I hate insecurity.
I have seen it bring out the very worst in me and in others.
It is crazy how we can be insecure about how we feel about ourselves or the way someone else feels about us and that insecurity will cause us to lash-out instead of love-out.

Instead of showing an abundance of love to the ones we are insecure toward we put up a wall of defense and go into attack mode. Fight or flight kicks in every time.

Insecurity.
It’s rooted in fear.
It takes perfect love to cast out fear (1 John 4:18).
I don’t know about you but I don’t have perfect love on my own. There is nothing perfect in or about me…  That is at least until the day that perfect love accepted me and came to dwell in me and with me.

When I accept that Christ has accepted me and given me His perfect love… then His perfect love for me can cast out fear. As His perfect love cast out fear in me and as I learn to trust His perfect love for me, then my insecurities begin to lessen, and fade away, as I begin to learn that I am indeed secure in Christ.

Are you secure in Christ?
Are you secure in His love for you?
Is His perfect love casting out fear in your life?

Day Eleven

Today we are going to focus on learning to trust our Savior’s perfect love. We are going to be reminded today that we are secure in Christ. We do not have to live our lives in the darkness and fears of our insecurities. We don’t have to continue to hurt others or ourselves as we live in fight or flight mode due to insecurity. We are secure in Him… and honey… if God is for us who can be against us?

Just like yesterday, here’s a list to print off and read daily… study these Scriptures and let the perfect love of your God cast out every fear that creeps into your heart and mind and spirit.

I AM SECURE IN CHRIST  

I am free forever from condemnation
Therefore there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and of death.
Romans 8:1-2

I am assured that all things work together for good
And we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose.
Romans 8:28

I am free from any condemning charges against me
Who will bring a charge against God’s elect? God is the one who justifies; who is the one who condemns? Christ Jesus is He who died, yes, rather who was raised, who is at the right hand of God, who also intercedes for us
Romans 8:33-34

I cannot be separated from the love of God
For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing, will be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Romans 8:38-39

I have been established, anointed, and sealed by God
Now He who establishes us with you in Christ and anointed us is God, who also sealed us and gave us the Spirit in our hearts as a pledge.
2 Corinthians 1:21-22

I am confident that the good work God has begun in me will be perfected
For I am confident of this very thing, that He who began a good work in you will perfect it until the day of Christ Jesus.
Philippians 1:6

I am a citizen of heaven
For our citizenship is in heaven, from which also we eagerly wait for a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ;
Philippians 3:20

I am hidden with Christ in God
For you have died and your life is hidden with Christ in God.
Colossians 3:3

I have not been given a spirit of fear, but of power, love, and self-discipline
For God has not given us a spirit of timidity, but of power and love and discipline.
2 Timothy 1:7

I can find grace and mercy to help me in time of need
Therefore let us draw near with confidence to the throne of grace, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.
Hebrews 4:16

I am born of God, and the evil one cannot touch me

We know that no one who is born of God sins; but He who was born of God keeps him, and the evil one does not touch him.
1 John 5:18

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I am reading slowly through Grace Abounding to the Chief of Sinners by John Bunyan. I was reading in it yesterday and Mr Bunyan was sharing how he was in the midst of a great temptation to be insecure in his relationship with Christ even with his salvation, and the validity of the Scriptures, and the truth that Christ is the only way unto salvation. He shared how this temptation lasted for at least a year. 

I wish that I could tell you that if you go through this challenge and you learn exactly who you are in Christ you will be fixed forever… I can’t. The tempter still seeks to devour you, to condemn you, to make you doubt, to discredit you… He still will seek to destroy you.

However you will be stronger. As you strengthen your faith muscles by walking in the Word and living by the truth of God rather than your feelings. As you grow in knowledge of Him and His grace, you will grow in His love and as you grow in His love, that perfect love will begin to cast out insecurity…

You, precious one, are secure in Christ.

