The problem with idolizing someone as “the perfect Christian woman” is that once you get past the “image” you have made/desired them to be in your head, the REAL person has real emotions, real fears, and REAL flaws. She’s all the way human, all the way still being worked on by her Maker, all the way a person with a past, though no longer walking in it. There’s no perfect woman (shout-out to the Proverbs 31 woman). That’s why coveting another’s wife/marriage is not just sin, but also FOLLY.
It’s never just about you finding your good thing, being able to show someone off, and getting what you desire or have prayed for (even when she seems to fit the bill). It just isn’t. That woman you really desire, her heart requires something: UNCONDITIONAL love!!!
To be loved how Christ loves the Church (because oh how the Church needs grace!), to be shown mercy; to have her flaws and offenses covered and forgiven; to be pursued and called beautiful when many parts of her are not; to be covered and protected with genuine masculine love that is strong AND safe: THAT’S LOVE. That’s the Christ-Church relationship marriage is supposed to reflect. Walking together through and despite the ugly parts, beauty instead of and despite ashes. Perfection needs no grace!
Please don’t grasp at women for your own benefit, without care, concern, or a readiness to love. At that point you’ve become completely unsafe.
“If I could speak all the languages of earth and of angels, but didn’t love others, I would only be a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. If I had the gift of prophecy, and if I understood all of God’s secret plans and possessed all knowledge, and if I had such faith that I could move mountains, but didn’t love others, I would be nothing. If I gave everything I have to the poor and even sacrificed my body, I could boast about it; but if I didn’t love others, I would have gained nothing.”
1 Corinthians 13:1-3 NLT
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