s why fetishization of the very young or of certain racial groups is such a big deal in pornography. You really can’t separate the hatred of women from the hatred of certain races. Pornography takes all of our horrible prejudices and makes them worse, because it’s our prejudices that make us feel “better than”, or strong.
But what I want to look at today is how the excuses that he gave for what he did actually are the logical extension of much of our teaching around porn and temptation.
Here’s what the shooter said:
After his arrest, Long indicated to investigators he believed he had a sex addiction and “an issue with porn,” and claimed to see the spas as “a temptation … that he wanted to eliminate,”
So he saw these women as temptations to eliminate.Well, that’s pretty much how Steve Arterburn, author of Every Man’s Battle, talks about lust. Let’s break this down:
1. Women are the enemy.On this New Life website, he has an article on how to perfect the “bouncing your eyes” technique:
First Step: Make a List of Your Enemies!The first way to start, Fred tells us, is by making a list of your “greatest enemies”. These could be lingerie ads, either in a seemingly harmless department store catalog, or that Victoria’s Secret magazine that your wife left laying around. It could include billboards, it could be TV shows or ads, it may be female joggers, or maybe it’s that female co-worker who tends to dress a little suggestively. And then there’s always the beach.
Steve ArterburnHe literally puts women in the category of “enemy” and says you should make a list of them–a list that includes joggers and co-workers, or any woman at the beach.
The victim of lust is portrayed as the man’s purity not the woman he is objectiyingEvery Man’s Battle portrays lots of rather disgusting anecdotes of how men get into trouble with lust, but the women that they are objectifying are not described as the victims here–instead, the man’s purity is described as what is being lost. When Alex masturbates to his sleeping sister-in-law, it’s not discussed how this objectifies her in his mind and how this is a sin against her. When a youth volunteer rapes a 15-year-old, the problem is that now he may get in trouble because her parents may report him–not one single word is spent describing the trauma he has just inflicted on this girl.
The cure for lust is in women’s handsAnd how do men get over lust? It’s a two-fold process. First, they “bounce their eyes” away from women, and then they transfer all their sexual energy onto their wives. As Keith and I already talked about in different posts, “bouncing your eyes” only solidifies lust’s definition of women as dangerous, and never chooses to respect women and see them as human beings.
You may also enjoy:Why “bouncing your eyes” doesn’t workThe Lust is Not Every Man’s Battle PodcastCan We Respect Women, Please? A New Look at LustAfter you bounce your eyes, though, you have to direct all your sexual energy to your wife, which will cause your desire for her to go up. And then she will become your “methadone”:
“Your wife can be a methadone-like fix when your temperature is rising.” p. 118
“This newfound hunger will shock her. She has been accustomed to providing you five bowls a week, primarily through physical foreplay and sexual intercourse. Things were at equilibrium. Suddenly you need an extra five bowls from her. For no apparent reason, you come calling for intercourse twice as often. ” p. 134
Steve ArterburnEvery Man's Battle
In Every Man’s Battle, women are only ever talked about in terms of their body parts or their looks–or their relationship to menWomen are either dangers or rescuers; they are never just people. Every Man’s Battle never talks about actually respecting women–only avoiding women or else using your wife. They equate male sexuality with objectifying women, and the goal seems to be to objectify one woman for the rest of your life. Sex isn’t talked about as intimacy, but only in terms of sexual release. To wives, they say:
“When men aren’t getting regular sexual release, their eyes are more difficult to control. Help him out in this battle. Give him release.” p. 148
Steve ArterburnEvery Man's Battle
And in the entire book there is no mention of women’s pleasure or experience at all. Women are only ever talked about in terms of what they can do for men. Even that horrible anecdote about the youth volunteer raping the 15-year-old is under the heading “lurking at your neighbor’s door”, as if the sin is really against the father.
When women are seen as the enemy; where men’s purity is the thing that is at danger, not women; when women are dehumanized; should we be surprised when this happens?What would happen instead if, in church, we were taught that women were to be respected, and that respect didn’t look like avoiding women and trying not to look at them, but instead choosing to truly see them? What would happen if we talked about how women were more than their body parts? What would happen if, when talking about lust, we framed it as men being dangerous to women, rather than women being dangerous to men?
What would happen if we simply treated women as if they were real people?
I am so sorry for the grieving families in Atlanta today. But I believe that these messages about lust and women contributed to this killing, at least in part. And I believe these messages hurt so many others, even if no killing actually takes place. When women are dehumanized and men are told they have no self-control, and so need women to step in for them–how can anything but disaster ensue?
And what about that Missouri pastor being put on leave for saying that women need to stay attractive to their husbands?I wasn’t going to talk about this because I felt his sermon was just so gross, but I think it fits in today’s broader theme. So let’s take a look for a moment.
Stewart-Allen Clark, of First General Baptist Church, in a sermon sometime in February, said:
“I really don’t believe women understand how visual men are…I don’t think women understand how important it is for a man to have a beautiful woman on his arm.”
“You can call it juvenile, immature, sexist…God made men to be drawn to beautiful women. We are made this way, we can’t help ourselves.”
Stewart-Allen ClarkHe also said:
“I want you to know a need that your man has that he won’t ever tell you about, but since I’m the preacher man, I’ll say it: Your man needs an attractive wife.”
Stewart-Allen ClarkAnd finally, about the “do not deprive” verses, he said:
“The wife does not have authority over her own body but yields it to her husband…After you get married, men, put this on your headboard in the house…Whenever she’s not in the mood, take out your Bible.”
Stewart-Allen ClarkOver and over again in the sermon, he said “that’s just the way men are made”, but he didn’t reference hardly any Scripture for that. Instead, he read from one of the very books we used in The Great Sex Rescue to show how problematic the teaching is–His Needs, Her Needs.
Now, the problem with his sermon was that he said all of this over and over and over again, and when you listen you just get disgusted. But here’s the issue I’m having:
Everything he said is ALSO said in our evangelical bestsellers.Just a few examples:
His Needs Her Needs says “An Attractive Spouse” is one of men’s five big emotional needs in marriage–whereas it doesn’t register for women in the same way. “She should try to look the way her husband likes her to look. She should resemble the woman he married. Does that mean a woman mus stay eternally young? Of course not, but getting old is not an excuse for gaining weight and dressing like a bag lady.”
He also says that being married to a wife who had gained 100 pounds is “like a prison sentence.”
For Women Only says that men need you to try to be attractive, too. “As we struggle with [the] hard truth [that when you take care of yourself, your expectation that ‘I only have eyes for you’ feels fairer and easier to accomplish], it might be helpful to remember that we’re not alone: We’re also asking our man to do something that is hard and goes against his natural instinct [not look at other women] The man who originally opened my eyes to this issue explained it this way: “We need to see that you care about keeping our attention on you–and off of other women. Sometimes it is so hard for us to look away. It takes a lot of work and a lot of effort. But it helps me so much if I see that my wife is willing to do her part and purposefully work toward staying in shape and looking good.” p. 168.
“A man can’t not want to look.” p. 112
Through a Man’s Eyes (also by Shaunti Feldhahn) says: “because men and women are wired so differently, women often don’t realize how the opposite sex sees the world. Most women simply aren’t aware of what men’s visual nature means, or how much it impacts literally every area of most men’s lives and relationships.” p. 8. It describes Jack’s typical day at work, where most of his mental energy goes into trying not to look at co-workers, get distracted by billboards, or stare at the teenagers in bikinis in the hotel pool. It says things about his day like, “the next few hours are tough” because a female co-worker is in sight, or “Jack breathes a sigh of relief” because a skirt doesn’t ride up.
Every Man’s Battle has a chapter on lust simply called “Just by being male.” It’s how God made them, you see!
Act of Marriage says: “Women must cultivate the problem of visual lust, whereas men almost universally must cope with the problem just because they are men.” p. 298
Love & Respect says, “His sexuality is different from yours, because he is visually stimulated. He needs sexual release just as you need emotional release.” p. 251
Every Heart Restored says, “because of male hardwiring, men don’t naturally have that Christian view of sex.” p. 87
And that interpretation of 1 Corinthians 7, where men can just use it as a weapon every time she doesn’t want sex? It’s all over our evangelical bestsellers, everywhere.
You know what’s missing? Any discussion of consent.One of the big findings of our survey was the believing that a wife is obligated to have sex when her husband wants it wrecks sex for women and causes sexual pain to skyrocket. It’s one of the big reasons that evangelical women suffer from twice the rate of sexual pain as the general population. You can listen to a longer discussion of it in our podcast on obligation sex, or, of course, check out The Great Sex Rescue!
The Great Sex RescueNow Available!
What if you're NOT the problem with your sex life?What if the things that you've been taught have messed things up--and what if there's a way to escape these messages?