 

The next few days we are going to focus on either discovering for the first time or reminding ourselves all over again who we are in Christ.

In her book Shannon recommends that you print this list off and put it on your bathroom mirror and read it every time you enter. My challenge is for you to print it off and put it on your mirror and then print it off again and take it with you to work or school so that you have it with when you leave the house. Keep it with you until March 17th and read it everyday.

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I AM ACCEPTED IN CHRIST

I am God’s child

But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, even to those who believe in His name,

John 1:12

I am Christ’s friend

No longer do I call you slaves, for the slave does not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends,

John 15:15

I have been justified

Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ,
Romans 5:1

I am united with the Lord and one with Him in spirit

But the one who joins himself to the Lord is one spirit with Him.

1 Corinthians 6:17

I have been bought at a price; I belong to God

For you have been bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body
1 Corinthians 6:20

I am a member of Christ’s body

Now you are Christ’s body, and individually members of it.

1 Corinthians 12:27

I am a saint

Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God,    To the saints who are at Ephesus and who are faithful in Christ Jesus:

Ephesians 1:1

I have been adopted as God’s child

He predestined us to adoption as sons through Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the kind intention of His will,

Ephesians 1:5

I have direct access to God through the Holy Spirit

for through Him we both have our access in one Spirit to the Father

Ephesians 2:18

I have been redeemed and forgiven of all my sins

in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.

Colossians 1:14

I am complete in Christ

and in Him you have been made complete, and He is the head over all rule and authority;

Colossians 2:10

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How we see ourselves affects how we live and the decisions we make. If we see ourselves as weak, tempted beyond control, or needy, then that is how we will behave. But if that is what we still believe and how we still behave, then Christ’s death on the cross was in vain. He died so that His Holy Spirit could fill our emptiness, heal our hurts, and satisfy our every need.

~ Shannon Ethridge

Ladies, for the rest of this challenge study up on the truths of these Scriptures. Let God prove His Word to you. Open up your heart to Him and let His acceptance, His affirmation, His affection, flood your inner being and let the truth of who you are in Him overflow in and through your actions.

Oh precious one, never, ever forget who you are in Him and how very much He loves you…

Today’s challenge just might be the hardest yet…
It might be the most humbling, the most humiliating, the most harrying, but also the most helpful and most freeing… if you have the courage to face it.
Are you willing?
Are you ready?

Day Nine

We are fixing to dig deep ladies… so very deep. We are going to take a walk through our past and quite possibly our present.

Today your challenge is to at some point and time between now and March 17th… I am not asking you to do this today because I know personally how hard this will be for some… so just some time between now and March 17th I want you to get physically alone with God. No one else around. No time limit. Just you and God and a sheet of paper… or a couple of sheets of paper. Get alone and undistracted and pray that God would lead you in this challenge.

The challenge I am issuing you is the same challenge that Shannon was given as she sought healing. I will share the challenge in a bit, first let us go back to the garden.

It’s somewhere between 6000 and 8000 BC and Adam and Eve are at peace in a beautiful garden. God comes and walks with them and they are naked and unashamed before each other and God. All the world is at peace… except for one.

There is one who has become full of pride and violence and lies. He sits lurking in the darkness, awaiting his opportunity, his perfect opportunity to steal authority over this world so that he might wreak havoc in it. He’s been watching Adam and he’s been watching Eve… and he sees his open door.

Eve is alone.
She is vulnerable.
He has figured out her weakness.
She gets giddy with the right words.
She gets intoxicated by what she hears.
You see it wasn’t the serpents smooth handsome face and physique that caught Eve… it was that smooth tongue. He spoke words that went to her head and moved her emotions and he deceived her and she did eat.

She then, quite possibly, slithered and slinked up to her husband in her new discovered false sense of power and Adam, dumbstruck and mouth gaped at the visual pleasure of his Eve, forgot truth… forgot holiness… forgot what was right… forgot God… and he listened to the seductress not his God.

