Teaching at Bright Lights

In our Bright Lights group, we have been studying Biblical Courtship. Many of you will remember when Mom taught a lesson on this subject a few months ago. Since this is something I am very passionate about, I offered to teach a lesson as well. I’ve been recently reading a book called “It’s (Not That) Complicated” by Anna Sofia and Elizabeth Botkin. (Click here and here to read a few excerpts from the book.) Hopefully I will be able to post a book review once I finish reading it all the way through. What I read in that book inspired most of my lesson. I thought I would share the lesson I taught below:

How to Have Biblical Relationships with Boys

I was very excited when the time came for us to discuss courtship here in Bright Lights because it is a subject that I am very passionate about. After our first lesson on courtship several weeks ago, I went home with my wheels spinning about the issues of courtship and relationships. I took a look at my bookshelf and noticed a book I had received for Christmas called “It’s (Not That) Complicated” by Anna Sofia and Elizabeth Botkin. I started reading it, and I am now about two-thirds of the way through. So far, it has been an excellent book and very encouraging!

Tonight I want to talk about how we can have Biblical, God-honoring relationships with young men. Relationships with boys have gotten very complicated for a number of reasons. Part of this is cultural. Dating has become a game for young people to play, and we have discussed the problems with dating in a previous lesson. As young ladies, we are pressured to conform to this relationship pattern. Another reason relationships have become complicated is because we as girls have a sin nature, as do young men. We also don’t have a proper understanding of what our relationships with boys should look like from a Biblical standpoint. We have an innate desire for relationships with males. That’s not a bad thing! That’s how God created us, and those feelings are very good, when allowed in the context of marriage someday.

To have our relationships with other boys in a correct perspective, we have to start from the top. Our relationship order should be this: Christ, our Fathers, our Brothers, and other young men. In order to find JOY in our lives, our priorities should be Jesus, Others, and You. Let’s jump right in!

Our Relationship with Christ

As Christ-followers we are called to have a close, intimate relationship with Christ. Ephesians 5:25-27 says: “Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave Himself up for her to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the word, and to present her to Himself as a radiant church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless.” The ultimate wedding someday will be between Christ, and we His bride! In order for our relationships on earth to be right, our relationship with our heavenly Father must be strong.

Our purpose in life is to bring honor and glory to God. We are to serve Him all of our days including when we are single. 1 Corinthians 7:34 says: “An unmarried woman or virgin is concerned about the Lord’s affairs: Her aim is to be devoted to the Lord in both body and spirit. But a married woman is concerned about the affairs of this world—how she can please her husband.” We also need to focus on serving others above ourselves, like the JOY acronym says (Jesus, Others, You.)

Our Relationship with Our Earthly Fathers

As we talk about relationships with fathers and brothers, I realize that this does not apply to everyone. Not all of you have fathers or brothers present in your immediate family. Or perhaps you do not come from a home with a Christian father. While these situations are important to discuss, I am going to speak on the assumption that most of us have Christian fathers and brothers. Even if we don’t have a father in our lives, hopefully we all have father-figures in our lives. Some of these may be grandfathers, uncles, pastors, as well as brothers in Christ.

Deuteronomy 5:16 says: “Honor your father and your mother, as the LORD your God has commanded you, so that you may live long and that it may go well with you in the land the LORD your God is giving you.” So many girls—including Christian girls—ignore one of the most helpful relationships in their lives: their relationship with their fathers! Until we are married, we are under the headship of our earthly fathers. Deuteronomy 22 is an important chapter to read on this topic. Deuteronomy 22:20-21 says: “If, however, the charge is true and no proof of the girl’s virginity can be found, she shall be brought to the door of her father’s house and there the men of her town shall stone her to death. She has done a disgraceful thing in Israel by being promiscuous while still in her father’s house. You must purge the evil from among you.”

This chapter talks about the consequences upon a young woman who has committed sexual sin while living in her father’s home. You’ll notice in the verses we just read, that the daughter was stoned on her father’s doorstep. He was held responsible for her sins. If this young girl had a godly relationship with respect for her father and his authority in her life, this would not have happened. We have the responsibility to honor our fathers and accept their protection in our lives as from the Lord.

If we invest in a healthy relationship with our fathers, if we let him know the characteristics we are looking for in a future husband, and ask for his guidance in our lives, he can save us so much heartache down the road. Dads are very helpful in the screening process of young men in our future. But we can’t wake up one day and expect our fathers to just “know” what kind of man we desire to marry. We need to invest in proper relationships with our father right now.

