Getting the Girl: What You're Up Against

Dear Christian Guy,

I saw you checking out Christian Girl at church today.  Yes, the one with the John MacArthur Study Bible.  You thought no one was looking.  You thought wrong.  It's OK, I won't tell anyone else, but I will tell you a thing or two while you're here.  In a perfect world you could just sidle up to that good-lookin-Jesus-lovin girl and ask her out; she'd promptly bat her eyelashes, blush and say yes.  Well, honey, I hate to break it to you, but you have some competition. 

First of all, let me speak to the most annoying competition - the Bad Boy.  It is an age-old question muttered in exasperation by fine upstanding Good Guys  and whispered in confusion by best friends - Why do Good Girls fall for Bad Boys?  I certainly don't aim to solve it, but I'll shed a little light on it while we're here.  Sometimes they fall for El Malito because he's bold and brash and full of bravado.  At the moment it doesn't matter that he's also that other b word because her eyes are so full of the first three qualities.  

He might call her Honey and treat her like a princess, and he might even mean it at the time, even if he repents of it later.  He might be a charmer and sing to her and ask her about her dreams.  He's well versed in the language of love, even if he wouldn't know the real thing if it ran over him.  Sometimes girls fall for the Bad Boy because they're dumb and don't have friends smart enough to tell them so, but that's another blog post for another time.  Be gentle, be wise, but have guts.  Better to get turned down for being bold than to be a lonely chicken.  Show the Bad Boy who's boss.  

Your next enemy is a little more daunting, permeating, far-reaching.  Yes, John D. Oe in the second row, you are right in guessing the Media.  Bravo.  Back in the day, girls gaped over the Sears and Roebuck catalogue, or the chance Vogue magazine laying around.  Those were publications that came in the mail.  Now we have Victoria's Secret models glowering down at us from mall walls, and perfume ads that try to convince you that wearing Ralph Lauren eau de sexy will definitely end in you making out with a shirtless model man.  Ew.  It's on billboards, magazines, makeup packaging, oh, and Facebook and Pinterest.  

http://25.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lkqus1xVf51qgx1spo1_500.jpg 

We're supposed to be 5'8", size 0 with curves and hair that glows like a sunset in the Bahamas.  Sure, girls realize those images are edited and it's not our fault that we're 5'5" and a size 6, but it gets to us.  Sometimes we think, geez louise, I'm never going to get a guy if I can't afford $50 haircuts and Christian Louboutin shoes and fit into those skinny minny jeans.  Media says, "Be this and you'll be worth something, fail and you'll be forgotten and insignificant".  And it scares us.

Now that you're wielding your sword of manly manness against Bad Boys and Media Mongers, here's your last and perhaps most difficult task in the quest to getting the girl.  Your final foe is the girl herself.  Oh, we can be fierce and tough in the office, relentless in the classroom, and a samurai swordswoman on the operating table, but you can turn us to a sloppy mess of melted chocolate.  We don't like being made vulnerable.  Whether it's a bad past experience or a heritage of divorce, even when we trust you, we aren't so sure that we should.  

Forty years of feminist aftermath and we're liberated to being alone and confused.  We're looking for knights but hardly dare dream that they will come.  David's mighty men of valor surely don't still exist?  Could we really find a man whose first instinct in trouble is prayer, who dares to win the heart of the girl he loves - even after they've been married for a decade, who will lead us closer to Jesus Himself?  Doubts assail us at every turn.

It's a lot.  I know.  I'm sorry I turned your checking out that cute girl into a complicated blog post... sort of.  I hope you take it as a challenge, and not one that I think you will fail.  You're not the only one who's been people watching.  I've seen you and your compadres around.  Sure, a few of them have a mile and a half of maturity to conquer before they ought to be asking girls out, but there are some good men among you.  You're competing against a lot, but I think the glimmering hope of success is worth the endeavor.  

Quit reading blogs and go show that girl with the MacArthur Study Bible that the vision of the knight is more than a legend. 

Love and affection,

Little Miss Sunshine