Welcome to the Great Sex Rescue. Order Now!I just have one simple question after laying this all out:
Why is it that when people say EXACTLY THE SAME THING that is in our bestsellers and it hits the news, Christians are horrified–and yet we keep buying these bestsellers?The Atlanta shooter conveyed the exact same message as Every Man’s Battle, and shows the logical conclusion of that argument, and yet no one batted an eye when that series sold four million copies.
The Missouri pastor’s sermon is basically just a whole bunch of lines from all of our bestsellers strung together, and yet when we see it that way, we’re upset. But we still bought all of these bestsellers that say the same thing!
This stuff comes from a common place. Our evangelical culture treats women, lust, and porn in terrible, terrible ways. We don’t talk about respect and dignity. We don’t talk about freedom in Christ. We talk about dangers and neutralizing threats and men being lust monsters (which they’re not, and which contributes to men feeling shame from normal sexual attraction, which they shouldn’t).
We cover all of this at length in The Great Sex Rescue, and I truly believe it’s a freeing message.
I’ve spent all week recording the audio version at a studio near here, and so I’ve just read it all out loud over the last few days. It is honestly a very good book that gets to the heart of what is wrong with the way we talk about sex.
But when I see these news stories, I just get so saddened and horrified and frustrated all at the same time, because it’s just all so predictable and so unnecessary.
Church, this has nothing to do with Christ. And we can do better.Can’t we? Please. I need to believe that we can change the conversation about sex. Can you believe with me?
And, again, I know that many people struggle with lust, and I’m not trying to shame them. I just think the way we talks about this makes it worse. Many men have said they found our lust podcast freeing, and I hope you do, too!
What do you think? Why can people say this terrible stuff in books but then people not make the leap to how dangerous it is? How can we stop it? Let’s talk in the comments!
Sheila Wray Gregoire Founder of To Love, Honor and Vacuum
Sheila has been married to Keith for 28 years, and happily married for 25! (It took a while to adjust). She’s also an award-winning author of 8 books, including The Good Girl’s Guide to Great Sex, and a sought-after speaker. With her humorous, no-nonsense approach, Sheila is passionate about changing the evangelical conversation about sex and marriage to line up with kingdom principles. ENTJ, straight 8 FacebookTwitter Related Posts Our FREE Video Book Study for The Great Sex Rescue is HERE!Mar 15, 2021 | 5 Comments
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March 18, 2021
The All About Orgasms Podcast!
We’ve got a quick podcast for you today that’s all about orgasms!
Browse all the Different Podcasts
See the Last “Start Your Engines” (Men’s) Podcast
Or, as always, you can watch on YouTube:
Timeline of the Podcast
0:35 Joanna and Sheila discuss what makes orgasms MORE or LESS likely
9:00 We have a new patreon to help fund our research!
13:15 What happens when books DON’T say sex is for women too?
16:20 Women need to be TOLD their orgasm matters!
20:00 What if sometimes it’s about what ISN’T said?
25:42 RQ: Help, I’m experiencing painful sex after getting married!
31:20 Rebecca’s theory on why women are more horny BEFORE the wedding
36:55 Closing with a new positive review
Joanna breaks down four big stats from our survey–and there were SO SO many.
We talked about how marital satisfaction is related to sexual satisfaction–the better your marriage, the more likely she is to orgasm. We looked at what beliefs she has that can impact her orgasm rates–and cause them to plummet. And a few more other nuggets to help you see what contributes to women’s sexual satisfaction. If you want to see the rest of the data on what goes into orgasms, check out The Great Sex Rescue!
Can you help us get our message–and our research–out there?To be frank, we need funding to pay Joanna and Rebecca so that they can work on submitting our research to peer-reviewed academic journals (you don’t get paid for that!), and to start other social media channels that we can’t monetize yet to reach a different audience.
This blog is completely self-sustaining, and I don’t need any money for it. But we’re all passionate about getting our research into more hands, and helping people in the evangelical world see what healthy sexuality should look like, and helping the academic world understand what is happening with sexuality and with sexual pain in the evangelical world so that we can do it better. For that we will need some funding.
None of it will go to me.
But we’ve got some fun perks planned for people who want to support us, even with a few dollars a month, including a private Facebook group, some unfiltered podcasts, Q&A meetups, and more!
Support us on Patreon! On Orgasms: Maybe it’s what’s NOT saidRebecca then joined me on the podcast as we looked at what is often missing in many evangelical marriage books–mainly any mention of women feel pleasure from sex, too. Perhaps it’s what’s NOT said that hurts women’s orgasm rates as much as what IS said?
Reader Question: Why does sex hurt so much?Another big part of sexual outcomes for women, other than just orgasms, is sexual pain. No one should have to feel pain during sex–but so many women do (and conservative religious women far more than the general population). So we tackled this question:
I got married a few months ago and, while everything else about our marriage has been wonderful so far, sex has been a real challenge. Sex is often painful for me and I find it hard to want it. I often feel like I’m disappointing my husband (who is AMAZING), even though he would never say that. I just started your Boost Your Libido course, so I’m hoping that helps with the psychological aspect at least. I’ve also read the Good Girl’s Guide to Great Sex. I can’t tell you how comforting and reassuring it is to read that other women have similar experiences to me. My unexpected lack of interest in sex has been a discouraging kick in the stomach (I was horny AF before we got married), but reading your books and blog gives me hope.
I know you’ve already written a bit on this, but I really appreciate resources for what to do when sex hurts. Nobody talks about it, so I wasn’t prepared for it. It’s been a lonely journey so far, trying to figure out where to go from here.
We want to start by saying that it’s perfectly normal to not want sex if it’s causing you pain.
This is what we see so often in women who have pain (and this is what I experienced, too): we internalize guilt about not wanting sex, and we make the issue that we have no libido, when really the issue is simply that we’re experiencing pain, and that’s the first thing we need to take care of! So the issue is not that she doesn’t want sex; the issue is that she’s in pain! And pelvic floor physiotherapy plus reading The Great Sex Rescue to understand what contributes to pain can both really help.
Things Mentioned in This Podcast:Our Patreon!The Great Sex Rescue–our new book looking at orgasm rates, sexual pain, and more!The Orgasm CourseThe Honeymoon CourseThe Orgasm Series
Any advice for this reader with pain? Any thoughts on what evangelical books DON’T say? Let’s talk in the comments!
The Orgasm Series:You Are Not Broken if Orgasm is ElusiveThe Orgasm Podcast 5 Things that Make it More Likely that She Will Reach OrgasmWhat Sex is Like for Women Who Don't OrgasmHow Do I Not Feel Self-Conscious about what it Takes to Reach Orgasm?10 Things Husbands Who Are Great Lovers DoFiguring out What's Holding You Back from OrgasmWhat to Say to Your Husband if He's a Selfish LoverThe Orgasm Course LaunchStart Your Engines Podcast: When your wife has difficulty with orgasm5 Ways Husbands Can Bridge the Orgasm GapWhy Don't My Orgasms Feel That Great?All About Orgasms PodcastAnd don't forget to check out:The Orgasm Course31 Days to Great SexThe Good Girl's Guide to Great Sex Sheila Wray Gregoire Founder of To Love, Honor and Vacuum
Sheila has been married to Keith for 28 years, and happily married for 25! (It took a while to adjust). She’s also an award-winning author of 8 books, including The Good Girl’s Guide to Great Sex, and a sought-after speaker. With her humorous, no-nonsense approach, Sheila is passionate about changing the evangelical conversation about sex and marriage to line up with kingdom principles. ENTJ, straight 8 FacebookTwitter Related Posts We’re in The New York Times Book Review! Plus lots more to listen to!Mar 12, 2021 | 5 Comments
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March 17, 2021
25 Quick Ways to Show Your Husband Love–or Your Wife Love!
This post may contain links to amazon products. After you navigate to Amazon using one of my links, any products you purchase during that visit earn me a commission at no additional cost to you.
Wondering how to show love to your husband? Try showing him love in actions, not just in words or feelings!I’ve been trying to write about how to bring the tension level down in marriage and have more fun–instead of feeling as if marriage has to be a hard slog. Earlier this month we looked at 79 hobbies to do as a couple.
I’m spending this week recording the audio version of The Great Sex Rescue in a recording studio, so I thought today I’d rerun another important post that can help make marriage more fun and help you feel closer–even when life is tough.
When our son was terminally ill, a counselor we were seeing suggested that we each make a list of 20 things that the other person could do for us that would make us feel loved and special, just to keep our marriage close during a really difficult time.
In every good marriage you need to find non-sexual ways of showing your spouse love–that you’re thinking about them and you care about them.
Show Your Spouse Love–The Rules
I wanted to show my husband Keith that I loved him, but it was hard when we were going through such a difficult time. How do you get yourself out of your head enough to think about someone else when you’re hurting so much? But doing this exercise really helped us. It took the guesswork out of wondering how your husband felt loved (and he didn’t have to worry about how to make me feel loved!)
We simply wrote up the lists together, exchanged them, and then committed to doing roughly two things on that list each day.