Our Relationship with Our Brothers

First Timothy 5:1-2 says: “Do not rebuke an older man harshly, but exhort him as if he were your father. Treat younger men as brothers, older women as mothers, and younger women as sisters, with absolute purity.” How can we treat young men as our brothers if we don’t treat our brothers in a godly way? So many young ladies I know—including myself at one time—think that their relationships with their brothers aren’t as important as the others we’ve mentioned (i.e. our relationship with Christ, our fathers, and other young men.) But the reality is the brother-sister relationship is one of the closest to the marriage relationship in many ways. Obviously, there are differences, but there are lots of similarities. We live with our brothers day-in and day-out. We see the good, the bad, and the ugly. If we cannot learn to get along with and have a fruitful relationship with our blood brothers (who are sinful, fallible human beings just like us), how can we expect to get along with and have a fruitful relationship with our husband someday (who will be a sinful, fallible human being just like we are?)

As sisters, we share in the responsibility of helping our brothers become the young men God has created them to be. So many young girls lament the fact that there aren’t godly young men in their lives that they would even consider marrying. But could it be that so many of us are neglecting our roles as sisters? Our attitudes towards our brothers and how we treat them will affect their views on other girls. This is a big responsibility, but we can either choose to help our brothers become godly young men who will raise godly families or we can choose to discourage them and not help them. I hope that you will all evaluate your relationship with your brothers and look at them through a Biblical lens. This is one of the most important training relationships in how we will treat other young men.

Some of you may think that your brothers are too young for this kind of relationship. You may be saying “I only have little brothers. They don’t understand the duties of manhood yet. How can I treat them as men and encourage them to be leaders?” I struggled with this question because I am the oldest; all of my siblings are younger than I am. But I have had to realize that one day my brothers will be leaders. Obviously I’m not going to let my 8 year old brother rule my life! J But as sisters, there are things that we can do right now to help our brothers no matter how old they are.

We can demonstrate respect. Our brothers are created in the image of God, and have been given gifts by Him. When our brothers do something honorable, or manly, we should praise them. It’s very easy to always be saying negative things to our brothers. We need to focus on encouraging them more than we discourage them. We can also let them assert themselves, lead, and teach us things. This can be painful if you are like me and have always had a more dominant spirit as the oldest child. There are things that my brothers can lead in, and things they can teach me that I don’t know. As the oldest, it’s easy to have an attitude of “I know more than them because I’m older.” But that’s not always true! Allow your brothers to teach you things!

We also need to talk with our brothers. It’s very easy to completely ignore our brothers or just treat each other civilly, but not have true friendship with them. It’s important to have conversations with our brothers not only to encourage them, but to also help us learn more about them. Talking with our brothers helps us understand their point of view on issues and how they view the world. They can give us a male perspective on things that we may not have thought of.

We can also become a part of their world. How many of you have brothers who have BIG ideas? My brothers often come to me and tell me about their latest and greatest idea. One day I desire to be a helpmeet to my husband as God created me to be. Genesis 2:18 says: “The LORD God said, ‘It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper suitable for him.’” If we can learn how to encourage and help our brothers with their ideas, we will be farther ahead of most girls when they get married and have to figure out how to be a helpmeet.

And lastly, we may need to repent of past sins. This is VERY hard to do, but VERY necessary in having a good relationship with our brothers. Psalm 51:17 says: “The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise.” Our relationships with our brothers will never be truly helpful if there are bitter feelings between us. There have been many times when I personally have hurt my brothers very badly by things I have said or done. It was very hard to repent when I thought I was right, but the Lord has shown me that my relationship with my brothers is more important than being right all the time. Ask the Lord to convict you of areas of your life that you need to repent of, and ask your brothers to forgive you as well.

Our Relationship with Other Young Men

Now that we have laid a foundation of what our other male relationships should look like, we can discuss our relationships with other single young men. *Important Note: If what I say goes against the way your parents have asked you to act around young men, please honor and obey your parents, not me. God has made them your parents and you are to honor their decisions, not mine. I do hope that what I share will cause you to evaluate the way you treat young men and what your heart motives are.*

I could talk for hours about ways we girls treat young men, but I have to narrow it down a bit! J I have picked a few things to discuss that I know have been problems for me, and that I believe are the most common errors.