Their life would never be the same… consequences came… they always do.

Adam and Eve lost their relationship with God, severely damaged their relationship with each other, lost their authority over Satan and over this earth. They traded acceptance for rejection, belonging for loneliness, competence for inadequacy, equity for exploitation, identity for confusion, security for anxiety, significance for worthlessness, and transcendence for a spiritual void.

The serpent was cursed, Adam was cursed, the land was cursed, and yes… Eve was cursed.

Let me a share a little something with you. My heart was broken over and over again by boys that I wanted so desperately to want me, to like me, to love me, to think I was beautiful. I wanted them to desire me and I was willing to go to whatever extreme just to get that… even if it was only for a moment. The desire was rooted in the heart of a little 2nd and 3rd and 4th grade little girl who wasn’t pretty enough and the boy said he didn’t want her anymore and went off holding hands with another girl. The desire was rooted in the shame of a date rape that I blamed myself for and never told anyone about. The desire was was rooted in wanting the approval of a man…the affirmation of a man because I felt so unattractive and unwanted compared to other girls. The desire was rooted in the curse… your desire will be for your husband. 

Then one day I got tired of being hurt and I realized that I could be the one in control. I realized I could say and do certain things and I could have power and I learned how to use it. I grew cold. The last thing I wanted was a relationship with a man. I just wanted to control him the way I had been controlled by the desire to be loved. He was not going to rule over me. I would rule over him. The problem was… I still got hurt… it was just in a different way.

“I believe a woman’s desire and the issue of rulership or power are related in a way that unwraps some of the mystery behind a woman’s sexual conduct (or misconduct, rather). I believe that the desire for power (and the belief that men possess the power women crave) is what causes many women to seduce men, as well as what prompts some to use sex as a bargaining tool in their marriage. It’s not as much sex or love that these women are in pursuit of as it is the power behind bringing a man to his knees with her charms.

When we discovered as young women that our curvaceous bodies or pretty faces would turn heads, it awakened us to a form of power that we may have never known as preadolescence girls. For some of us, that power was intoxicating… perhaps even addicting.”  

“Most of my single days are a tragic testimony of a young woman striving to gain some sense of power through inappropriate relationships with men. Rather than use what beauty God had given me to bring glory to Him. I used it as bait to lure men into feeding my ego. Rather than inspiring men to worship God. I subconsciously wanted them to worship me, and if I was successful in hooking a man with my charms, I secretly felt powerful.” 
~ Shannon Ethridge

So my dear sweet sister… what have you used what beauty God has given you for? Has it been to inspire men to worship God… or to inspire them to worship you? Why have you had the relationships you have had?

Why do you think so many women degrade themselves with photographs? Why do you think magazines are full of thousands of articles about how to manipulate and control a man through sexual positions and seductions? Why do these women pose for these pics and play these parts in the movies and dress that way and dance that way?

Because they have scanned the room and though there are eyes that condemn them, that pity them, that are embarrassed for them, that truly love them, they instead choose to lock eyes only with the one they realize that they have power over… the ones that are affirming them… these eyes they are addicted to and these eyes they will continue to degrade themselves over for this very moment… this moment of being “worshiped”.

Shannon shared the confession of a young women named Jennifer who admitted that she realized that even when she went to church she dressed herself to be seen. She said she walked in the sanctuary and she scanned the room to see if there was anyone whose eyes were on her. You see she came to church not to worship God… but to be worshiped.

Oh… honey there is only one that is worthy of worship.

It’s time to share the challenge.
I’ll let Shannon introduce it.

“I was seeking to understand why I still felt tempted outside of my marriage, so my therapist asked me to spend a week making a list of every man I had ever been with sexually or had pursued emotionally. I was shocked and saddened to see how long my list had grown through the years. 

At the next visit, she asked me to spend a week praying and asking myself, “What do each of these men have in common?”