I can’t tell you what a difference it made in our marriage! If your husband’s willing to do this, I recommend it wholeheartedly.
But if he’s not, you can still make your own list of ways to show your husband love. And while saying “I love you” is nice, learning how to love your husband in actions is usually more important. When we act love, we feel love. And when we act love, he will feel loved, too! Actions often speak louder than words. So here are some ideas to get you started:
Show Your Husband Love–The Ideas25 Quick Ways to Show Your Husband LovePraise him in front of the kids.Greet him at the door when he gets home–drop whatever you’re doing and go kiss him!Make him a coffee to take with him in the morning.Give him a backrub.Brag about him to your friends when he can hear.Tell him one thing you admire about him in relation to his work–and try to make it a different thing every time you say it!Rub your fingers through his hair as you’re watching a movie.Lay out his clothes for him the night before.Make an appointment to get an oil change for the car.Sort the mail so he doesn’t have to.Put on lipstick and fix your hair 15 minutes before he’s expected home from work (or right before you arrive home from work!).Text him and tell him specifically what you love doing with him.Bring him a glass of water if he’s working out in the heat.Bring him a drink when he’s working at his desk.Ask him what he’d like for dinner–let him choose the menu at least once a week.Wear something you know he loves.Going out to pick up an ice cream/treat with the kids? Bring him one, too–even if you went out during the day when he was at work. Save it for him, with a note, “We were thinking of you!”Rub him dry when he gets out of the shower–and put some “manly” moisturizer cream on him, or some talcum powder. Towel dry hair for him, and tell him you just love how he smells. Granted, this one may be a little sexual.
Read a bit of a book/funny story/newspaper to him while he takes a bath.Pray for him while you’re lying in bed–out loud. Reach out, put your arm on his, and say a sentence-or-two prayer.Walking by him? Reach out and touch him for a second!Rub his feet while you’re watching TV. (You can even get a cloth and wash his feet and put some cream on them, too).Ask him his advice on something–and then follow it (without challenging him!)Ask him to explain something about a hobby to you.Don’t just tell him you love him–tell him WHY you love him. Or here are some ideas for how to show your wife love:(And, yes, a lot of them are the same!)
25 Quick Ways to Show Your Wife LovePraise her in front of the kids.Greet her at the door when she gets home–drop whatever you’re doing and go kiss her!Make her a coffee to take with her in the morning.Give her a backrub.Brag about her to your friends or your family when she can hear.Tell her one thing you admire about her in relation to her work or her giftings–and try to make it a different thing every time you say it!Rub your fingers through her hair as you’re watching a movie.Gather all her devices at night and plug them in so that they’re charged for her in the morning.Make an appointment to get an oil change for her car.Sort the mail so she doesn’t have to.Put on her favorite cologne right before dinner, or before you watch a movie together. Or shave right before you go out to dinner!Text her and tell her specifically what you love doing with her.Bring her a glass of water if she’s working outside in the garden or watching the kids outside.Bring her a drink when she’s working at her computer.Share your “high” and “low” with her everyday–the time you were the most “in the groove” and the time you felt the most defeated today. Let her into your heart. Wear nice pajamas that don’t have holes in them that you know she loves.Going out to pick up an ice cream/treat with the kids? Bring her one, too–even if you went out during the day when she was at work. Save it for her, with a note, “We were thinking of you!”Rub moisturizer all over her back and her legs when she gets out of the shower. Read a bit of a book/funny story/newspaper to her while she takes a bath.Pray for her while you’re lying in bed–out loud. Reach out, put your arm on hers, and say a sentence-or-two prayer.Walking by her? Reach out and touch her for a second! (But don’t grab a boob! Brush her shoulder, her waist, her back, her hand). Rub her feet while you’re watching TV. (You can even get a cloth and wash her feet and put some cream on them, too).Ask her his advice on something–and then follow it (without challenging her!)Ask her to explain something about a hobby to you.Don’t just tell her you love him–tell him WHY you love her.
Start doing two or three of these things everyday, and you’ll be changing the dynamic in your marriage. You’ll be showering him (or her) with random acts of kindness, and that makes a difference. It says “I’m thinking about you.” It tells your spouse “I love you”, even if times are tough.
But one big caveat: we tend to experience love differently.We tend to want to express love in the same way that we experience it, but sometimes this can backfire.
I love backrubs. I really do. There’s nothing you can do to make me swoon more than rubbing my back, mostly because I have such horrendous posture. But my husband, when he’s thinking, likes to be left alone. So if I go over and rub his back, I’m annoying him. He loves it when he’s just relaxing; he doesn’t like it when he’s thinking. It’s just a little thing, but we can think we’re showing someone love when really we’re not. So we have to figure out how our spouse interprets kindness.
We tend to experience love differently. So we have to figure out how our spouse interprets kindness.
(Click here to tweet this quote)
That’s why this exercise works best if you EACH make up your own list, and then exchange lists.Use my list of 25 things as a starting point, but remember: he may not feel loved from all of these, and she may not like some of the things on her list, either! Maybe he’d rather choose his own clothes. Maybe he’d rather that you left him alone while he’s showering. Maybe he doesn’t even like you with lipstick! And maybe she doesn’t like cologne. Maybe she WANTS you to grab a boob!
So don’t try these things and then get upset if your spouse doesn’t react well. The point of the exercise isn’t to do as many things as possible for your husband (or your wife); it’s to do the things that actually show your husband love, or actually show your wife love. So ask your spouse to sit down and write lists with you. Then exchange lists, and you’ll be amazed at what happens in your marriage!
And again–this really works best if you’re both doing it. When one person makes all the effort in the marriage, it can create a very unhealthy dynamic. If your marriage is in a rough spot, being the one to take the first step and do kind things anyway can often be the thing that gets you out of that rut. But that shouldn’t be a long-term thing.
But What about Flirting? Sign up for my newsletter and I’ll send you “25 Ways to Flirt With Your Husband” straight to your inbox!Now, what advice do you have for us today? Tell me in the comments other ways that perhaps I’ve forgotten of quick things to do to show your husband love!
Like this post so far? You should also check out:
One Thing Most Couples Get Wrong about Date Night
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Sheila Wray Gregoire Founder of To Love, Honor and Vacuum
Sheila has been married to Keith for 28 years, and happily married for 25! (It took a while to adjust). She’s also an award-winning author of 8 books, including The Good Girl’s Guide to Great Sex, and a sought-after speaker. With her humorous, no-nonsense approach, Sheila is passionate about changing the evangelical conversation about sex and marriage to line up with kingdom principles. ENTJ, straight 8 FacebookTwitter Related Posts The Thalidomide Test Podcast: What Makes a Marriage Book GoodMar 11, 2021 | 37 Comments
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March 16, 2021
The FUN Marriage Series: Do We Take Marriage too Seriously?
I hope you would all say a resounding, “no!”
We know that God thinks of marriage for our benefit–our emotional benefit, not just our character-transforming benefit. He said that it wasn’t good for Adam to be alone. He said it was very good once we were together. God created woman as a “helper”–which doesn’t mean subordinate it all, but rather a connotation of strength that was perfectly suitable for him.
Marriage is about not being alone, about having someone that you are suited for to walk through life with, to support you and be your shield (the word “helper” had a military meaning, as well, where God was often called our help and shield).
Marriage is something good!
Yes, God desires us to be transformed into His likeness, which involves growing our character.But this month we’re looking at how sometimes the emphasis is misplaced. It isn’t that God deliberately wants us to suffer in order to grow–as if all God cares about is whether we are holy.
It is that God wants wholeness for us–He wants all of Jesus for us. And Jesus is not only about holiness. He is also about emotional and spiritual and relational health. He is about growing into all fullness and wholeness. And that means that we should not elevate suffering above everything else.
God uses suffering to draw us to Him, yes. But God also uses everything else, too. We are not holier if we suffer, and God does not want us to have terrible marriages in order to give us opportunities to be more and more selfless.
And yet that is often how marriage advice sounds.
I wrote about this last week briefly on the blog, and then on Facebook, and we had huge engagement on Facebook about this. So many people said some actually quite brilliant things, and I’d like to leave some of those comments here because you said it better than I could have myself:
Suffering actually is much harder on me spirituallyMany women wrote that they think they were learning the wrong lessons from suffering, and that suffering does not automatically make you closer to God. One woman wrote:
The difficulties in my marriage have not been a source of growing closer to Christ or the will of God. They have been the greatest challenges to my spirit. It pains me to wonder if God’s intended plan for me was to learn to set boundaries that would have ultimately led to not getting married to someone with that kind of temper, and if I would have developed as a better Christian had a taken a braver route back when I was young and idealistic.Now I wonder constantly what is the best way forward.
