Choosing Love by Heidi Johnston
Have you ever wanted to explain to someone you know what marriage is really about? Or why it is important to take ‘being unevenly yoked’ so seriously? Heidi Johnston’s wisdom and patience come through with clarity and conviction as she gives biblical and common sense advice to girls and women who are looking for love. In the second half of the book she does have ‘the sex chapter’ but the one that she really wants you to read, even if you don’t read any others, is chapter eleven about finding satisfaction in God.
I really think that Johnston has drawn together all the threads and given a clear explanation of God’s way of approaching romantic relationships. In chapter six she explains how understanding covenants in the Bible helps us to understand God’s design for marriage. This lays the foundations for explaining how sex and marriage go together. But she also takes the time to beautifully and compassionately acknowledge the impact of broken covenants.
In chapter seven ’The Truth About Sex’, Johnston busts common myths like '“God disapproves of Sex” and “Sex is just something you do with your body”. She explains how sex is an expression of the covenant of marriage and that it was never meant to be separated. She reminds us that when we make mistakes there is forgiveness and restoration available from God in this area of our lives.
One of the chapters that I found most compelling was chapter eight ‘The Power of Home’. It is here that Johnston really explains why we need to take being ‘yoked’ together to another person so seriously. If a marriage and then a family is where we remind each other of God’s word and we also share God with others, then
“When we understand what is at stake and have a vision of the kind of home we want to build someday, it will make us think carefully about who we choose to share our lives with.” p82
I know that many young women have been given unhelpful books and unhelpful advice on relationships and on marriage. And many women have been given kind, loving and gospel centred advice. I hope that reading this book will help many of us to give that well thought out and God centred advice. Reading it together and discussing the study questions would be even better. In a culture saturated with romance, sex and relationships, it is refreshing to hear a wise, patient and clear voice calling us to look to God for love first, before we get caught up in emotions and loose our way.
“If we spend our lives watching the horizon, desperately searching for our dream guy, the tragedy is that we miss the God who is right beside us, ready to give us the very satisfaction we are longing for.”
Meet Rachael Collins
Rachael is a follower of Jesus. Her friends are endeared and baffled in equal measure by her obsession with all things Jane Austen. In between helping a new church plant to grow and making chocolate fudge, she really hopes to read some good books this year.