“As I searched my soul to discern why such a common thread existed in my relational pursuits, the root of the issue became evident: my hunger for power over a man.”
~ Shannon Ethridge  

Ladies this is the challenge: create a list of the men you have had sexual experiences with, pursued emotionally (or allowed to pursue you), or fantasized about, the point is to find out what common threads surface as you do this.  

When you discover it… go boldly before the throne of grace and seek help in your time of need and ask God to meet this need in you. Seek His forgiveness.

Then if you need to… seek your husbands forgiveness if you have been using your sexual relationship with him as a means to control or manipulate or punish him.

*(PS- destroy this list after you have done it… it is the past… we are working to put it behind us… and not bring it into our present or future any longer)  

Compare and compromise and competition… we are going to continue today to look at comparisons and our emotional ties… but today we are focusing on us… woman to woman.

Day Eight

There she goes… big brown eyes, smooth perfect complexion, at least a D cup all perky and tight, makes it to the gym every day, flat stomach with no stretch marks, butt is still where yours used to be, she eats only food from the organic store because she doesn’t have two or three (or five or six) kids at home to feed on a one income budget… and every man she walks by looks up and smiles… ugh.

And you look down, you haven’t showered in two days because the kids have had the flu, you smell like medicine and vomit, and you have on an old pair of leggings with your husbands over sized old sweatshirt that he wanted to throw out… but you kept for days like this, because it was comfortable… and you see her… you don’t know her but you have just decided that you hate her and you hate yourself for not being her.

So you get ill and mad and ugly (only in your head of course, on the outside you are the queen of Christian politeness, you may even make a point to purposely say “Hi” to her just to prove that to yourself).

“Hmmmm well I could look like that too if I didn’t have a family to take care of.”
“Enjoy that body while you can honey, because it’s all down hill from here”
“Well, I can still look that good if I want to, and next time, I come in this store, these men will be looking at me”
“She is probably stuck up and rude and thinks she’s something”

Then… you walk out and there she is…

She has on a shirt that is too short and jeans that are too tight and stuff is hanging out the bottom and over the top. Her hair is stuck in the eighties and her make-up is way too dark and you think, “Honey did you not look in the mirror before you left the house, please do not tell me you actually think you look good.”

Now you walk out to the car feeling pretty darn good about yourself because at least you had the good sense to cover up and camouflage anything that was hanging out or over. Now here you are still smelling like medicine and vomit in old sweat clothes and because you saw her after you saw her… well now you can head back home feeling pretty darn good about your hot mess self and ready to pump kids full of tamiflu and tylenol all momma style.

This is a challenge I face. I have allowed the beauty of another female to make me feel so insecure that I couldn’t even get “in the mood” for my husband because I would be so disgusted with my own appearance compared to hers… all I would want to do is put on even baggier clothes and crawl under the covers and bury myself until death do us part.

This type of measuring is dangerous for us and it is dangerous for our marriage.

“We feel huge and sloppy. We feel powerless. We wonder who would ever want to be with us. Such feelings can lead us to become victims of seduction. When we focus so much on superficial appearance, our self-esteem can become so low that if a man takes notice of us, we are pleasantly surprised and become affirmation-seeking missiles. We begin to hunger for a man’s approval so much that his flattery and attention can manipulate us.”
~ Shannon Ethridge 

So today ladies… let us not compare ourselves woman to woman. For the rest of this challenge, this is added to your challenge. Don’t compare your husband to another man and don’t compare your self to another woman. This goes back to Psalm 139… you my dear are fearfully and wonderfully made.

“When we compare ourselves to others, we put one person above the other. We either come out on top (producing vanity and pride in our lives), or we come up short (producing feelings of disappointment with what God has given us). Regardless of how we measure up when we make these comparisons, our motives are selfish and sinful rather than loving.”
~ Shannon Ethridge

Ladies, we have lost something in this day of feminism and liberation… we have lost our friendships with one another… woman to woman. Instead she has become your competition. You compete with her and you don’t trust her. So you choose to make and form friendships with men instead of women… but ladies, listen to me… WE NEED EACH OTHER!

