Summer, 1971, I was 16 going on 13. In terms of maturity and intellectual development I was 16 going on 13 or maybe 11 or 12. Physically, I was a six-footer, 16 going on 17 with an August birthday at hand. I decided I wanted to have a sexual experience before I turned seventeen. It seemed to me like the viral guys my age, the popular athletes were getting that sort of affirmation and I wanted some. Such are the sins and foibles of adolescent male longing.
My older brother had subscribed to Playboy magazine through which I browsed, and I found lots of porn in ditches along the road here and there, so I had the wrong kind of information and introduction to sexuality, but I wanted the actual experience, the badge of honor of teenage tough guys, a sexual conquest. Even though I was a good-looking kid, I was not popular or well-liked in my high school subculture and I had limited resources for carousing.
An idea came to me. I would pray to God and ask Him to fulfill my desire. I had no faith in God at that time. I did not grow up going to church. I had gone to a Nazarene church voluntarily when 10 – 12 years old but the bible studies and sermons, the spiritual ideas had mostly bounced off my head. I did not have faith, did not understand Christianity, just possessed an unverified set of poorly formed Christian ideas. I wanted to see if God exists which was a prevalent thought and question in my mind as a teenage boy. I thought I will pose this to God. It seemed to me from all I had heard about the Christian God that He wants people to believe in Him even though He mostly remains silent and invisible. It also seemed to me from my limited repository of bible ideas that God had strict laws and limits regarding human sexuality. Therefore, I would ask God to fulfill my desire for a sexual experience and see if it were more important to God to verify to my mind that He existed or would God do nothing to fulfill my desire because of the divine laws and standards pertaining to sexuality which He Himself wills humanity to follow. I was playing moral and theological chess with God. I also reasoned that Satan would not do anything to fulfill my desire because Satan wants humankind to not believe in God. Therefore, if I were to have a sexual experience God, not Satan would have to arrange it. That I was spiritually naïve in my reasoning, but of course. I was trying to compel God and or Satan to do or not do various things. That summer of 1971 I expressed all this in a prayer to God then waited for a result.
A week or two after this private prayer session I got a phone call from a girl I met at a high school sporting event when I was a sophomore. She was 2 years older than me, unwed and already had a child. We hooked up and I had my sexual experience. It was dreadful. I was terrified, of making her pregnant, of STDs. The experience was entirely negative but, as God is my witness, it happened.
I share this anecdote to promote experimentation with prayer. God exists. As Jesus said to His disciples, “The very hairs of your head are numbered.” Such is the granularity of God’s administration of our lives. God listens for our prayers. I want to challenge you whoever you are who may have stumbled upon these words. If you have no faith in the Judeo-Christian God, put Him to the test, not with the sinful intent of an adolescent boy but with the spiritual intent of an adult mind seeking God and truth. Do not approach God with the expectation that He will perform for you like Santa Clause. Consider, God is God. Approach God with humility and reverence. Talk to Him even if it feels like you are talking to yourself. Experiment with His existence. Expand involvement with Him in spiritual commerce. You will be amazed. My God wrought sexual experience did not immediately bring me to Christian faith. It took two more years before the Spirit of God informed my mind and brought me across the threshold of faith. Pray, I beseech you, talk to God and see what transpires. Pray and pray again with a bit of diligence. He stands at the door and knocks. Open your heart and mind to Him. One more thing, God will give you what you need which may not be what you want. Get over it. Lol Why have I shared my sordid personal experience? David’s sin with Bathsheba has been paraded through 3000 years of human history for our instruction. His object lesson instructs to this day. It does not really matter what anyone thinks of me. God exists. That matters. Get with the program.
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