new to you friday–popping (a) question

I love to hear how couples met.

It’s one of my very favorite questions, both to break the ice with acquaintances or to spark reminiscing among old friends. Although love is ancient and unchanging, modern romance is very specific: he asked me out to this dance, she wrote me this letter, this friend introduced us at this party. I enjoy watching people share the details of the one love story in which they play the starring role.




These stories are, of course, as different as the people involved. There’s the woman convinced her bachelor beau was a player who would hurt her–until he slowly wore her down with his kindness and character. There’s the guy who asked his future wife to all the big college events and nothing in between, until his roommate told him to get serious or he would ask her out, too. There’s the youth pastor who developed feelings for a barely-in-college former youth group member and honorably talked to her parents about getting to know her. (They’ve been married ten years, have three young kids, and this winter alone have shared the flu among their family of five approximately 43 times.)

I wrote this blog after another sweet friend shared her story and, as many folks do, included phrases about “just knowing it was right.” Three years later I’ve decided some of this certainty is evidence of a good relationship, but some is a function of personality. I hid under cribs in the church nursery and I triple-check my alarm clock each night. I’ll probably never be someone who “just knows”—and that’s okay.


But I’d love to hear your thoughts, and I’d really love to hear your story. Pretend the coffee is hot, the evening is young, and I just asked how you met (or charmed, or chased) your Valentine. Tell us in the comments!

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Last weekend I attended a beautiful wedding. The night before, at the rehearsal dinner, I asked the bride how she met her groom and how long they dated before deciding to marry. She replied the whole thing had been rather quick; she knew she wanted to marry him after several weeks, and they got engaged within six months.

I am cautious and careful in most areas of life (other than cross-country moves) so I find this fascinating. My tendency is to double and triple-check everything, including my feelings, and to overanalyze situations until I’m exhausted. I would love to just “know” that someone is “the one” but I don’t experience total certainty in any other important decisions (college major, choice of career, location of home) so I don’t expect to in my dating relationships, either.

You married folks—is that okay? Did you have a total assurance and sense of peace when you met your spouse, and does the lack of that mean the relationship is doomed for divorce court? You single folks, do you expect to feel 100% sure about someone, and is that a requirement for you to commit to a marriage?

frozen chosen

Years ago, one of my then-coworkers said I should consider selling my eggs—the inference being I might as well put them to good use and make some money since I wasn’t getting married anytime soon.

Didn’t.

Appreciate.

However, I did very much appreciate the question a different friend asked recently.

“So I was thinking,” he emailed, after reading an article about a former tennis pro who had children in her mid-40s after freezing her eggs as a younger woman, “let’s say that seven or eight years from now you finally find the right guy. It’s very, very possible, you know.”

(My friend is an optimist.)

“And you decide having kids is a good idea—very, very possible as well. It seems it would be pretty reassuring to know those frozen eggs were nestled somewhere.”

I appreciated his boldness in raising the issue (unlike the former co-worker, this friend has earned the right) and his compassionate approach. (“I cannot begin to understand the emotional strain of making that decision,” he concluded. “If the above scenario did take place, it seems it would have been worth it. On the other hand, if that guy never came along, I can’t imagine how difficult it would be to let those eggs go.”)


“Setting your own biological clock” is an interesting idea and one I’ve never really considered, mostly because it’s only in the last couple of years that the proverbial clock has ticked loud enough for me to hear. But the chance of having a healthy baby drops off rapidly after age 35 unless younger eggs have been kept in reserve.

Since the eggs are not fertilized before freezing, no new life has occurred, so I don’t see a moral issue with either the process or the eventual disposal of unused ones. (I welcome feedback/links that say otherwise.)


I also don’t believe the truism that if God wanted me to have children I would have married and had them by now. Life happens. Break-ups happen. Wasting years of my 20s with the wrong men happens. I made choices then and I get to make choices now.

But while God may not have determined the details of my current life, He did create our biology with certain parameters. Women aren’t designed to bear children in their mid 40s. And do I really want to chase a 2-year old when I’m 47?


Roy Mays used to say, “Just because it fits doesn’t mean it’s fitting.” I could do this, and I’m probably not completely done considering it. (That will come when I discover the cost.) But I’m not sure it’s right for me.

What do you think? Is this putting current science to its best use or “playing God”? What are the pros and cons?

new to you friday–men, man up

A few weeks ago, a guy I’m friends with said two things that made me smile.

The first—“I thought about dating you, but decided it wouldn’t work because I’ve been reading your blog and you’re too Christian”—because that deserves a trophy for Back-handed Compliment Of The Year.

And the second—“You need a strong guy, and there aren’t many strong Christian guys”—because it made me think of this post.




Let’s make up a statistic and see if we can get it to go viral. How about, “If you are a single Christian woman over 30, you are 64% more likely to get hit by a bus than to get married.”

