Why Waiting Until Marriage Should be the Norm

Recently I came across an article about a Christian artist who I listen to quite frequently on the JoyFM radio station. Colton Dixon, an alum from American Idol, gave his testimony about how he and his wife remained abstinent up until their wedding day and how they are both very glad that they did. He gives his testimony to People magazine here.

It didn't take too long after him sharing his story for the negative comments to come flowing in on various message boards. We live in a highly sexual driven society, who also doesn't care one bit about God's standards or morals. It got me to thinking how sad it is that in today's society people actually think it's crazy or bizarre for a person to decide to stay a virgin until they get married. Not only is it backed up by God's Word,  but there are so many benefits in general of keeping yourself pure until the special day you get to say "I do" to your other half. I believe it's the best gift you can give to your spouse, by letting them know you waited just for them, for them to have one of the most intimate parts of you and for them only.

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And the fun continues! Five important things I've learned from 2 years of marriage so far.

So my husband and I  recently celebrated our 2^nd year anniversary on November 30^th!To be honest it feels like we have been married for much longer, it's just so super being married to him. On being married for 2 years with the love of my life I've recapped just 5 of the most vital things I've learned so far that helps to maintain a happy marriage.

      1. Prayer

Since being married I have noticed I pray a lot more than when I was single. This is true because not only do I need to constantly pray for the Lord to guide me, but I need to pray for my husband as well. There is no greater thing a wife can do for her husband than to constantly be praying for him. I pray for my husband when he’s at work, when he’s on the road and I also pray for my husband in general as he leads our household. Also if I’m feeling aggravated with my husband concerning an issue I go to God about it and ask Him to help me relieve me of my negative emotions. It’s nothing worse than acting out on your emotions in the heat of the moment. It will create an argument that can 100% be avoided if we go to God about it first instead of reacting immediately. Through prayer I've learned when to be quiet during disagreements and leave it in God’s hands to sort it out. This way my husband and I have learned how not to argue and instead talk things out with respect towards one another.

      2. Selflessness

When you decide to marry a person you are now agreeing to become one with them physically and spiritually. This means that their problems becomes yours and you can’t think of yourself first anymore. It’s really a beautiful thing when you can put someone before yourself. It’s similar to how Jesus tells us to lay down our lives for God. When you become selfless it’s much easier to become that spouse you need to be for your other half.

      3. Patience

Some of the things your spouse does may aggravate you, for example leaving their dirty socks laying around or snoring at night. But in all these things it’s important to be patient and not lash out on them about it. Learning patience has kept me from getting easily angered at my husband. Instead it makes me reflect on myself and how I can make the situation better and not worse.

      4. Romance

I've always been a romantic ever since I could remember. I knew when I got married I wanted a husband who did romantic things. My husband is a pretty practical guy, but lately he’s been doing these really sweet things for me J! Doing romantic things for one another keeps the spark alive and it adds to the tenderness in the marriage. Don’t forget to treat each other like the time when you were first pursing each other. Romance is not only for the husbands to do, but I also do romantic things for my husband as well, which shows him how special I still feel to be his wife!

      5.  Love

Last, but certainly not the least is that I've learned to love another more than I ever thought that I could. My love for my husband is beyond words. There's a oneness I feel with him that is truly beautiful. As I continue to love him and go through this journey of life with him I become a better person. God definitely gets the glory, because without God we wouldn't know what true love was. If you love your spouse you’re going to do anything in your will power to keep the marriage happy and flourishing. I love my husband so much and I’m excited for the many more years to come of being married to him!


God's Grace is Limitless,

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What's so sinful about having sex outside of marriage?

This is a question asked a lot, especially from those who are in “committed” relationships and they have children together. I see a growing trend in my generation. Many of the young people are having babies, yet there is only a household of one, generally it being a mother. And even if it is a household of two, the parents are not married for some reason or another. I am in no way writing this blog post to condemn anyone, I am writing it so I can express the beauty of marriage done God’s way and how it’s so important that if you label yourself as a Christian to live as one by doing things the way God designed for it to be. I am also writing this post so we can bring back Godly values to a dying generation who seem to be moving further and further away from God.