Perhaps it is in overcoming such challenges the growth comes, but I no longer have faith that I can just keep throwing positivity and support at my partner to encourage him to be the person he’s capable of, or that we just need to keep trying to understand each other. It’s been 17 years and I’m tired. I’m anxious, increasingly cynical, defensive, and most horrifying of all, bitter. I still don’t understand the choices I made to accept relentless bullying, and that terrifies me in a way I can only imagine self-harmers feel when they look at their past destructive behavior and can’t explain it. But I don’t feel secure enough in my current situation to forgive myself or my husband for the past, because I’m terrified that will lead to an erosion of my long, staggering climb out of outright abuse as I loosen my grip on the negative but useful emotions that help me hold on to my sense of self and knowledge of what a relationship should be— or a least, the bare minimum of how people should treat each other.
God helped us every step of the way, I have no doubt. There was nothing inevitable about turning things around from the point we reached, let alone all the progress we’ve made. And he continues to steer me tenderly between the cliffs of Numbness and Hysteria day by day. Yet, I feel so lost and directionless, because I don’t even see a path forward to a level where we can thrive. His mental health has improved, but plateaued, and mine has slowly deteriorated, and I’m always left guessing what eggshells each new day will bring.
A How can we be refined if we’re constantly being put down? A marriage should refine you, yes, but trials have ending dates. Being miserable for the entirety of your adult life ≠ sanctification. It wears you down so that you can’t function, which then leads to you just can’t serve. Shannon Why the focus on suffering in the first place? How do we keep it in perspective?What if by simply enduring suffering we’re not learning the right lessons, because what God wants from our suffering is to learn problem-solving! He wants us to do something about what is wrong! Some people had some interesting thoughts!
To some extent, I feel like it is spiritual bypassing. Sometimes it feels easier to just “submit to suffering” instead of **doing the work** to make things better. I guess I just wish Christians were FAR more active in alleviating suffering, especially when it comes to systemic oppression of women and minorities. Not to get too heavy here, but I guess I see a lot of misogyny here when it comes to applying all of this to marriage and other hierarchies. You have to teach people with less power to accept their suffering without a fight in order to maintain power. What would the church look like if we rose up and said NO MORE to these kinds of unnecessary suffering? Karen I have felt so frustrated with this false dichotomy. Holiness and happiness are not mutually exclusive. Not to mention, everything in life is for sanctification – but we don’t talk about ANY other area of life like this. When you’re frustrated with your job, nobody says “Well, work is primarily for your sanctification. It’s to make you holy, not happy.” No, they brainstorm with you about what needs to CHANGE. This teaching prevents problem solving, normalizes unhealthy marriages, and is one of the reasons I was scared to get married. It turns out being married is the happiest thing that ever happened to me. But that is NOT what I was expecting going in. It’s sad to me that the church isn’t providing a more compelling view of marriage than “suffering in marriage will make you a better person.” Charissa There are always ways to humble yourself and serve your spouse. To be less selfish. To take everything to the Lord first. But you don’t have to have an unloving, uncaring spouse to do those things. You could have a spouse who is humbling himself and serving you right back. You could be serving others together. Giving of yourselves together. Suffering through a marriage isn’t a sign of sainthood it’s a sign you need help. Kasey I don’t think suffering makes some people “holier” than others. Some of my good friends have been through some very tough situations, but I don’t think that makes me less holy than them somehow. To imply that I’m “less holy” or “not as close to God” because I haven’t suffered as much is discouraging. And that’s not even touching on how that view impacts women in abusive marriages! Hannah What happens when we see suffering as good, as the aim?To me, the big problem comes down to expectations, as Shari sums up perfectly:
Something I heard repeated for over a decade: since James said that we are to count it all joy when we face diverse trials, a wife should actually rejoice that her husband is misusing/abusing/causing her to suffer, because he is being used by God to make her more Christ-like (Christ likeness being defined as “emptying himself, becoming nothing”). Do you need to read that again? Wives have been told to rejoice that the man who is supposed to love, cherish, honor, and protect them is doing the OPPOSITE. HOW does that speak to the value of a woman? That betrayed wife needs to hear, “he has broken his marriage covenant with you, and that is not a reason to rejoice”! Melissa I think this narrative that marriage is supposed to be hard because it sanctifies us is *really* toxic and dangerous.How many people stay in abusive marriages because they have been taught that marriage is supposed to be hard? If you go in with the expectation of having to experience hardship, how are you supposed to know what isn’t okay?
Shari Maybe it would be helpful if the people who say “marriage is hard”, could define what they mean by hard. People in destructive marriages live hard, and just think they have to live with it because everyone says marriage is hard! But defining terms would enable them to recognize that their hard is not healthy hard.For example, I believe healthy hard would be both partners laying aside their preferences in order to pursue and love the other person. Unhealthy hard would be one spouse becoming nothing in the relationship so that her husband can suck all the joy out of her. Both are hard, and the one living the unhealthy version will often just continue in it because she doesn’t realize that there are two kinds.
Melissa A soldier is arrested and becomes a POW in a terrible military prison of the enemy. He goes through abuses of every nature, misses his family and friends, and it is his faith that sees him through. Through his suffering he draws closer to Jesus.Then, his allies find and capture the prison and discover him in his cell. They open the door and welcome him to freedom, but he insists on staying because he’s a more sanctified Christian as a tortured POW than as a free man.
It sounds absurd because it is. So, why do Christians think abused women have to stay in abusive marriages? They are no longer in “The Lord’s Army” when with an abusive man. Instead, they are prisoners of the enemy. It isn’t a marriage, anymore, when one spouse abuses the other.
Kateri You don’t have to be miserable to have marriage grow you.You can learn to be selfless on a day to day basis. You can choose to think of your spouse first. You can train yourself to be loving. You can immerse yourself in Scripture and in jesus and get to know Him better, so that He flows out of every pore of you.
And you can do this even when your life is not characterized by suffering.
I have felt the closest to God and the most sure of my faith in times of great suffering. But I have grown the most when life is relatively calm and I have time and breathing room to think and focus on healthy change.
Marriage should not be a great time of trial for you. On the contrary, God made marriage to be something that is joyful, that helps you face life together with someone you love. Maybe if that were the expectation–that marriage would grow you in a good way because you could go from strength to strength–we’d have more joy in marriage, and less suffering.
What do you think?
You may also appreciate:The Iron Sharpens Iron Series: How Marriage Should Make Us Better PeopleDo You Have a Difficult Time Standing up to your Husband?
God wants us aiming for His will. That sometimes will mean that we need to confront our husbands when they’re doing something wrong.
Struggle with how to do that? Are boundaries a difficult concept for you? 9 Thoughts can help!
Take me to it!
Sheila Wray Gregoire Founder of To Love, Honor and Vacuum
Sheila has been married to Keith for 28 years, and happily married for 25! (It took a while to adjust). She’s also an award-winning author of 8 books, including The Good Girl’s Guide to Great Sex, and a sought-after speaker. With her humorous, no-nonsense approach, Sheila is passionate about changing the evangelical conversation about sex and marriage to line up with kingdom principles. ENTJ, straight 8 FacebookTwitter Related Posts What If We Don’t Need to Suffer in Marriage to Be Made Holy?Mar 10, 2021 | 34 Comments
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March 15, 2021
Our FREE Video Book Study for The Great Sex Rescue is HERE!
We’ve been working behind the scenes on a video book study to go along with The Great Sex Rescue, and it’s all finished–and FREE!
Each of the 8 videos is between 11-15 minutes long, and comes with discussion questions, so that you can work through this with your friends. Works great with either couples or with women.
Each video gives a synopsis of the chapter (or chapters), plus a few of the key stats we found, and often some behind-the-scenes stories that didn’t make it into the book. Plus we try to provide Scripture where appropriate to take a broader look at the topic.
We had planned to film these in a beautiful old church near us, but we were getting them all ready during lockdown, so we ended up using my living room.
Here’s just the first video:
To get access to all the videos, plus the discussion questions, just sign up below, and you’ll get an email with all the links pretty much immediately!
I’m confident that I’ll keep coming back to this book time and again to reframe my thinking and be more empowered.
Cortney, Review This is the Kind of Study that’s COVID Friendly!You can each watch the videos alone, and then meet in a Zoom room to go through the discussion questions and talk about it! Or you can even use an app like Rave so that you can watch the videos simultaneously and chat about it as it’s happening.
Or use a Facebook group to watch the videos and then talk about it. Even when we can’t get together in person, once you sign up, everyone will have a link to the videos. No DVD that you have to watch in a machine together, and no cost to anyone.
And it doesn’t have to be awkward, either.We’ve got some tips in the very first video about how to make this group study not-so-awkward. But I don’t think you’ll find that it will be hard to get people to talk. I think it will be far harder to get people to be quiet! So many people are desperate to talk about sex in a healthy way, after all the unhealthy stuff we’ve been taught. They WANT to deprogram and see this through Jesus’ eyes. I think you’ll have fun!
There is freedom to be found in the pages of this book, and I cannot recommend it highly enough.