Look both ways, ladies.

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At dinner with some friends this weekend, one of them described the guy she’d just started dating. He was raised in a Christian home but no longer attends church or “practices” any faith. My friend likes him and plans to see him again but she’s also approaching it casually; she realizes his lack of faith is a major issue.

Whether or not she should date a non-Christian at all is a whole other discussion. In his book How to Get a Date Worth Keeping, Henry Cloud asserts that dating unbelievers is fine if you approach it as a way to make new friends, have fun, and grow as a person. As someone who dated and subsequently did the love and loss routine with an atheist, I would argue the opposite point of view.

But wherever you land on that, the point is she’s dating this guy (let’s call him Jack) because even though she knows dozens of Christian men her age at our church, not one has ever asked her out. And before you ask—yes, she is smart, attractive, outgoing, and generally “together.” So are my other single friends, many of whom struggle with the same situation. Why the dating drought when it comes to Christian men?


I obviously can’t speak for the men, but based on the statistics I’ve read it doesn’t seem they lack interest in marriage and family. The majority of single men—believers and otherwise—say they hope to marry and raise children.

Yet many Christian guys don’t date—they lead Bible studies and singles events, they pray for a wife, they attend group activities for years on end, but they rarely exert a little energy or spend a little money to know any woman individually.

Nothing’s wrong with groups, but Jack didn’t wait for verification from five buddies as to whether my friend might be interested in him. He initiated conversation with her, expressed his interest, and took a risk.


God created men to be initiators, so this kind of assertiveness gets our attention. My friends and I are strong women, but we refuse to usurp that role and act as the pursuer. If our Christian brothers won’t, either, what’s the new strategy? My friend summed it up well as we finished our coffee. “I don’t know what will happen with Jack, but it’s frustrating to have few alternatives. I guess we’re just supposed to be ‘waiting on the Lord.’ Okay. We’re waiting……”

I’m really not trying to be down on men here. I know it’s hard to take those kinds of risks, and I know women can be confusing and contradictory. But I do believe that, despite the difficulties, God created men to step up and take action in every area of their lives—which includes “finding a wife” (Proverbs 18:22).


Guys, we don’t expect you to quote poetry or be able to benchpress your car. We just wish you’d spend a little less time reading Wild at Heart and a little more time living it.

girl scout badges for today’s women

The Upper Hand: Awarded for juggling three bags of groceries, a large purse, a cell phone and mail while successfully unlocking the front door without dropping anything. Bonus points if the grocery bag contains eggs or you are also holding a baby.

The Slim Chance: Awarded to any woman who can wear a size eight after age 40.

The This Too Shall Pass: For handing the communion tray to the person sitting next to you without bitterness that you’re not allowed to stand at the end of the row and receive it.

The Sick and Tired: For keeping one’s mouth shut when, after you’ve spent years of your life pregnant and endured the subsequent excruciating deliveries, your husband a) whimpers like a toddler from a splinter; b) takes to his bed for three days during his annual cold and demands 24 hour bedside service; c) refuses to consider a vasectomy because of his fear of medical procedures.

The Don’t Cramp My Style: For attending two business meetings, accomplishing four things off the to-do list, swinging by the grocery store, and attending a ballet recital/T-ball game/soccer practice while wearing heels instead of curling up under the covers with cramps like you want to.

The Clothes Call: One badge awarded for each shopping trip with a daughter age 8-18 in which you successfully prevent purchases of halter tops, low-rise pants, short-shorts, and anything designed to show one’s navel. Award is not invalidated by daughter’s tears or public outbursts proclaiming her hatred of you.

The Grace Note: For smiling and nodding when, after the meeting you helped lead, one of the male participants asks you to Xerox his notes.

The Big Event: Automatically awarded upon completion of your 20^th ladies banquet, tea or retreat involving hats, finger sandwiches, scrapbooking, and/or “spa” manicures.

The Shear Magic: For blowdrying your hair into a style remotely resembling anything you left the salon with after your last cut.

The Wonder Woman: For somehow summoning the superhuman strength not to say, “No, PMS isn’t the problem. You’re just especially annoying today.”

singled out

I’m usually fine with being single. I’d like to be married someday, but life is good and I’ve always been (too) independent, so I’m content on my own…..usually. This week was not one of those times.

Nope, didn’t see a cute couple holding hands. Didn’t watch a sappy movie. Didn’t even feel too stressed at the prospect of unpacking and setting up the new house by myself—actually, I enjoy doing this alone without a guy insisting, as one of my friends insists to his wife, that every wall be painted only white.

So, none of those things. Instead I had a glass jug fall on my head.

Thursday morning, while standing on a chair attempting to see if the vat I use for iced tea would fit into the top cabinet (answer: no), I lost my grip and it tipped forward, slamming into my right eye before hitting the ceramic tile and shattering.

