![Ask Anything Q&A: Jewish Feasts, Friendships with Non-Christians [Transcribed]](https://phyliciamasonheimer.com/wp-content/uploads/roberto-nickson-vRAYwESFc-U-unsplash-400x250.jpg)
Every few episodes in our current podcast series is a quick compilation of Ask Anything Monday questions. I answer these rapid fire, covering a range of ideas and topics sent in by you! In this episode, we talk about:
dating for experience versus dating for marriage
friendships with non Christians
why charismatics are accused of being New Age
the origins of Mennonite churches
![Relational Barrenness, Singleness, & Discipleship [The Women’s Issues Series]](https://phyliciamasonheimer.com/wp-content/uploads/jess-bailey-K9BOrwoFVYc-unsplash-400x250.jpg)
Why is singleness treated like a second class status? Or a holding pattern until life really begins?
Is contentment an equation to get a relationship?Â
Is singleness really a gift?
How can marrieds bless the singles in their lives?
For many Christian girls, the boundaries in dating are fluid and ever-changing. How far you go depends on who you are with, and the standards of purity are, well, fifty shades of gray.
![How God Sees My Body [The Women’s Issues Series]](https://phyliciamasonheimer.com/wp-content/uploads/septian-simon-OWSC2LRuO8U-unsplash-400x250.jpg)
In this episode of the women’s issues series on Verity, we talk about the biblical view of the body, why it plays into the theology of resurrection, and how it affects our view of female sexuality.
I recently shared an older post of mine – one I wrote shortly after I got married. It’s the story of why I waited until my wedding day to lose my virginity, and I why I did so with no regrets. Shortly after I received a comment: “I like this article, but the title indicates you lose your purity when you get married.”
This statement, though well-intentioned, reveals the problem we face in the church today. Today’s Christian culture treats virginity as equal to purity, when they are not the same thing at all.
Dear church, you’re wrong about sex.
Not all the time – but a lot of the time. There’s been some truth sprinkled here and there. There’ve been some speakers and ministries who’ve done this tender topic the justice it deserves. But in general, the sexual narrative Christian women have heard over the last four decades is not one of gospel freedom. It is a message burdened by fear, guilt, shame, and legalism – sometimes all of these at once. It’s why Christian girls are done with courtship culture. It’s why many are fleeing legalism and others flee the church. Through one ear, women are being taught about the love and grace of Jesus Christ, while into the other pour proof-texted, fear-based half-truths about female sexuality.
I'm a product of "purity culture". I wore the ring, read the books, and didn't date in high school. I could tell you...
Like almost everything else I write about on this blog (kissing, dating standards, modesty, submission, men), there are two extreme camps on this issue. One implies women should spend life in their living rooms, skip college, and wait for a man who pursues them. The other vouches for ’empowerment’: citing ‘equality’ as reason enough for women to ask men out on a date the same way a man would ask a woman. Women are encouraged to pursue men and make their availability wantonly clear.
And there we are, God’s women, sitting in between these two camps: one piously citing faith in a very unseen suitor, the other out every evening with a different guy.
What’s a girl to do?
In this episode, we kick off a series that will teach us how to discern false teachings within Christianity. Discover...