Michele S., Reviewer Imagine if talking about sex in the church in a HEALTHY way became the norm!Imagine what would happen if we stopped talking about how all men struggle with lust, and so women have to watch what they wear. Imagine if we stopped equating sexual attraction with lust, and stopped heaping shame. Imagine if we stopped telling women to have sex under threat–or else God will be mad at you; or else he’ll watch porn; or else he’ll lust or have an affair. Imagine if we stopped telling people that men need “physical release”, while what the women needed was “emotional release” (whatever that means).
Imagine if we talked about sex like it was a MUTUAL, INTIMATE, and PLEASURABLE experience.
Imagine if we talked about how both of you should want and like sex, and if one of you doesn’t, that’s something to work on, rather than just guilting them into granting the other access to their body.
Imagine if we talked about sex like it was a knowing, rather than an owing.
Imagine how that would change how we parent. Imagine learning enough about sex in a healthy way that we actually pass on good messages to our kids!
We can do that. But it starts by talking about it.
In The Great Sex Rescue, we started that conversation, by looking at the results of our survey of 20,000 women, and seeing what things mess up sex for couples, and what things make it so much better.
Now you can continue that conversation with your friends.
Are there 3 or 4 friends, colleagues, or couples that you could work through the book with? Or even just a sister that you want to talk to about this?
Now’s your chance! Sign up, and together, we really can create a church culture with a healthy, godly attitude towards sex!
Sheila shifted my thinking to realize how much bad advice evangelicals have often given about sex, and she focuses on what sacrificial, loving sex should look like in marriage. I highly recommend this book.
Sean McDowellProfessor. Speaker. Author.
In The Great Sex Rescue, we started that conversation, by looking at the results of our survey of 20,000 women, and seeing what things mess up sex for couples, and what things make it so much better.
Now you can continue that conversation with your friends.
The Great Sex RescueNow Available! What if you're NOT the problem with your sex life?What if the things that you've been taught have messed things up--and what if there's a way to escape these messages?
Welcome to the Great Sex Rescue. Order Now!
Have you talked to other people about The Great Sex Rescue yet? Or have you read it yet? Let’s talk in the comments!
Sheila Wray Gregoire Founder of To Love, Honor and Vacuum
Sheila has been married to Keith for 28 years, and happily married for 25! (It took a while to adjust). She’s also an award-winning author of 8 books, including The Good Girl’s Guide to Great Sex, and a sought-after speaker. With her humorous, no-nonsense approach, Sheila is passionate about changing the evangelical conversation about sex and marriage to line up with kingdom principles. ENTJ, straight 8 FacebookTwitter Related Posts My Jesus Does Stuff: Serving the God Who LaughsMar 9, 2021 | 27 Comments
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March 12, 2021
We’re in The New York Times Book Review! Plus lots more to listen to!
The New York Times Book Review actually covered The Great Sex Rescue–in a positive way!
It was one of four books looked at in its review “Looking for Sexual Healing.” Not overly long, but positive, and we can now say, “As featured in The New York Times.” So that’s kind of a big deal! I think they choose less than 1% of books submitted to them to include, so Yay US!
“The Great Sex Rescue” explores Christian teachings on sex against a backdrop of academic research on evangelism and sexuality. A chapter entitled “Your Spouse Is Not Your Methadone” is intriguing in its exploration of how one idea central to Christian sex education — that men must have to constantly control their lust and women are the sexual gatekeepers — has been disastrous for many couples. Traditionally women are blamed for men’s porn addiction. Gregoire puts the blame squarely with the addict.
I don’t want to leave the impression that Gregoire writes about sex in a punitive fashion, though. Far from it. There is a lot of joy in these pages. In fact, I’d like to suggest she retitle her book: [I’m leaving out what she said the title to be because some of you may find it iffy. But we thought it was seriously funny!]
Judith NewmanLooking for Sexual Healing?, The New York Times Review of Books
That was such an encouragement to us to be covered favorably!
I’ve also been so busy behind the scenes recording a bunch of different podcasts, and I thought I’d leave some of them here in case you wanted to listen in!I’ve done so many I won’t be able to list them all. I’m trying to keep up with them in my Instagram stories, but if I haven’t mentioned yours, it’s nothing personal. Leave a comment and I’ll try to remember to share it next time!
The Puddcast–featuring both Rebecca and me
Jonathan Puddle has such a great podcast, and he’s on a journey to discover what healthy spirituality looks like. I loved his devotional and workbook You Are Enough, and we were blessed to be able to be on his podcast. This was a fun one since it featured both of us.
And Jonathan said about our book that it caused a whole range of emotions, including feeling convicted–and it was a long time since he had read a book that convicted him.
Listen to the Podcast! The Worthy Podcast: Celebrating the Value of WomenI joined Eric Schumacher and Elyse Fitzpatrick, authors of The Worthy Book, for this podcast. Something funny happened while we were recording this one. I was telling the story of Aunt Matilda, and how marital rape is a thing in so many of the evangelical books we looked at, and as I was telling the story Elyse, whom I could see on Zoom, looked like she was going to swallow a lung or something.
I had totally forgotten how shocking some of the stuff we say is, because we’re so immersed in it it’s become normal. So that was actually healing for me, to see the shock on someone else’s face and to realize that we weren’t crazy for finding this terrible!
Listen to the Podcast! Faith, Philosophy and Politics with Scott ColeyI’ve been interacting a lot with Scott on Twitter lately, and it was wonderful to be able to sit down with him and talk about The Great Sex Rescue. I really appreciate his voice advocating for justice and moral clarity in the evangelical church, and this was an awesome conversation.
Listen to the Podcast! Dear Young Married Couple PodcastRebecca and I joined marriage counselors Adam and Karissa King to talk about The Great Sex Rescue! They both were blown away by what we shared about the evangelical resources that have become our go-to resources, and we had a great talk with Karissa afterwards about how to get more peer-reviewed data into evangelical hands.
Listen to the Podcast! Can you help me with a MAJOR GOAL?A bunch of people have asked how they can support us right now. Of course, the #1 thing you can do is GET THE GREAT SEX RESCUE! (And buy it for your church library; request it at your local library; tell everyone about it!)
The Great Sex RescueNow Available! What if you're NOT the problem with your sex life?What if the things that you've been taught have messed things up--and what if there's a way to escape these messages?
Welcome to the Great Sex Rescue. Order Now!And, of course, we’d love it if you could leave a heartfelt review on Amazon and/or Goodreads and/or Christianbooks once you’re done! That helps us so immensely. Truly.
But one more thing: I am now just over 9000 followers on Instagram. If I can get to 10,000 followers, I open up a lot more ability to share links and get people to see my blog, podcasts, and books!
So if you haven’t followed me on Instagram, please do! Or share about me in a story and tell your friends to follow me! I want to see if I can get to 10,000 in two weeks! What do you think? Can we do it?
Do you know a podcast you think I’d be a great fit for? Let me know in the comments!
Sheila Wray Gregoire Founder of To Love, Honor and Vacuum
Sheila has been married to Keith for 28 years, and happily married for 25! (It took a while to adjust). She’s also an award-winning author of 8 books, including The Good Girl’s Guide to Great Sex, and a sought-after speaker. With her humorous, no-nonsense approach, Sheila is passionate about changing the evangelical conversation about sex and marriage to line up with kingdom principles. ENTJ, straight 8 FacebookTwitter Related Posts Women’s Day: Keith’s Message to Those Harmed by Evangelical Marriage TeachingMar 8, 2021 | 30 Comments
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March 11, 2021
The Thalidomide Test Podcast: What Makes a Marriage Book Good
We tackled a whole bunch of stuff in today’s podcast!
Browse all the Different Podcasts
See the Last “Start Your Engines” (Men’s) Podcast
Or, as always, you can watch on YouTube:
Timeline of the Podcast
0:35 The NYT reviewed our book!
1:45 How a trip to Italy made Sheila see Jesus differently
9:00 What do holiness and joy look like?
12:30 The Missouri pastor situation
18:15 RQ: Using birth control for health reasons?
23:50 To those trying to discount the survey…
33:35 How do we measure a book helping?
36:20 Sheila’s theory on whether a specific book is actually what is helping
42:26 Thalidomide, a parallel to sex advice in Christian marriages
46:10 Keith address the intent behind advice
48:40 So what outcome do we want from our marriage advice?
We introduced our new series, talking about how life would change if we could picture God not as a magazine cover (“7 Ways you could be a much better person right now”; “5 ways you’re messing up at this exact moment”) and more like a laughing Jesus.
I started talking about that this week in two posts–serving the God who Laughs and we don’t need to suffer in marriage to be made holy. We’ll be talking about how to emphasize joy in marriage for the rest of the month!
