An Endangered Species

Wednesday, December 16, 2009 at 7:25pm

So, I’m less than a week away from my 27th birthday (Please, yall… None of those “This is for your Birthday AND Christmas” combo gifts) and I’ve realized that I have a lot to be grateful for. I’m still alive. I’ve graduated both High School and college. I’ve managed to avoid being arrested or going to jail. I have God in my life and know what it truly means to follow him. I’ve finally found what I’m passionate about (I’ll give you one good guess what that is). And –to the amazement of some, for all sorts of reasons—I’ve managed to maintain my purity, more or less.

Well, maybe I should be a bit more specific about that last statement.

I’m almost 27 years old. I’m a virgin…and I remain so on purpose.

Ok, maybe it hasn’t always been on purpose. I will admit, I didn’t always have that conviction. Up until I was almost 18, it was for lack of “game”, for want of a better term. I was very shy and introverted back then and didn’t have enough nerve to even approach women, let alone pursue anything physical. Halfway through my first semester of college, I decided to become a Disciple of Jesus and actually make every effort to live my life the way he would want me to, and that means --among many other things-- holding out until marriage. Wow, great timing, right? I mean, just after I started to break out of my shell, I decided to give up all that I’d never experienced. No sex, no strip clubs, nothing even close to those things. Most guys my age at that time, being surrounded by endless possibilities away from home, would look at you like you were crazy if you asked them to give all that up. However, I figured, if Jesus loved me enough to die –a horrible and gruesome death, mind you—for me, the least I could do is refrain from having sex until I’m married.

I get a wide range of responses when I tell people that I’m still a virgin and am abstinent. By the way, it’s not something I broadcast, but I don’t hide it, either. Anyway, most people tend to give me that surprised, wide-eyed gasp when they find out; like they can’t believe that someone like this exists. Sometimes I feel like I’m part of an endangered species, the way some people react. After the initial shock, however, the comments I receive are quite interesting.

When I tell other guys that I’m a abstinent virgin, I get the opposite reaction of what I would expect. For a while, I half expected to be ridiculed and thought of as less of a man whenever I would make my convictions known. However, the responses I get from most guys are about as far from that as can be. For the most part, many guys tend to respect me more after I tell them. A lot of guys have told me things like “Don’t rush man, take your time” or “You’re not missing anything.” I’ve even had guys tell me that they wish they were still in my position. Hearing these statements spoke volumes to me. For so long, even though I knew that I really did make the right decision, I would often second guess myself or wonder what it would be like to experience the things that I was denying myself of. I felt that I was missing out on things. However, it was the fact that the guys that were telling me otherwise weren’t other Christian guys with similar convictions, but guys in the world who had experienced all that I thought I was missing out on that encouraged me to no end. They were the ones reassuring me that my decision remains the correct one.

Surprisingly enough, the less-encouraging reactions actually came from women. Don’t get me wrong; I still got my fair share of “keep doing the right thing” type of responses from them. A fair amount of women, however, don’t believe me when I tell them. This is strange to me because I figure most guys would lie about not being a virgin as opposed to being one, but I digress. I’ve had women warn me that making my convictions known up front or otherwise too soon would be a turn off to some. Little do they know, I’m ultimately turned off by the women who would be turned off by my convictions anyway, but I’ll expand on that later. In response to that, I’m told that my dating pool is going to be extremely limited, since I supposedly will have a hard time finding a woman who feels the same way that I do. Again, I find it strange and am ever so slightly disturbed that this is coming from the women. I respond by telling them that they’re not telling me anything I don’t already know and that I’m perfectly fine w/ my dating options being limited. If God sees fit, he’ll send the right one my way. Most recently, in response to discovering my convictions, I’ve been asked if I’ve ever made a woman feel inadequate by not making love to her. My response was that it’s never happened, since no woman who isn’t also saving herself would get past the “friend zone” and into a relationship with me anyway. ***For the record: I do not require that a potential girlfriend be a virgin. She just has to have, prior to our relationship, decided that she is going to be abstinent until she is married. This has to be for GOD, not me; otherwise, it won't last.***

Of course, people always ask me why and how I do it. The “why” is simple. I’m a disciple of Jesus and I believe in and follow the Bible. Period. Not gonna apologize for it. Some may not agree, but that’s another “random thoughts” for another day. As I said earlier though, Jesus died for me, so the least I can do is live my life for him. Yes, I make mistakes and I fall short, but I make every effort to change if I do; not making excuses about it, saying “Well, God will forgive me anyway” or “God knows my heart.” For those wondering what God says about sexual immorality, I’ll point you in the right direction. These aren’t the only scriptures that apply, by any means:

Luke 9:23
1 Corinthians 6
Galatians 5:19
Ephesians 5:3
Colossians 3:5
Hebrews 13:4

Now, on to how I do it. Let me start by saying that remaining abstinent is no easy task. I realize that, though I didn’t think so at the time, the fact that I was still a virgin when I decided to follow Jesus has helped a lot. I don’t know by experience of course, but I can imagine that having sex is like a drug; once you get a taste, you will always want more. One thing that keeps me straight is having a tight vice grip on my thoughts. Make no mistake about it; the fact that I’m a Christian does not make me any better than any other man. I struggle with the same nasty, perverted, pornographic, evil thoughts that all other men do. The only difference is that I make every effort to deny myself (see Luke 9:23). I can’t control whether those thoughts come or not, but I can control whether or not I act upon them. What you do is a product of your thoughts. Nothing that a person can do can take place without him having thought about it first. If I don’t think about it, I won’t put it into action. As I said, I can’t keep those thoughts from popping up initially, but I can choose to stop thinking them once they arrive. Many guys have asked me questions, such as: “Well, what if some girl just throws it at you?” “What if you’re alone with a woman and….” To this, I say look at 1 Corinthians 15:33. Yes, I do have friends and acquaintances who don’t share the same convictions as me. However, the people who I spend the majority of my time with are people who feel the same way I do.  My friends that don’t, they respect me enough to not pressure me into doing anything that I don’t want to, nor do they do anything around me that may tempt me into doing otherwise. There’s no way I could stay pure if all of my male friends are constantly asking me “Hey, did you hit that last night?” There’s no way I could stay pure if I knew that all of my female friends wouldn’t hesitate to give themselves up to me if given the right circumstance. I also keep in mind Proverbs 6:28. I pray that I will be strong enough to survive such a situation as a woman throwing herself at me, but an even smarter tactic is to not allow myself to even be in such a situation in the first place. How do I do this? Again, I don’t spend unnecessary time w/ women –let alone date them—who don’t respect my convictions (the Bible). I know myself –my flaws and tendencies—enough to know where I can and can’t go; what I can and can’t do in order to keep myself out of impure situations. No; I won’t say that I’ve been perfect in this, but I can say that the times that I have come close to crossing the line have given me stronger convictions on this.

So, there you have it. The almost 27 year old virgin, and the methods to my madness. Lord willing, I’ll get married long before I become eligible to star in the sequel of “The 40 Year-old Virgin.” I hope that those of you who read this were inspired and convicted. If for some reason you were made uncomfortable by any of this…. Well, there’s a reason why. I’ll let you figure that out.

**********UPDATE!!!**********

Wednesday, June 25 2014

On Saturday, March 1 2014, I proposed to the love of my life (who also happened to be an "endangered species") and we're set to be wed on September 20 of this year!