Many “Christians” think its OK to have sex and still call their selves “Christians” when they are not married to their sexual partner. I mean they love their partner’s right? Their doing no one any harm and most of all they are "committed".

The fact is is that these people are not really in fully committed relationships; rather they are in semi-committed relationships. And some of the reasons why marriage keeps being held off is at least one person in the relationship is not ready to commit, or maybe they are not sure if they want to spend the rest of their life with this one person, or simply put why would they buy a cow when they can milk it for free?

Another thing important to realize is that if we proclaim ourselves as Christians we need to understand that sex outside of marriage does cause harm. It causes harm to our spirits and most importantly is causes harm to our relationship with God. Sex is more than just an act of physical pleasure; it’s literally the bonding of two people mentally, emotionally and spiritually. It’s something so intimate and if done God’s way is so beautiful. God meant for sex to be done within a marriage between a husband and a wife, and that doesn't include engaged couples. The Bible says you must be married.

1 Corinthians 7:2 But because of the temptation to sexual immorality, each man should have his own wife and each woman her own husband.

Hebrews 13: 4 Marriage should be honored by all, and the marriage bed kept pure, for God will judge the adulterer and all the sexually immoral.

1 Corinthians 6:18 Flee from sexual immorality. All other sins a person commits are outside the body, but whoever sins sexually, sins against their own body.

1 Thessalonians 4:3 It is God's will that you should be sanctified: that you should avoid sexual immorality

Sexually immoral people in the Bible are described as those who can’t control themselves and are having sex with men/women who are not their spouse. If they couldn't control their flesh the Bible says it is better for that person to marry than for them to burn with lust (1 Corinthians 7:9). Premarital sex is a sin and if you are having it you are not in a good place with God, and it’s grieving His heart. He knows how precious you are and He doesn't want you selling yourself up short to please a human. God wants you to put Him first.

God designed sex for a husband and a wife for a reason. For one it saves a lot of emotionally heartache when you thought the person loved you for forever, but all they really wanted was sexual pleasure. The reasons why a lot of relationships don’t work are because they think sex is what’s going to keep someone. For a while sex will keep a lustful person, but after a while they get bored, the arguments start and you realize you aren't compatible. It’s because your relationship was based off of lust and not pure love. If a person sincerely loves you they will wait for your hand in marriage to join physically one with you by doing things God’s way.

Sex clouds a person’s judgment. When you know the person isn't right for you you still try to be with them because you have joined yourself to this person when you shouldn't have in the first place. Now you’re unhappy and struggling to make the relationship work, but it’s not going to work unless you start putting God first in it and serving God with your body.

A way you can tell if you are in a serious relationship based on love is by telling that person you will not have sex with them anymore until after you are married with them. If that person gets angry, doesn't understand and starts trying to convince you to change your mind, then that’s lust not love, and it reveals their true intentions. Their desire for you is conditional and based mainly on physical pleasure. Staying with this person will not help your relationship with God, but hinder it. That person is keeping you from a prosperous relationship with God and furthermore they don’t care about the eternity of your soul, all they care about is fulfilling their fleshly desire. That shouldn't be so.

The love of your life should love you no matter if he/she can have sex with you or not. Do things God’s way and see the positive changes it can have in your relationship. For one you should do things God’s way because you love Him, and as Christians we are to obey Him. My husband and I first started as sinners and argued constantly because we were doing things the devil’s way, but once we got saved we practiced abstinence and our relationship has never been better. It’s because we planted our relationship on solid ground by following God’s principles. Check out Our Not So Ordinary Courting Story.