Yes, that Missouri Pastor was DisgracefulSo many of you have sent me links to the story about the Missouri Pastor who gave a sermon on how wives shouldn’t let themselves go. It was absolutely terrible (I recommend not listening to it), but we wanted to mention it briefly because it shows the need for The Great Sex Rescue. In fact, the pastor even read a passage from the book His Needs, Her Needs that we even quote in our book!
We honestly can do this better. So many are saying that we’re being too hard on the church in our book, but stuff like this just shows that these bad attitudes are out there, and they need to be fought against!
The Great Sex RescueNow Available! What if you're NOT the problem with your sex life?What if the things that you've been taught have messed things up--and what if there's a way to escape these messages?
Welcome to the Great Sex Rescue. Order Now! Reader Question: I need hormonal birth control for endometriosis, but my church judges me for itA woman writes:
I got married almost a year ago, and we immediately learned that the hormonal problems I’ve dealt with for years made sex really hard for me. My amazing husband loved me so gently through it and continues to do so, and insisted we ask for help. We soon found out that I have endometriosis. My husband has cared for me so well as we’ve adjusted to life knowing I have this disorder, but other than his love and support, I’ve mostly felt alone in my pain. This is because the church culture I grew up in took a very dim view of any form of birth control, which is the main treatment for endometriosis. I’m happy to say that it has helped a LOT! However, I have felt like I can’t tell anyone about my condition, because they would disapprove of my choice and not really be concerned about the pain I’ve had. It’s hard to not see my fellow Christians as a supportive group who I can tell about my suffering and ask for prayer or help.Can you offer tips to the church for how to be more understanding of women in this kind of situation? I wish there were more Christians who would just be listening ears rather than those who would judge a very private decision like birth control, especially for a medical reason totally unrelated to trying not to have kids yet!
“Your survey was just biased”!We had to revisit this again because more authors that we critique in our book are starting to make false statements about our survey (if you see any such statements on social media, please share our survey methodology).
We put up a new FAQ section on that page, where we’re answering some questions, including this one that keeps popping up:
Are you concerned that your respondents all thought the same way?
No, we are not, because our respondents had all sorts of different beliefs. In fact, if our respondents had all had the same viewpoint we wouldn’t have been able to do a comparison study! Claiming that our over 20,000 respondents all had the same viewpoint shows a fundamental misunderstanding of the nature of odds ratios. We were able to make our conclusions only because we had a diverse set of beliefs among the survey respondents. If the respondents all had the same point of view, we would not have been able to make comparisons. For instance, in order to judge how the belief “all men struggle with lust; it’s every man’s battle” impacted women, we needed both women who believed it and women who didn’t.
Great Sex Rescue Survey Methodology
More than this, though, there’s a bigger question: Why do they hate our survey so much? Our survey basically had five huge findings, with everything else stemming from this:
We have a 47 point orgasm gap (meaning that 95-96% of men almost always/always reach orgasm compared to about 48-49% of womenBelieving “boys will push your sexual boundaries” when you’re a teenage girl ends up hurting your sex life in marriageTeaching “all men struggle with lust; it’s every man’s battle” ends up hurting women’s sex lives and marriages even if they don’t believe it. Believing it hurts it even more.Believing “a wife is obligated to have sex with her husband when he wants it” hurts tremendously, and increases the rate of sexual pain more than anything else we foundBelieving “a wife should have sex with her husband to keep him from being tempted to watch porn” does all kinds of nasty things, too.If you see someone trying to discredit our survey, then, I’d ask: Which of these findings do they not like? Do they think the orgasm gap is a good thing? Do they want to be able to keep teaching women they should have duty sex? Do we want women to keep feeling responsible for men’s porn use?
On how books help, plus Thalidomide!We used the example of Thalidomide to look at how we should handle books that harm.
But we also asked, “If a book was found to do harm, but many people found that book helpful, how should we think about this?” Here’s a theory: If a book presents a view that was harmful, it doesn’t mean everybody will be harmed. But it also doesn’t mean that the book helped those who read it. It could be that when you decide to read a marriage book, and you decide to think about your marriage and pay attention to your marriage, that helps your marriage, regardless of what book you read.
And if the things that you found helpful were things that basically all marriage books say–we have different perspectives; we should think of the other and not be selfish–then it could be that if they had read a non-harmful book they would have been just as helped!
Things Mentioned in This Podcast:The Great Sex Rescue–it’s doing wonderfully and selling wonderfully! Thank you so much–and help us out by leaving a review on Amazon or Goodreads once you’ve read it!Our survey methodologyOur podcast last week where we talked about our survey methodsThe New York Times book reviewBooks that we liked–How We Love by the Yerkovichs; Boundaries and Boundaries in Marriage by Henry Cloud and John Townsend10 Ways to Know if Your Church is ToxicOur Open Letter to Focus on the Family about Love & RespectThe story of Thalidomide
Sheila Wray Gregoire Founder of To Love, Honor and Vacuum
Sheila has been married to Keith for 28 years, and happily married for 25! (It took a while to adjust). She’s also an award-winning author of 8 books, including The Good Girl’s Guide to Great Sex, and a sought-after speaker. With her humorous, no-nonsense approach, Sheila is passionate about changing the evangelical conversation about sex and marriage to line up with kingdom principles. ENTJ, straight 8 FacebookTwitter Related Posts Something Precious from a Reader: Hope for the FutureMar 5, 2021 | 14 Comments
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March 10, 2021
What If We Don’t Need to Suffer in Marriage to Be Made Holy?
I went with Teen Missions International (I’ve blogged about the problems with Teen Missions before), and the devotional for that summer was “The Way Up is Down.” It was all about how humility and suffering brings us closer to God, because God uses our suffering.
Now, I actually do believe that He uses our suffering. But more than that, I believe God uses EVERYTHING–the good and the bad–to bring us closer to Him.
Sometimes, though, we focus so much on suffering that we think we learn more through suffering than we do at other times in our lives.
Certainly when we suffer we often feel God to a greater degree, because He’s all we’re holding on to. But this can lead to a strange faith where we think that suffering is ultimately good–that suffering is something we should pursue.
And even that those who suffer know God more and are “sanctified” more.
So let me ask a question:
What is sanctification really about?I’m going to get all theological here for a moment, but bear with me, because I think this impacts how we see marriage.
What is “sanctification”? It’s a big word which means being set apart and made holy. When we are saved, we’re justified–we’re made right with God. But that only changes our position. Sanctification is a change in our character, as, over time, we grow in holiness.
And that’s what God wants for us–to be made holy.
Okay, great. But what is holiness?
It means pure and free from sin, right? So that must mean that anything that makes us holier is good! And if we’re refined by suffering, then suffering must be good. Suffering must be for our benefit.
People who suffer have more of a chance to learn humility. They have a chance to learn to be more giving, less selfish. When relationships are bad, then, that can actually turn out for our good, because in those relationships, we’re actually made more like Jesus, and that’s the bigger point, right?
What is our goal in life? To look like Jesus!Let’s back up a minute here. What if we’re only seeing one slice of the pie, and not the whole thing?
Romans 8:29 says this:
For those God foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brothers and sisters.
Romans 8:29 Our goal is to look like Jesus.Jesus is holiness, yes. But Jesus is more than holiness--or perhaps we should say that if holiness=Jesus, then holiness is more than just purity from sin.
Jesus came not to be served, but to serve. Jesus gave His life as a ransom for many. Jesus humbled himself to the point of death, even death on a cross.
All of that is true. But He did all of that for a purpose–to usher in a new kingdom not based on the normal rules of power (see Matthew 20:25-28), but based instead on this upside-down way of living where serving and love reign. His death was our forgiveness, and it changed the nature and point of life. It wasn’t rules and striving; it was love and joy and serving.
So if we’re to be transformed into Jesus’ likeness, then it isn’t only about not sinning and being perfectly selfless.
It’s about all the things that we know God is, that can be summed up in the fruits of the Spirit:
But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law.
Galatians 5:22-23Jesus wasn’t just purity from sin; he was also pure love. Pure joy.
He also, as we talked about yesterday, laughed!
Maybe one of the ways that we’re transformed into the likeness of his Son is that we understand pure joy! Isn’t that what Paul was talking about in Philippians? Rejoice!
What if being holy–being transformed to look like Jesus–is as much about joy as it is about suffering?What if getting to know Jesus better doesn’t just mean that we need to suffer. What if it means that we simply need to understand and be part of the kingdom of God with all of that entails–including pure joy?
Would this view of sanctification change the way we see marriage?I think it would.
So often we feel as if marriage is a slog that God ordained for us so that we could learn to be selfless (as if single people are somehow “less than” because they never had this opportunity to grow). We grow closer to God when we learn to empty ourselves and look out for our spouse first and foremost.
The more unhappy we are in marriage, then, the greater our opportunity to pour ourselves out and become like Jesus. The more unhappy we are, the more faith we get to live out, and the more we serve.