Instantly I’m bent over at the waist, one hand pressed to my eye, bruises forming and blood dripping between my fingers, shards of glass everywhere, and no one here: no one to find a butterfly Band-aid so I won’t scar (my first concern, I admit); no one to deal with the mess; no one to advise if it’s worth a trip to the ER; no one to help me find out where the nearest hospital even is.

So I did what I always do: I took care of it myself. I stopped the bleeding and covered the cuts with bright green bandages featuring yellow cartoon giraffes (and made a mental note to buy some normal ones). I iced the bruises. I swept up the glass. I postponed my trip to the grocery so as not to frighten small children.

And I thought how nice it would be to have someone looking out for me now and then, even if it means too many white walls.

an inconvenient truth

When two of my friends got married, the pastor reminded the groom that while it’s right to be willing to lay down his life for his new bride, he must also be willing to be inconvenienced for her.

That’s often more difficult. There is something noble and soul-stirring about the grand gesture, but neither of those adjectives apply to waiting without sighs and eye rolling while she does her hair and makes you late. There is something heroic about the gallant knight expertly commanding his white horse to duel for the lady’s honor—it’s much less exciting to adjust the tire pressure on the white Camry so she can drive safely.

The same principle applies to other relationships. While I am quite willing to fly across country and be there for a friend at a time of great need, how often am I willing to take a phone call during my hectic day and listen to the details of hers? I would donate a kidney to a family member, but will I stifle a snarky comment the next time I’m annoyed with one of them?

And it’s true with God. As Twila Paris sang in her old song Undivided Heart, “There have been days when I would die for You, and days when I would not die to me.” I’ll hopefully never have to find out, but I think I really could face a firing squad rather than deny my faith. So why is it so hard to tithe?

God asks few of us for the grand gestures, but he asks all of us as his bride, the church, to “inconvenience” ourselves for His sake. Most of us won’t have to lay down our lives, but we all have to take up our crosses.

Last weekend I attended a beautiful wedding. The night before, at the rehearsal dinner, I asked the bride how she met her groom and how long they dated before deciding to marry. She replied the whole thing had been rather quick; she knew she wanted to marry him after several weeks, and they got engaged within six months.

I am cautious and careful in most areas of life (other than cross-country moves) so I find this fascinating. My tendency is to double and triple-check everything, including my feelings, and to overanalyze situations until I’m exhausted. I would love to just “know” that someone is “the one” but I don’t experience total certainty in any other important decisions (college major, choice of career, location of home) so I don’t expect to in my dating relationships, either.

You married folks—is that okay?  Did you have a total assurance and sense of peace when you met your spouse, and does the lack of that mean the relationship is doomed for divorce court? You single folks, do you expect to feel 100% sure about someone, and is that a requirement for you to commit to a marriage?

Wife of a preacher man

As I get older, more and more people volunteer their services (usually unasked) to find me a suitable husband. In fact, just the other day one of my co-workers caught me between meetings and said, “I found your husband—he’s my doctor! And I have another appointment with him this afternoon, so I’ll interview him some more.”

Actually, it’s not just a recent phenomenon; almost since I graduated from college “The Committee to Find Jen a Mate” (TCFJAM for short) has been active and developing new branches as far away as New York City, Cincinnati, and even London. They are a fun group—we’re all getting t-shirts soon.

When a zealous Committee member decides they have discovered The One, they must first submit to a list of questions: How old is he? Is he a Christian? Is he a minister? If the answer to the first question is over 35 (or, “Ummm….”), the answer to the second is no, or the answer to the third is yes, I used to say no thanks.

My experience growing up in the church and watching my parents lead and serve was an extremely positive one. (I now realize how careful they were to speak positively of the church and its leaders so that I would grow up feeling this way.) But even the happiest “PK” has experienced church dysfunction and politics, change at the pace of icicles melting, and just plain mean people. My own portfolio of horror stories has expanded as I’ve served churches and church leaders in my professional life for the past eight years, and I now have very little desire to work on a church staff.

So it seemed logical to veto any possibility of marrying into the position—after all, no one works for the church like the pastor’s family.

But in the last few years, I stopped asking that third question—or at least basing my decision on it. (There are usually plenty of other reasons to reject TCFJAM’s suggestions.) Like Sue Wilson writes in a recent Christian Standard, a calling to ministry can take many forms. Even as I’ve seen “the dark side” of church, I’ve also met many women who love their role as partner and supporter in ministry, and who wouldn’t trade it for anything.

I spent last weekend with some good friends who have served in ministry all six years of their young married life. They talk candidly about the frustrations, the strain it has at times placed on their marriage, and the sacrifices they’ve made. But they also speak of the joy of serving, and much of our conversation throughout the weekend focused on their dreams for the future.

It doesn’t seem like an easy gig, but it no longer seems like such a bad one. Then again, neither does marrying a doctor.