Looking at Young Men the Way God Sees Them

Many of us girls make the mistake of not looking at young men the way God looks at them. We either have super high standards (“One day my Prince will come” or “I can’t wait until my Knight in shining armor arrives.”) or we are disdainful of young men (“He’s such a jerk” or “The way he acts is creepy.”) We as young ladies have to remember that no man or woman on this earth is perfect, including us. Romans 3:10 says: “As it is written: ‘There is no one righteous, not even one.’”) God sees all men and women as one in Christ. We are to look at everyone the way Christ would.

Flirting or Shunning?

Many of us girls fail in our relationships with boys because we fall into one of these categories. Some of you may be thinking “I don’t flirt with boys! I don’t ignore them and hide from them!” But what if I were to define “flirting” as: teasing, bantering, acting giddy and giggly, and trying to attract attention? What if I defined “shunning” as: being shy and uncomfortable, avoiding conversations, pretending boys don’t exist, and speaking in a cold and rude manner when we are forced into conversations?

All of these attitudes come from not thinking of other young men as brothers in Christ. First Timothy 5:1-2 says: “Do not rebuke an older man harshly, but exhort him as if he were your father. Treat younger men as brothers, older women as mothers, and younger women as sisters, with absolute purity.” One very good rule of thumb when it comes to our behavior around other young men is this: Ask yourself “would I treat my brother this way or act in this manner around him? If the answer is “no,” then you shouldn’t be acting that way.

Reading into Conversations

One of the many struggles we as young ladies have is controlling our thought life. It’s very easy when we are in a conversation with a young man to begin “reading in” things to what they say. I’m sure you all have a pretty good idea of what I’m talking about. We often dwell on something a young man said to us and think to ourselves, “What did he really mean by that? Does he like me? Does he think I’m a nice girl? COULD HE BE MY FUTURE HUSBAND???” etc. J Proverbs 4:23 says: “Above all else, guard your heart, for it is the wellspring of life.” Philippians 4:8 says: “Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things.” We need to be content during our single years. If we are constantly dwelling on and analyzing our conversations with boys, it shows that we really aren’t content in serving where God has us right now.

Being Intelligent, but Not a Smarty-Pants

In order to have productive and edifying conversations with young men, we need to have something to talk about! As girls we enjoy talking about hair, sewing, chick-flicks, and clothing. These are not the kinds of things that young men like to talk about as you can imagine! J We as young ladies should be well educated on many subjects including law, politics, economics, theology, science, education, and lots more. Our motive for learning shouldn’t be just to have something to talk about with young men, but rather from a genuine desire to learn important things.

An important note to all of this is not to come across as a “Smarty Pants.” Nobody likes talking to a “know-it-all.” Our heart motive shouldn’t be to make ourselves look better or smarter than the young man we are talking to. Our goal in our conversations with young men should be to encourage, sharpen, and edify each other, and most importantly, to honor God.

I would encourage you to look at some of the following conversations between men and women found in the Bible: Rebekah and Eleazar (Genesis 24), Ruth and Boaz (Ruth 2), and Abigail and David (1 Samuel 25). All of the women in these conversations displayed humility, honor, and respect towards the men they were conversing with. They are not shy, bashful, or stammering in their speech. They speak plainly and confidently. We can learn a lot from their examples.

I hope that you will consider the verses shared in this lesson and the things we’ve talked about tonight. I hope that you will go home and talk with your parents about your relationships with young men and how they could become more pleasing to the Lord. I’d also love to hear from you about things you have found helpful to keep in mind when talking with young men.

After completing the lesson, I handed out the cards pictured above. These were for the girls to give to their brothers or their fathers. The card said the following:

“I am very thankful for having you in my life. God has blessed me! Yet I realize that our relationship is often trivialized by our culture. The Lord has convicted me that I need to work towards having a better, more fruitful relationship with you.

I will strive to demonstrate respect towards you. I will allow you to teach me things. I will be more humble towards you, and more willing to listen to you. I will engage in meaningful conversations with you, and encourage you with my words.

I want to become a part of your world! I will look for ways that I can help you in your projects, support your vision, and encourage your dreams. With a repentant heart, I ask your forgiveness for times that I may have wronged you in the past.

I look forward to seeing how the Lord helps us grow in our relationship together!”

“By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.”

John 13:35