“Not only can we attract unhealthy relationships with men when we feel intimidated by or superior to other women, we also miss out on something we all desperately need: intimacy with our sisters. Whether we are single or married, our sisters often keep us connected to God’s love in a way that a boyfriend or husband can’t or won’t. If we would stop competing and start connecting with other women, this battle for sexual and emotional integrity wouldn’t be nearly as overwhelming. Remaining connected to healthy, loving friendships can keep us out of bed with the next guy we meet and help us satisfy our longing for emotional fulfillment”
~ Shannon Ethridge 

Ladies I understand your fear of female friendships. I experienced the lies and the stabs in the back and the twist of the knife from those girls that were supposed to be my friends. I experienced the secrets shared and the boyfriends stolen… and yes, growing up I was just as guilty of all that at times myself.    

We are not kids anymore.
Let us not act like it.

When we were children growing up we did foolish things… we said foolish things… we hurt others for selfish gain… we are not children. We are women of God who know better now. Let us be those women and let us raise our daughters and the other young women in our lives to not compete with one another, to not compare with one another, but to hold each other up.

We need each other.

I need women in my life that I can come to and confess my hurts and fears to. I need women who have been there and made it, who can encourage me. I need women to laugh with, and cry with, and stand firm with, when times get hard. Ladies, I need you!

I received a comment on one of the Thirty-three day Challenge posts sharing that they were doing the challenge, but they felt like a failure…

Ladies, God is honoring your efforts. Just as I shared with this woman I will share with you, don’t feel like a failure, just persevere! Keep going. Our God is not a performance based judge. He judges according to the heart. 

Day Seven:

Today as we focus on becoming a woman of sexual and emotional integrity we will focus on our thoughts toward our husbands or future husbands….

She doesn’t compare her husband to other men, discounting his personal worth and withholding a part of herself from him as punishment for his imperfections.
~ Shannon Ethridge

I think that quite possibly this is one of the leading causes of infidelity and divorce when we get down to the heart of the matter. Comparisons.

“When women compare their husbands with other men, they are toying with a threat similar to the threat a man plays with when visually lusting after other women. Whether the comparison is physical, mental, emotional, or spiritual, we not only show disrespect for our husband’s uniqueness, but also undermine our marriage and emotional integrity.”

“At the very least, when a woman’s comparisons of her husband with other men (real men or fictional men from a book) heightens any disappointment or disillusionment she feels with her own husband, it can prevent her from getting excited about him sexually or emotionally. These comparisons encourage her once-glowing passion for her husband to fade to a mere tolerance of him as she forgets all about the wonderful man she fell in love with.”
~ Shannon Ethridge

Ladies, for the rest of our challenge… stop comparing your husband with other men. Don’t watch a movie or read a book or listen to a song or look at the man you work with or go to church with and say..

“I wish my husband would spend that kind of effort toward me”
“I wish my husband would say things like that”
“I wish my husband would come to church with me like her husband”
“I wish my husband would lead our family like he does”
“I wish my husband was like that father”
“I wish my husband would meet my needs like her husband does for her”

STOP!

What you are doing is not fair. You are comparing your husband to fleeting moments you see in others. You don’t live with any of these men… and honey, none of these men have to live with you.

Think about that for a moment.

You have to love your husband through eyes of grace. He is not perfect.

However, he is yours.

Love him with 1 Corinthians 13 love.

Love him with the grace you have received from God and with the grace you desire to receive from him. Don’t get caught up in just trying to survive in your marriage. Don’t get caught up in escaping reality by burying your heart in a world of a fantasy. Instead, open up the Word of God and study up on grace.

“If we crave genuine intimacy, we must learn to seek it only in this kind of grace-filled relationship.”