I will leave you to ponder on some questions. Why can’t you give up sex for God? Has sex become your God? If so repent and move away from it. God forgives a sincere heart who cries out to Him and stops committing the act of sexual immorality. You can live the holy life God desires for you to live, which is a life worth pleasing to Him.

1 Thessalonians 4:4 that each of you should learn to control your own body in a way that is holy and honorable

Romans 12:2 Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is--his good, pleasing and perfect will.

It is with great love that I write this post. As Christians who love the Lord we live to please God, and not people. We can't call ourselves a child of God, but act like children of the devil. Value yourself and put God first. You can do this!

GOD’S GRACE IS LIMITLESS,

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What it's Like Being Young & Married So Far

So it’s almost been about 3 months married and I can honestly say that these last few months have been the best 3 months of my life so far. Being married young is awesome! Being married in general is a beautiful thing.  You should be so connected to that person that you can’t imagine life without them and you know without a shadow of a doubt that God created that person just for you and that they were created to be your spouse. When God created Khalid God was thinking about me and when God created me He was thinking about Khalid and how absolute we’d fit together.

There is not a day that goes by that Khalid doesn't make me laugh.  He is there always encouraging me and helping me to become all that I can be. He is always pushing me to God and he is patient with me. I don’t believe our marriage would be so peaceful if it hadn't been for us both giving our lives to God before we got married. Read our Courting story here if you haven’t already.

In our courting stage we decided to stop doing anything that was physical and we focused on getting to know each other as Spirit to Spirit, which is what we truly are. We are Spirits having a human experience in earthly bodies. If we are only attracted to someone because of their outer shell then it won’t work because you won’t know how to effectively communicate with that person and minister to who they really are by speaking life into their spirit.

I still get butterflies just holding his hand because I know how patiently I have waited to do so. Kissing him makes me warm with joy all over. I enjoy just lying in the bed being cuddled up with him, I love talking with him and him understanding me sometimes without me even having to say anything, when I might be feeling a little down he knows just what to say to lift my spirit again and when I am away from him it feels like a part of me is missing, I can’t stand it. I honestly believe without him I wouldn't be what I am today. Without any questioning I know God created us to be together. We have endless fun I am so blessed to be married to my best friend.

Here are a few questions I have received since being married.

Q: Is it any different being married?

A: Yes! It’s extremely different. For one there are no restrictions and we now get to be intimate with one another how God intended it to be within a marriage between a husband and a wife. Not only that, but I feel like we are extremely intertwined with one another. Now I understand what the Word means when it says two flesh become one. I truly feel like I am one with my husband because spiritually we are connected now because we made a covenant with God. I came from Khalid’s rib and no one else’s.

Genesis 2:24 For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and they will become one flesh.

Q: Have you had any big arguments yet?

A: As I said in my blog post Our Not So Ordinary Courting Story we don’t yell or argue, we talk things out if we don’t agree with something. I will admit there have been times when my flesh wanted to be prideful and stubborn, but those are the times when I have to seek God’s voice the most. He will tell me to listen to Khalid and apologize when I was in the wrong. Other than that my husband knows me and he knows how to handle me and keep me in check, and I can say the same about me for him too.

Q: How’s married life?

A: Lol, this is a no brainier question and I suppose we will get this question asked often in the beginning; hence the title of the post, but married life is awesome and I am so happy that God has placed us together, I feel extremely blessed to experience such a beautiful thing.

Other than that those are some common questions we get. If you have any other questions yourself feel free to ask. Of course with anything you have to put in work. I would say the best advice that I have for married couples is to communicate. It’s good to listen to your spouse and be genuinely concerned and interested with what they want to talk to you about, or if they are having something that they want your input about. Also you have to be on the same page to make it work. I wouldn't advise anyone to be unequally yoked. Be with a person who loves God the same as you do, if not even more so they will encourage you to go higher in God.

If your foundation is set on God it will be strong and unbreakable. Include God and God will bless it. You CAN do this!

