I was doing some research in anticipation of adding a page to my blog site on a very hot topic for Christian singles: Our sexual desires. And what to do about those pesky things.
I found tons of articles for Christian singles about our base but very human desires. I’ve noticed, like many of you have, that most of them were written by married people.
A few 
were written by people who were single at the time they wrote the article but have since gotten married. I bet that as soon as several of you noticed that, you felt your hope fly out of your heart like air out of a popped balloon.
There was some good advice out there, some good observations. Observations like loneliness and physical frustration at unfulfilled sexual desires are not unique to single people; surprisingly, married people experience these. Like our desires are valid, but must be subjugated to our love for God. And that what we put in our minds and emotions will fuel our flesh if we don’t rein it in sooner than later.
There was one approach that I didn’t see addressed as a solution in those first dozen plus articles I read. Maybe everyone has already tried this and it doesn’t work. Another possibility: no one wants to try it.
It’s this: In a moment of calmness, in a moment when you’re not crying and you’re not feeling hot and horny and everyone of the opposite sex looks good enough to jump in bed with, ask God to put those desires “on ice” until at least you’re engaged.
What?!
“I have begged God to take away my desires, and He never did it! I’m dying over here!” you may burst out.
Before you click away from me and write me off, hear me out.
I, too, had immense hormonal desires to be sexually fulfilled. It was physical. I was dying, too, y’all. I’d always assumed I would be married long before I was 30 to take care of this problem.
It never happened. I watched friend after friend get married. At these weddings, all we singles would secretly think how lucky they are, they get to go have sex now every day for the rest of their lives. We have to go home and go to bed alone.
We abandoned singles would complain about this at the reception. Makes a single believer want to swear sometimes!
During those years, I got irritated that couples would be walking around the mall holding hands. Or I would get sad when the man in front of me would put his arm around his wife as they sat together in church. I noticed that church culture catered to married couples with children even back then when singles were the newest demographic to be outreached for large ministries with real budgets according to all those “church growth” specialists.
Some time early in the 1990’s, in a moment of calmness, in a moment when I wasn’t crying and wasn’t feeling hot and horny and wanting to jump into a relationship with the next guy who asked me out so I could rush past the altar for sex, I quietly asked God to help me with my desires for intimacy.
I acknowledged that my craving for intimacy had become an idol, and He wasn’t having any competition. He knew my idolatry would destroy me. I asked Him to put my hormones spiritually and physically “on ice” until I got engaged.
As I kept meeting godly men whom I was not to marry because they were outside my calling, I realized that the longer I waited, the harder I might fall once I met Mr. Right. I changed my prayer to thawing my hormones out on the day of the wedding!
It worked, y’all.
It’s been many years since I’ve been sad or irritated about couples’ PDAs, whether out in the community or in church. I am truly happy for friends getting married. And I am relieved that my physical desires for sexual intimacy rarely surface to distract me anymore.
I look forward to experiencing spiritual and emotional intimacy with my future husband before getting married so that the physical intimacy will be unbeatable. I know that God can reset my hormones to “raging” status once I get married, and we will have many years to joyfully make up for.
Why are we single Christians afraid to even temporarily check our sexual desires?
I think part of our problem is we Christian singles don’t know what we would do with ourselves if all that sexual desire, energy, and frustration suddenly disappeared. It’s been part of our identity for so long that we would freak and think something was wrong with us (as in “Do I have cancer?”). We don’t know that we could live without those hormones for a long while.
We forget that we’re not animals. We forget that not only were we made in the image of God, with the ability to choose. We forget that we were re-made in the glory of God, with Christ’s resurrection power pulsing through us.
We might be relieved that those pesky urges were gone so that we wouldn’t be distracted. However, we would have nothing to sublimate and energize other areas of our lives.
We would have to replace our addiction to the pleasure that sexual acting out brings, whether it was temporarily satisfied through pornography, masturbation, or actual sex. And we might not desire that emotional and spiritual connection that leads to marriage, which is something God wants for most of His people.
You don’t have to be dedicated for some special ministry to sublimate your sexual desires. Everyday believers like you and I have already been asked to set aside our memories and emotions and obey Him in other challenging areas: finances, relationships, speech.
Now, while you’re calm and not raging, ask Him to put your hormones “on ice” based on His power and for His glory. And get ready to obey Him for the rest of the victory.
When God’s timing is perfect, He will make sure you connect with the right person in the joyful union called marriage so that you may finally experience legitimate sex that is blessed by God.
To my faithful readers, thank you for checking regularly in for inspiration, encouragement, and exhortation to love and good works. I have a short announcement for you!
NOTICE: My last weekly post on a Sunday is next week, on March 25. Starting April 1, 2018, I will no longer post on Sundays. My first post for April will be Tuesday, April 3. But I will still be here next Sunday morning, I’ll see you then!