I’ve often felt like the problem with a lot of our marriage doctrine is that it elevates suffering in marriage on earth, telling us that we’ll get our reward in heaven. It makes it sound like if you have a bad marriage, you’re holier.
We are not made holier by having difficult marriages. Those with good marriages are not losing out on a chance to grow their faith.On the contrary, we’re able to grow in love and kindness and serving, too, while also growing in joy.
Look, God uses everything. He grew me in some of my roughest times in my life.
I had a much rougher childhood than my girls did, and a much rougher first years of marriage than either of them have had. But they have their own stories with God, and they have grown in faith and in love for Him without the need to suffer like I did. I didn’t want my kids to suffer so they would know God better; I wanted them to know God and be able to handle whatever came their way. But I never thought they had to suffer to have faith.
Marriage makes us holy in the same way that singleness makes us holy or going through periods of unemployment makes us holy or grief makes us holy. God uses everything.
And any marriage teaching that focuses on making sure you are unheard and unseen in your marriage in order to grow in holiness is missing the bigger point. We need to stop elevating suffering and start elevating Christ.
And Jesus? He laughs. So should we.
Sheila Wray Gregoire Founder of To Love, Honor and Vacuum
Sheila has been married to Keith for 28 years, and happily married for 25! (It took a while to adjust). She’s also an award-winning author of 8 books, including The Good Girl’s Guide to Great Sex, and a sought-after speaker. With her humorous, no-nonsense approach, Sheila is passionate about changing the evangelical conversation about sex and marriage to line up with kingdom principles. ENTJ, straight 8 FacebookTwitter Related Posts The Great Sex Rescue Launches Podcast…And Then We Fall ApartMar 4, 2021 | 34 Comments
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March 9, 2021
My Jesus Does Stuff: Serving the God Who Laughs
Back in 2012 my family and I ventured to Europe (back in the days when we could still travel!) to see the sites of Rome, and Florence, and Greece, and some others. It was tremendously fun, very educational, and extremely hot.
But one day, after my husband had I had toured the Renaissance art gallery in Florence (the Uffizi), I was struck by a rather melancholy feeling.
I couldn’t really put my finger on it until the next day, when we visited another church and looked at all the breathtaking artwork. In Italy, I never saw Jesus do anything.
Jesus was everywhere–though perhaps Mary was in slightly more paintings. But everywhere that Jesus was, He wasn’t doing anything. He was either a baby, or else He was dead. Now, I’m not trying to say that dying on the cross wasn’t important, but more often than not He wasn’t even depicted on the cross; He was off the cross, with his bleeding head cradled in some women’s arms. So he’s a baby, or He’s weak, helpless, and dead.
I found the artwork beautiful, and the cathedrals stunning, but I can’t say that I had very many profoundly religious experiences, because I didn’t really sense the Jesus that I know. Rarely did I see Jesus feeding the five thousand, or talking to the woman caught in adultery or the woman at the well, or pulling little children to His lap, or making a whip out of cords, or even rising from the dead! No pictures of empty tombs here.
In the Sistine Chapel there were some paintings of other scenes from Jesus’ life, but in all, His death and his baby-hood took the pre-eminence, as if there was nothing between and nothing afterwards. And I thought to myself, that’s a very hard Jesus to relate to. You know that He suffers, and you know that He was human, but that’s really it. You can’t get a sense of His personality, or His very real-ness. He seems almost impotent.
In contrast, the saints were always doing stuff–slaying dragons, or writing letters, or debating. The apostles were, too. Even the women in Jesus’ life seemed to take the initiative and do something. But not Jesus.
But then I started to wonder: in all my criticizing of this art, do I honestly believe that Jesus does stuff?Or am I just comfortable with the Jesus that I know from Bible stories, too? Do I think that Jesus’ whole life can be depicted in paintings, and that it somehow ended 2000 years ago?
I’m not talking about whether or not I believe that Jesus is alive now–I do, and I think most reading this blog do as well–I’m talking about whether or not we believe and we act as if we believe that Jesus is still active now. There’s a whole lot of difference between being alive and being active.
Do we really believe that God does stuff, even today? Do we really believe that He can make a difference in our lives, or are we trying to follow a God who we know about through the Bible, but that’s really as far as it goes. We haven’t experienced Him. That was the overwhelming feeling I got in those cathedrals: they knew about Jesus, but I didn’t see Jesus being an active part of anyone’s life.
I don’t have all the answers, but I do have two big thoughts today that I’d like to introduce as we start a new series on the blog.
1. God rarely answers prayers as we think He should–but He does do neat stuff.Ever get tired of prayers that go, “Lord, if it is your will, let X, Y and Z happen, because that just seems obvious to me.” We throw in the “if it is your will” so that if it doesn’t happen, we can say, “well, it’s not my fault. It’s not that I didn’t pray enough. It’s God’s will.” It’s kind of like a cop out.
And we often judge our faith by how well God answers our specific prayers.
But one thing I’ve found over my half century of life is that God often does absolutely amazing things that I could never have prayed for because I didn’t even know they were a thing. Let me tell you a bit more of the story of The Great Sex Rescue, and Joanna.
Our family met Joanna through Joanna’s little sister Gracie, who was best friends with my daughter Katie. Both of my girls were involved in Bible quizzing with the Alliance church when they were teenagers. They memorized entire books of the New Testament (seriously; Katie has about half the New Testament memorized, and Becca almost half). They were so good they made the internationals team.
both my girls, on separate teams, quizzing against the team Joanna’s dad is coaching
And so they met teenagers from all over, including a family of 4 from Pittsburgh (Joanna and her family). But Joanna met other Canadians while quizzing, including a really tall guy named Josiah from Saskatoon. They married. My girls even did the hair for the wedding!
Fast forward a few years and Rebecca gets an email from Joanna because Josiah has graduated law school and needs a placement, and wanted to know if we had any leads. So I put them in touch with a lawyer from Belleville, and lo and behold, they end up in Belleville!
We get to know them a bit, and Joanna starts doing some work on the blog right around the time the whole Love & Respect thing breaks. Because she’s an epidemiologist, she’s worked extensively with data coding and analyzing in academia, and she’s able to write up the first report for Focus on the Family–which they ignore.
And one day Joanna and I are FaceTiming when she says, “Maybe I should just go back and do my Ph.D. so I could do a big survey and see how these teachings have affected women.” And I reply, “We don’t need to do a Ph.D. for that. We could just do it!”
And we did. Because I had Joanna, who actually knew what she was doing with statistics, and Rebecca, who knew what she was doing with survey development, and me, who could write (although Rebecca wrote all the funny bits of the book).
None of us could have done this project alone.
Now, it turns out that Josiah’s job was a wonderful learning opportunity and gave him some experience, but it wasn’t forever. And so he moved on to a job in the Canadian arctic.
The Great Sex Rescue authors before Joanna moved up to the Arctic!
We all thought they were moving to Belleville because of Josiah’s job. But it turns out they were moving to Belleville for Joanna, who, at the time, was a stay-at-home mom with a baby. We would never have reconnected with Joanna otherwise.
One of my sharpest memories of internationals in 2009 was Josiah in the finals, answering a question clearly and solidly. I never remembered his name, but I remembered him. And who would have thought that we would know them so well now?
One of the few pictures I have of Katie quizzing against Josiah’s team (Josiah is looking down). Little did we know!
We could never, ever have prayed for any of this. I think we were praying totally different things for the direction of the blog or for Rebecca’s work or anything. But God was weaving all these strange pieces of our lives together so that at just the right time, we would all be together.
I can look back at so many different times in my life when I was praying for something specific, but I didn’t know the big picture. I thought God wasn’t answering my prayers, but really He was doing something even stranger and cooler.
And it makes you sit back and be in awe sometimes.
What I’ve learned in prayer is that a powerful prayer isn’t so much about specific actions God should take as it is about the qualities that we want to see in people afterwards. So rather than pray, “God, teach my husband how to show me love by helping him to see that I need him to talk to me at night, and not sit in front of the TV all the time,” you can pray, “God, make my husband into a man who seeks you first, and then shows your love to others. Let him experience your love in a powerful way, and let that spill over into all aspects of his life.”
Or instead of praying, “God, get me this particular job,” you can pray, “God, give us our daily bread. And work things out so that whatever we do in life puts us in exactly the place you want us to be for what you have in mind. Keep us open to opportunities to speak a word into someone’s life. Let us be part of making your kingdom come on earth. Make us always sensitive to your Holy Spirit.”
2. Finally: We Serve a God Who LaughsThis is really the point I want to make today, and what I’d like to talk about through the rest of the month.
Would our view of God change if we understood that Jesus laughed–a lot? Would our walk with God change if we understood that God has a sense of humor, and that He enjoys laughter?
Think about it: rough fishermen liked spending time with Jesus. Sinners and tax collectors liked eating with Jesus. They didn’t feel judged. Little children liked sitting on Jesus’ lap, and felt welcome.
What do all of those things have in common? Laughter.