                                                     Love and happiness, 

                                                            ♥Shaniqua

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Our Not So Ordinary Courting Story

So as you all may know I am married to Khalid Snowden, that fine guy in the above picture with me! My rock, my best friend, my lover, my one and only, my everything! Ahh, I just love that man! We actually got married November 30, 2012, exactly 2 months ago, so happy two month anniversary to us!!Yay! I know there is going to be plenty of more time for us to grow together and spend the best time of our lives together. I am so excited to spend this journey in life with him and for us to grow old together. I will discuss in another post on how we met…

To begin I want to share a testimony of how God completely changed our lives. When we first got together we weren't saved in the least. It was our senior year of High school and then we both decided to move in together with roommates that we knew for our first 2 years of college. Mind you we were raging sinful teens when we first started to date and didn't do things God’s way at all. And let me just tell you this doing things your own way is NEVER a great option and it will always, always lead to destruction. It is NEVER OK to put your girlfriend or boyfriend before Christ. We submitted to the lust of the flesh and disregarded God’s law. And as the consequence of our sins this lead to many arguments and break ups to make ups. It was like there wasn't a day that went by that we wouldn't be going off on each other. And then when we did get saved at one point we were kind of up and down with that too, we were like those “sorta, kinda Christians.”

Finally there came a point to when the arguments ceased for a bit after a really big argument had escalated. We decided we should really start maturing if we really loved one another. We started loving God more than we loved each other and we wanted to begin taking our walk with God seriously. God convicted us that if we were going to profess to be Christians it was high time that we started acting as ones. God became number one in our lives and we really started to serve Him. We made the decision to stop dating and start courting. There is a difference between the two and I will also be making a post on that topic later as well.

When we started courting it took some getting used to at first, but God’s grace is truly sufficient. Through His grace we were able to break the power of the lust of the flesh. We were still room mating with friends at the time. It was a 3 bedroom apartment with four people. But being now committed to our relationship with Christ we started taking turns sleeping on the couch. We stopped kissing and even stopped holding hands. He wanted to wait until we were married to kiss because kisses are powerful and can lead to something more that you have no business doing until marriage. Read my article here concerning the The Power of a Kiss.

I saw a real change in my now husband. He inspired me and encouraged me to run after God with my full heart even more, as he still does to this very day. His love for God and his servitude for God truly amaze me.

And as a reward of being obedient to God and doing things His way we reaped the benefits. We learned how to talk things out if we disagreed with anything instead of arguing. We actually don’t argue anymore, and by argue I mean yelling at each other and disrespecting one another. We do have disagreements, but we talk them out with respect versus arguing. At first I thought this was impossible when my pastor would say to the church that her and her husband never argues. I thought “as if!” But after taking the psychical aspect out of the relationship we learned one another and we begin to know each other from spirit to spirit instead of flesh to flesh. We have to remember we are not human beings having a spiritual experience, but we are spirits in a human body having a human experience. If you can’t get to know a person from their spirit and it always requires something psychical then your love for them is conditional. You love the feeling and not the person because their spirit, which is who they really are, should be enough to satisfy you to the point of no fornication.

Us in our courting stage, notice the space between us, lol.

We did make the huge mistake of moving into a 2 bedroom 2 bathroom because we couldn't find any roommates that we could separately roommate with when our lease was finally up with our previous roommates. Our previous roommates decided to get their own places so that option was off the list. It was still a new city for us at the time, because we moved from our hometown to go to college. We didn't want a stranger because we didn't want to go through the nightmare of having a complete stranger who was an immature college kid. Granted, we regretted moving in together to the point that we became willing to move in with a perfect stranger even if they turned out to be psycho. We just wanted to please God and not allow what is good to be spoken evil of.

Even so we couldn't change the matter. We couldn't move back home with our parents since they lived so far away and we couldn't break the lease. We decided we were going to continue to keep our boundaries. We still wanted to live for God because that was our first heart's desire is to please Him. We made the mistake of moving in together, but we were still going to be accountable, and we weren't going to be having sex outside of marriage and sinning against God. We did tell our pastor about it, because we didn't want to hide something like that away from our leaders. Of course she didn't encourage it, but God confirmed to her that we were setting boundaries and not fornicating, she saw the love we had for God and our actions did match up with our words.