~ Shannon Ethridge

Spend today remembering all those little things about him that you fell in love with. I understand you may feel like you have been abandoned and lost in the shuffle of his life. You may feel last on his list. He may even be horrible to you…

If you are to find the life God wants for you, you must do one more thing- you must forgive. This may be the last thing you want to do, but it may be the very thing you need to do most. Your husband may never ask for your forgiveness. Or at times he may say he is sorry only to repeat the offense in a short time. He may be the worst of the worst, but no matter how “bad…” he is, you need to find a way to forgive him. Not for his sake, but for yours.

The longer you refuse to forgive him, the longer he has control of you. You may think he doesn’t “deserve” forgiveness, but you deserve living beyond the bitterness and resentment that hurts only you. You deserve the freedom that will only come when you let go of all you have against him. This is not an easy or instant process. You may have been so badly hurt that it would take years to forgive him totally. If that is the case, all the more reason to begin the process now.

Many men do not even know the depths of hurt and pain we have caused the women we love. We have a way of rushing through our lives and stumbling over the most important people in them. Please forgive us for the hurt we have caused. Please forgive your husband so you can unshackle yourself from a past you can not change and destructive feelings you cannot afford to harbor. Forgive the unforgivable and move into the life that is waiting for you.

~ Stephen Arterburn

Ladies here is when you begin to put the Word of God in action. When you finally begin to apply the truth of grace and forgiveness to your life and to the lives of those closest to you, even the one’s who have hurt you the most. Let me assure you that His Word never fails. Love never fails because God never fails.

We live in a day when we have a list of rules or steps that are supposedly guaranteed to solve all our problems. Just do this, this way, in this order, and sit back and watch the results. Life just doesn’t always fit into a list. How many times have you sat down in the morning or the night before and wrote out your “to do” list for the next day? How many times have you been able to accomplish it as written?

Today in our challenge we are going to talk about how to live lives of sexual and emotional integrity based on love not legalism.

Day Six

Our first look at legalism vs love: How far is too far?

As young women, we pushed the envelope while we were dating. Kissing on the first date was almost an expectation. Allowing him to go to first, second, or even third “base” was considered okay, as long as he couldn’t proclaim to his friends that he’d hit a “home run” with you. But all of this sexual activity during dating didn’t prepare us for true love, lifetime commitments, and faithful marriages as we thought it would. Instead, it prepared us to crave intensity and excitement that only a new relationship brings, causing us to be discontent once we marry and the relationship ages.

Because we never learned sexual self-control as single women (not just physical, but emotional, mental, and spiritual self-control), it seems extremely difficult to exercise it with the added stressors of two kids, a minivan, and a mortgage payment. How disappointing to discover that the wedding band placed on our finger didn’t change us at all!
~ Shannon Ethridge

If our question is “how far is too far?” Then you are living out of legalism not love. Love doesn’t seek to see how close it can get to getting it’s selfish desires fulfilled before it has crossed the line into whatever church, society, family, and friends has chosen is the line of sin.

Love does not act unbecomingly; it does not seek its own, is not provoked, (1 Corinthians 13:5)

In Dannah Gresh’s book What Are You Waiting For, she shared how a young man had went to his youth minister to ask him how far was too far, the advice given by the youth minister, “Anything above the waist is okay.”

Hello?!?!? WHAT??? Anything above the waist?

Ladies let me share a little something with you.

Did you see it?

Let the wife of your youth satisfy, her breast, the young man is too be exhilarated with her love. Yes, my breast belong to my husband and no one else. My husband is to be satisfied in my breast. Your breast do not belong to him and they are not to be out on display to be seen by him.

Miss swimsuit issue girl, and playboy girl, and pro-football cheerleader girl, and music pop star, and silver screen movie girl, and young woman sitting in the Sunday school class and worship service with the cleavage hanging out, and young lady on Facebook, and young lady with the cell phone who cries out for attention through posting and texting inappropriate pics… those breast are to be for one man.