So often, in our art and in our prayers, we picture God as the Man of Sorrows–which He was and is. But He is more than that. He is also the creator of laughter, the author of joy. He laughs when babies chortle. He laughs at squirrels that chase each other up trees. He laughs just like you do when you watch your children.
Jesus enjoyed life. He had to–or people wouldn’t have particularly liked Him. It was the Pharisees who were sad and somber, not Jesus.
Sure, He got angry, too. Sure, He wept over Jerusalem. We know that Jesus well.
But He also laughed.
Don’t you think He laughed when He was feeding the five thousand and the bread kept coming? Don’t you think He laughed when He told some of His parables? I think He likely had a twinkle in His eye.
And I actually think that makes a difference. And so this month, I’d like to talk about the God Who Laughs, and what that means for us in marriage.
Are you with me?
The Great Sex RescueNow Available!
What if you're NOT the problem with your sex life?What if the things that you've been taught have messed things up--and what if there's a way to escape these messages?
Welcome to the Great Sex Rescue. Order Now! [image error]Do you ever picture Jesus laughing? Does that make a difference to you? Have you ever seen God do something amazing–but you only recognize it after the fact? Let’s talk in the comments!
Sheila Wray Gregoire Founder of To Love, Honor and Vacuum
Sheila has been married to Keith for 28 years, and happily married for 25! (It took a while to adjust). She’s also an award-winning author of 8 books, including The Good Girl’s Guide to Great Sex, and a sought-after speaker. With her humorous, no-nonsense approach, Sheila is passionate about changing the evangelical conversation about sex and marriage to line up with kingdom principles. ENTJ, straight 8 FacebookTwitter Related Posts Why I’m Not Safe in Polite Company Right NowMar 3, 2021 | 31 Comments
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March 8, 2021
Women’s Day: Keith’s Message to Those Harmed by Evangelical Marriage Teaching
My husband Keith hasn’t written a post in a while, because for the last two months we were busy writing The Good Guy’s Guide to Great Sex together.
But he really wanted to be the one to write the post today in honour of Women’s Day. I couldn’t turn down that enthusiasm, so here he is:
I am reading The Great Sex Rescue again.
Honestly, I have lost track of how many times I have read it now. Obviously I am biased, but I believe there is so much in this book that it is likely that people will read again and again and again. I think it has such a message of hope for both men and women about what a sexually healthy Christian marriage can look like.
As a man, I think this book will be freeing for a lot of Christian men.Frankly, we have been fed a lot of garbage. Our bar has been set insultingly low, while simultaneously shaming us for being men in the first place. I don’t have any idea how we allowed teachings like this to continue. When we heard things like “We see the reason for the propensity of sexual sin among us, we got there just by being male” (Every Man’s Battle) or “men just don’t have a Christian view of sex.” (Every Heart Restored) why did we stand for that? Do we really believe that it is impossible to be a sexually healthy Christian man?
I have a higher view of men than that and I don’t think I am alone among Christian men. Men are not God’s mistake that women have to clean up after. We are both meant to reflect the image of God. Marriage is supposed to be an image of Christ and the Church. How did we ever get to the point where a husband having an uncontrollable addiction for which his wife has to be the methadone is the image of a Christian marriage? As a man, I am appalled.
But as we approach Women’s Day, I have been reading it in a different way, trying to think of what it must have been like to grow up and try to make a marriage work under these teachings as a woman.
And I wept.
We have allowed Christian teachers to tell you that your voice doesn’t matter.I am so sorry that you were given messages that tell you when your husband is doing something destructive in your marriage, like ignoring the children, that you must only speak to him briefly then wait 10-20 days before you approach him again (Love & Respect). I am sorry that you have been told that his “need for respect” at that level is more important than your “desire for love” and to be heard.
You should have been told that your opinions and feelings matter, because they do. You shouldn’t have to feel that they are secondary to his or that you need to put them on hold until he comes around to your view. Any decent guy I know doesn’t really want that. Caring husbands value their wives’ input and want to know if they are going off track. They also want to know that they can talk to you in the same way when you are off base. Because they want to be partners with you in marriage. I am sorry we did not see that you were being taught something other than this. Please forgive us.
We have allowed Christian teachers to imply women are responsible for men’s sexual sins.In the focus groups for the Great Sex Rescue, woman after woman told stories of how they had been raped, both before marriage and in marriage, but didn’t even realize that that was what happened because of what they had been taught in Christian circles. So many women told stories of saying “no” when they were teenagers, but he went ahead anyway. And they thought it was their fault because they had been taught that they were supposed to not let it get that far, that boys reach a point where they can’t stop. So not only did they live with the trauma of rape, people in the church heaped up shame on top of them by implying they had done something to make that happen by the way they dressed or acted.
If you are one of those women, I want you to know: Your “No” means “No”. If someone violated that, then that is not your fault. It doesn’t matter what you were wearing or what you did before you said “No”. I am so sorry the people in the church victimized you further by making you feel you were at least partly responsible for what happened. That should never have happened. It was not your fault.
How did we get to this point?One of the reasons we have failed to recognize how harmful these books are is that they do say things that are healthy. They even make healthy statements which sound like they are supposed to be an overarching theme. They may say outright that they do not condone abuse and that a man is responsible for his own actions and imply that the reader needs to interpret what has been said in that context. The authors then tell stories of women who have come to them devastated by the rest of the teaching in their books, and the authors explain that they are simply misunderstanding the teaching.
But the authors were wrong not to listen to those women, because those women were right. An author cannot present an anecdote in a book about a woman who wants to run away and hide from a husband’s withering rage and somewhere else in the book say “I do not condone abuse.” By presenting that story and failing to label it abuse, the author has in essence condoned abuse. Similarly, an author cannot spend pages and pages talking about how men are sexually tempted in a way that women can never understand such that women need to dress differently and act differently and then say they are not implying men are not responsible for their actions.
When women read this, they are not confused because they are misunderstanding the teaching; they are confused because they are being simultaneously taught two opposing things.
So if you are a woman who read these teachings and was harmed by them, then felt like you were crazy, I want to tell you, you are not. I would have interpreted what was written the same way you did. Ideally, we should have given you a healthier message from the start, but we certainly should have listened to you after you told us you were hurt. It is awful that you were not heard. Because you should have been.
Women are not less important than menAs I have read through most Christian marriage teaching, the overall message I would take away if I were a woman is that the Christian view is basically that I am an appendage to my husband. My role is to support what he is doing and to keep him safe from sin by the way I treat him, while his role is to do what God has called him to do. You may not have read the teachings this way, but if I were a woman reading this stuff I would feel like I was basically “one step down the food chain”, spiritually speaking. And that is a terrible tragedy. I believe this is a misinterpretation of God’s word. You are God’s daughter and He has a plan for you as well as your husband.
I believe most Christian husbands don’t want a subordinate; they want a partner. They want a co-laborer in the gospel to go with them through life, serving the Lord. I know I am ruffling feathers, but I think we have been sold a rather anti-woman version of God’s plan. Some men have bought into it because it played on their selfishness and their need to feel powerful. I myself was not entirely immune to that. I do not think that the majority of Christian men are like that, though. But those of us who did not fully buy into this mindset are still not entirely guiltless since we have not raised our voices to support you as we should have. Please forgive us. Know that we want to do better now.
And to the courageous women and men who have been warning us about these things for so long and making so little progress. I am sorry it took so long to catch up with you. Thank you for staying faithful even when others said you were fringe. We are praying with you now for the tide to turn.
I have been calling the 20,000 women who completed the survey “Sheila’s army”. My hope and prayer is that they are but the advanced guard. I hope healthy Christians everywhere will join her army. Together, I know we will create a healthy Christian sexual ethic where both husband and wife receive the respect, dignity and love we all long for.
The Great Sex RescueNow Available! What if you're NOT the problem with your sex life?What if the things that you've been taught have messed things up--and what if there's a way to escape these messages?
Welcome to the Great Sex Rescue. Order Now!
This has honestly been a really emotional month for Keith as he’s realized how deep this stuff goes. I wish you all could hear his emotion in this. He feels this tremendously.
We welcome your comments!
Keith Gregoire Blog and Podcast Contributor, Co-Author with Sheila of two upcoming marriage books
Keith is the rock that supports Sheila, who runs this blog! Sheila and Keith married when Keith was attending Queen's University medical school in Kingston, Ontario. He later completed his residency in pediatrics at the Hospital for Sick Children, and has since directed the pediatric undergraduate program at Queen's University, and been Chief of Pediatrics at a community hospital in Belleville, Ontario. He and Sheila speak at marriage conferences around the world, and together they've also done medical missions in Kenya. Next up: They're authoring The Guy's Guide to Great Sex together! Plus, of course, he's an avid birdwatcher. Related Posts The Great Sex Rescue: Our Not-So-Normal (And Quite Amazing!) BookMar 2, 2021 | 25 Comments
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