So how were we able to live together without fornication? We SET boundaries and we KEPT them!

1.       We always kept God First.

Before there is Khalid there is God, and before there is Shaniqua there is God. We love Him more than we love each other so in that way we respected and honored His ways before our own. His ways actually became a part of us because we loved Him so much.

2.       We slept separately in separate beds.

You can’t expect to fight off temptation but invite it into your bed.

3.       We did not walk around naked or in boxers.

My body was not officially his yet so in order for him to see the goodies, we had to be married first, flaunting off your stuff inevitably causes lust, point blank and we can't cause others to stumble. 

4.       We didn't kiss, hold hands or get intimate in any type of way.

We kept away all that would lead to temptation.

Of course there were people who talked about us and didn't believe we were keeping ourselves pure, but I learned to tune them out. As long as we were staying abstinent and God and my Pastor knew that we were, then we were holding ourselves responsible. Let’s get this clear, I am in NO WAY CONDONING for couples to live together before marriage. That does not please God. This is just my testimony and one that I hope can help others from making the same mistake, or if you are in a similar situation without any type of way to get out of it, that you can still put God first and remain abstinent before marriage. Whether you have backslidden or slipped up, it’s never too late to start living for God, God can grab you out of any mess and turn it into a beautiful message, but we have to at some point stop the backsliding and the back and forth and remain faithful to Him because the word says in John 14:15 If you love me, you will obey what I command.

While living together we learned the power of God's grace and how it can keep you. We didn't allow for there to be any temptations. We didn't allow for each other to kiss one another, or fondle one another. We were basically living as roommates. Of course I was excited for the day for us to marry, but I didn't let my mind wander to that far in time. I wasn't going to open the door for the enemy even one bit because my heart, mind, body and soul belonged to Jesus. If I claimed to love Him, I was going to obey Him like His Word says.

Courting removes all of the psychical and places it on what’s inside of the person; their thoughts, their ways, their future. And once Christ became a part of us I loved what was inside of my now husband even more. Words can’t even describe how much I love Him. I am so glad God came into our lives and turned everything new for His glory.

We kept off marriage for awhile because we were college kids dependent on financial aid, we weren't sure if the aid was going to get reduced or cut off if we got married so we originally set a date for 2013. Then we started discussing it with one another again and decided why wait? It wasn't because we were struggling, like I said the barriers we placed plus God’s grace helped us not to struggle with lusting after one another. We didn't want to wait anymore because our source came from God, not financial aid. And also God was taking us higher in Him and in ministry. We didn't advise such a thing for anyone to live with their boyfriends/girlfriends and we didn't want our good to be spoken evil of. Not to mention we didn't want to look like the world and do what the world does. Nowadays people think it's OK to move in before marriage, but that's not so. Besides we loved one another, was equally yoked and on the same page so marriage was just a natural thing for us to do.

God was so gracious to us while we lived together because He saw our dedication to serve Him. We weren't going to let our mistake steer us off the path of righteousness. We were going to obey God and do as He said by honoring His word.

When we got married everything felt like new. Our marriage day was the best and most joyful day of my life, besides the day I invited Jesus into my heart. We didn't put on a grand show for our wedding, that will come later, but everyday with him is already like a celebration. So here starts a new journey and as always God will be leading the way. And I know wherever God leads, my husband and I are headed in a good place to give Him the glory.

So honor God through everything you do and I can guarantee you that you’ll reap the great benefits He has for you if you obey Him. There is so much great things God has in store for my husband and I, and it all starts with obedience. Stay strong and be encouraged. You CAN do this!

Love and happiness, 

♥Shaniqua

Throwback pic of us. My have we grown.

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