I was so very proud over the public stand of a young VS model who finally realized that she was damaging her marriage and others by what she was doing… and she was causing young men to stumble…

She made her decision out of Christian love… not legalism… she chose to walk away and give her body back to her husband for his pleasure alone. I also loved that she did not condemn those who hadn’t followed her lead… yet. (I believe many will)

The majority of us do what we do and have done what we have done because we used the attention to fill a void in our heart… but this void can only be filled with Christ and can only be satisfied in Him and in obedience to Him through our love for Him.

Therefore, a list of laws about what women of integrity can and can’t wear, should and shouldn’t do and say, and so on, isn’t the answer…

The answer lies not in legalism but in Christian love.

~ Shannon Ethridge

How do we practically live this out? How do we learn to live by love instead of legalism?

If we love God, love our neighbor, and love ourselves (in that order), then we can live far above any set of rules or regulations. We have freedom to live apart from any legalistic standards when we live by the spirit of love.
~ Shannon Ethridge

When we live our lives through the eyes of legalism, we have a list of rules to keep. We make our choices and decisions through looking at the rules instead of the person. Rules are stone and cold and you can’t hurt them, you can break them, but it doesn’t hurt the rules, it only hurts you.

However a person is not made of stone… if you break them it does hurt.

Here is a little comparison of ways we can ask ourselves questions as we seek “permission”. Look closely and see if you usually ask questions of compromise and if you do may we learn to instead ask questions of integrity.  

Questions of Compromise vs Questions of Integrity

Are my actions lawful?
Are my actions loving to others?

Will anyone find out?
Is this something I’d be proud of?

Would anyone condemn me?
Is this my highest standard?

Is this socially acceptable?
Is this in line with my convictions?

Are my clothes too revealing?
Am I dressing for attention?

How can I get away with saying this?
Would this be better left unsaid?

Will this hurt anyone?
Will this benefit others?

Yes, we live in a free country and we are free in Christ. But we are not to use our freedoms to enslave another, or to allow the enemy to take our freedoms and use them to destroy another.

If we want to gain the prize of sexual integrity, we may need to let go of some of our “freedoms” (in dress, thoughts, speech, and behavior) in order to serve the best interest of others out of love.

~ Shannon Ethridge

Yes, honey you have the “freedom” to wear that, to do that, to say that, to go there, to post that, to text that… but at what cost? 

I can’t draw a line in the sand and say don’t cross that. That far is too far. That skirt is too short. That shirt is too low. That comment was too far. That post was too risque. That flirt was too far.

All I can tell you is to ask yourself what your motive is? What’s the why behind your actions. Is the why pleasing in His sight?

For a Christian woman, sexual and emotional integrity means that her thoughts, words, emotions and actions all reflect an inner beauty and a sincere love for God, others, and for herself. This doesn’t mean she is never tempted to think, say, feel, or do something inappropriate, but she tries diligently to resist these temptations and stands firm in her convictions. She doesn’t use men in an attempt to get her emotional cravings met, or entertain sexual or romantic fantasies about men she is not married to. She doesn’t compare her husband to other men, discounting his personal worth, and withholding a part of herself from him as punishment for his imperfections. She doesn’t dress to seek male attention, but she doesn’t limit herself to a wardrobe of ankle-length muu-muus, either. She may dress fashionably and look sharp or may even appear sexy (like beauty, sexy is in the eyes of the beholder), but her motivation isn’t self-seeking or seductive. She presents herself as an attractive woman because she knows she represents God to others.

~ Shannon Ethridge  

We are women. We have physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual needs. All of these needs are meant to be met in Christ. We cannot manipulate men, whether it be our husband or not, to get our needs met. We must come to our Savior. He is jealous for us, He loves us, oh how He loves us. All we need is Him and in Him…