Dating Jesus
[When 'lover of my soul' language goes too far.]

Agnieszka Tennant | posted 12/06/2006 08:43AM

God loved the world with an extravagant tenderness. He spun into our genes a strand of divine DNA. Imago dei, this God with us—it's an astonishing intimacy.

The Bible shows it from various angles: God is a hen, and we are the chicks. God is a Shepherd, and we are the straying sheep. God is a Bridegroom, and we, his church, are the bride.

We can see God draw near, and it is dizzying.

But does all this closeness mean that Jesus is the personal boyfriend of Christian women? That God is my fiancé? That the First and the Last is my husband? That he and I are dating?

So it appears to some.

In a popular book, I learn of women who set up date nights with Jesus. Christie enjoys her Friday nights by going to Barnes & Noble "to drink coffee with the Lord and to read whatever book from the Christian living section he guides me to" or by cooking a wonderful meal and setting the table for two, then "talking to God as if he is actually sitting there at my table with me, because I know that he is."

The author of this book calls women to "prayer, praise, and pampering" retreats: "Although God certainly loves us even with unshaven legs, no makeup, and a bed-head hairdo, he also deserves to occasionally have his princess sit at his feet while she is looking and feeling her best." She casts these retreats as exciting dates. "You are running away with your Lover, not confining yourself to a convent."

In another book, the author assures her readers that "you are the one that overwhelms his heart with just 'one glance of your eyes,'" quoting from the Song of Solomon. "His gaze is fixed on you," she writes. "He is captivated by your beauty."

These teachings have spread into churches. My friend's mother took part in a "tea with the Lord," during which she and the other women wore their wedding gowns—those, at least, who managed to squeeze into them—and fancied themselves as brides of Christ. An influential Kansas City church teaches thousands of people the so-called Bridal Paradigm, which encourages a quasi-romantic relationship with Christ. And who among us hasn't detected an eerie resemblance between a contemporary Christian song and a pop diva's breathy rendition of a sensual love ballad?

But such eros-laced sentiments directed at Jesus aren't a new trend. Neither is reading the Song of Solomon and other biblical passages as erotically charged letters addressed directly to the reader.

Several of those whom liturgical Christians call saints considered themselves wives of Christ. Catherine of Siena received a vision in which Christ married her and gave her a ring. It was made from foreskin left over after his circumcision. Before you laugh, consider this: After this event, Catherine devoted herself to the sick and the poor.

According to Women and Gender in Medieval Europe: An Encyclopedia, edited by Margaret C. Schaus (Routledge, 2006), medieval nuns used to participate in marriage liturgies as brides of Christ. The tradition continues in various forms today. The bridal imagery "presents explicit erotic content, yet also extols celibacy and pronounces the inherent sinfulness of sexual desire (concupiscence)."

Some men, too, managed to see themselves as brides.

The great poet John Donne besought God in the often-quoted sonnet:

Divorce me, untie or break that knot again,
Take me to you, imprison me, for I,
Except you enthrall me, never shall be free,
Nor ever chaste, except you ravish me.

I don't question the devotion of anyone who says she loves Christ intensely, whatever language she uses to express it.

But I have little patience for taking biblical metaphors too far and giving one's relationship with God an air of irreverent chumminess. Somehow, the scenario in which "his princess" shaves her legs for a date with Jesus seems to leave little room for fear of God.

And consider how unhelpful this misreading must be to single women who are hormonally awake. The cruel message they get is: If Jesus is really your husband, what's your problem? Be satisfied!

The Bible is replete with breathtaking metaphors that hint at God's love for us. Thank God, we don't always take them to illogical ends: I've never heard a preacher take the Good Shepherd image to mean that God raises his children to ultimately kill and eat them.

So, yes, in addition to being the Shepherd, the Bread of Life, and the Vine, Jesus is, poetically speaking, the Bridegroom. And we—the church—are his bride.

But that doesn't mean I'll be getting into my wedding gown anytime soon. Not that it would fit.

Copyright © 2006 Christianity Today.

My response...

Kudos to Agnieszka for writing such a thoughtful article on a subject that I have been having the same thoughts on. It is very true that we need to put a boundary so that we do not push biblical metaphors too far and taking them or understanding them in the way the world looks at a lot of things. I agree with her contention that if such metaphors are taken too far off it will create an unhealthy air of 'chumminess' with God that will most surely create an attitude of irreverence.

And when that happens we put ourselves at an equal standing with God which is NOT right! We must learn to respect God for who He is and remember that though the relationship we are called into with Him is intimate but it never should compromise the place of God as God. The intimacy must never be confused with what we understand as human intimacy per se. God uses metaphoric language to help us understand things but with Him it always connotes a higher level of understanding, things that are spiritually divine and never humanistic nor perverted.

A person I consider a shining example in seeing herself as 'married to Christ ' is the late Mother Theresa that devoted her entire life to give dignity to the dying poor of India. I think this is the fruit of such 'divine marriage' of the heart to Christ that one is willing to lay down one's life for the high calling of following in the footsteps of Christ and not just expressing such love in abstract language of almost erotic so called worship songs.

James clearly stated in his epistle that faith without action is dead and so our Christian spirituality demands that our faith becomes real in a real world. And so being a single woman the struggle will always be there, the struggle with emotional loneliness and sexual frustrations, the struggle with society's expectation that a woman MUST have a man to validate her worth, the struggle of learning to be interdependent (despite the pull to be more independent) and the plain struggle of learning to embrace the gift of singleness and celibacy with joy and not getting stuck in the doldrums of being a desperate and overly emotional woman in her forties.

I myself have thrived on the fact that I am already married in my heart to the One who is the Eternal Groom, but after years in the Bible Seminary I have come to understand this truth in a more Christ centered biblical and theological way. Even more I believed that I'm sustained as a person, a woman who has gone through a lot of emotional turmoil from young that has tore at the very fabric of who I am a woman, because of the extravagant and exquisite love of God not only for me in the context of the human race but as an individual created in the image of God.

To this day I wear a silver ring on my 'married' finger as a personal symbol to myself that my heart is already taken and therefore I have and I am devoting my entire life to serving Him in the calling that He has given me. Therefore this is why I strongly feel, think and believe that to be married is penultimate and the ultimate thing is to become more and more Christ like, being changed from glory to glory.

So, yes, a Christian woman can be single and sane and does NOT have to create some kind of mystical concept of having Christ as boyfriend or fiancé. If we do such things where is the sense of awe and reverence for Him as the Triune God?! Biblically Christ IS our Groom to be and as Revelation puts it we need to become (the process we go through in this earthly existence) the spotless Bride that He wants us to become. This embrace both the corporate and individual level of our lives as believers.