He's Just That Into You

You deserved to be pursued. Yes, you, the foxy lady reading this blog. You’re smart, gorgeous, and amazing. Men should be chasing you down every single day. But chances are… they aren’t. And I want to tell you that’s ok – because it is. But that’s hard to hear. And I’ve found that this is a growing concern I among my female friends – that men aren’t chasing them, and they don’t think this is ok. They want the whole princess fairytale ending thing, and if it doesn’t come to them, they’re going to go out and get it themselves.

Because if men aren’t going to take matters into their own hands we women should.

False.

Ladies, we are absolutely not supposed to chase men down. They pursue us. It’s in their very nature. Men are hunters. Kings of pursuit! They like to chase things. They get some sort of weird satisfaction from it. And once they’ve got what they’ve been chasing, they are very happy. Because they love to win. I bet it’s because winning usually results in super amazing prizes. And you, my dear, are one amazing prize.

One of my favorite quotes about men and the nature of pursuit is

from the book He’s Just Not That Into You. It says this:

“Many women have said to me, ‘Greg, men run the world.’ Wow. That makes us sound pretty capable. So tell me, why would you think we could be incapable of something as simple as picking up the phone and asking you out? You seem to think at times that we’re ‘too shy’ or we ‘just got out of something.’ Let me remind you: Men find it very satisfying to get what they want. (Particularly after a difficult day of running the world.) If we want you, we will find you.”

That seems pretty straightforward. I rest my case. You deserve to be pursued. Let the man pursue.

Now, while you’re hanging out being all awesome and cute and stuff, waiting around for that guy to come after you, I’d like to point out something else super important: you are already being pursued. Right now.

(No way?!)

Yeah. Check it out, Church Doctrine says: “The desire for God is written in the human heart, because man is created by God and for God; and God never ceases to draw man to himself” (Catechism of the Catholic Church (CCC) 27).

Did you catch that? I’m not sure if you really caught it. It was a pretty short quote. Let’s take a look at it again, a little closer this time: “God never ceases to draw man to himself.”

NEVER.

As in always.

As in non-stop.

As in dictionary.com’s definition: 1) not ever; at no time 2) not at all; absolutely not 3) to no extent or degree

To no extent or degree does God stop pursuing you!

And hey, let’s keep reading, because guess what? It gets better! CCC 27 goes on to say “Only in God will he find the truth and happiness he never stops searching for.”

Now wait a second. We need to pause here for just a minute, because I totally know what you are thinking. Your mind has been blown by the very definition of the word “never,” and you are pretty excited about that. But you might still be thinking something like, “you know Ash, I know God loves me and wants to be in a relationship with me. I got that covered. But I still think that if I just had the love of a man, I would be happy.” (don’t feel bad if you have these thoughts. I am guilty of having had them before too. Stay tuned!)

Oh hey 1 John 4:8, I think I almost missed you sitting there in the Bible being all awesome and one-liney and stuff. What’s that you say? “God is love?” Wait. God is, by biblical definition, love? And hang on, what’s that one super famous Bible verse… something about love… oh, yeah, 1 Corinthians 13? It goes on and on about love and all its qualities? Well, as Professor Rice once said to my class, “Why would you ever paraphrase Scripture? Who can say it better than God?” So without further ado:

“Love is patient and kind; love is not jealous or boastful; it is not arrogant or rude. Love does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrong, but rejoices in the right. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never ends…” 1 Corinthians 13:4-8

Ok. Now let’s process all of this. Here, I’ll even help break it down:

We want to be pursued? Check. God never ceases to do so.

We want to find love? Perfect, beautiful, blissful love, with a wonderful man who will do anything for us and we can live happily ever after with? Check, check, check. God is love. And he’s seeking us, right? And we have a definition of love from 1 Corinthians 13 that sounds pretty perfect to me… so therefore, one could draw the conclusion that (drum roll please) perfect, beautiful Love is seeking us out! Love from a wonderful man whose very essence is love! And guess what else? He is willing to do anything for us (even die!) so that we can spend eternity with him and live happily ever after in the heavenly kingdom of God!

P.S. You know who has kingdoms? Kings. And what exactly are the daughters of kings called? Oh yeah, princesses. So God has this kingdom… and he wants you there forever… his daughter whom he loves…because that would bring both you and him joy for all eternity. Check out Romans 8:15-17: “For all who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God. For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the spirit of sonship. When we cry ‘Abba! Father!’ it is the Spirit himself bearing witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs, heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, provided we suffer with him in order that we may also be glorified with him.” (spoiler alert: as a child of the Most High King… you’re a princess)

And hey, if love is calling on us, we should probably answer. We don’t just let our pals call us all the time and ignore them, right? We probably generally respond with something like “sure, I’ll hang out with you,” and from there we begin to develop a deeper relationship by spending time together doing friendly bonding activities. It works the same with the Lord; we’ve got to respond. And remember back in CCC 27 where it said that “only in God will he find truth and happiness”? Well CCC 30 says this too: “Although man can forget God or reject him, He never ceases to call every man to seek him, so as to find life and happiness.” Whoa. Even if we forget God, he still calls us to him because he still wants us to find happiness. I started thinking about that one. If someone forgets me, do I still call them unceasingly? I don’t know about you, but I all too often find myself thinking thoughts like a thinking thing that sound something like this: “Well, I’ve already invited this person out three times, and they declined every time, so they must not want to hang out; I’m done inviting.” God never does that. He never stops inviting us to love him back, and he never stops loving us. Holymoly. I don’t know about you, but I am a total slacker when it comes to loving.

I guess what I’m getting at is this: we all want the fairytale ending. We all want to be princesses who meet our handsome prince. He comes and sweeps us off our feet and takes us off into the sunset where we live happily ever after, and we just sit there looking pretty the whole time. Well, ladies, we have that! If we but let the Lord into our hearts we can have it right this very second! (Just don’t forget that God will never force you to love him; if you want this great gift, you have to say “yes” to the prince!)

I’d like to show you one last cool thing. Check this out:

What are the elements to a fairytale ending?

1)       Royalty – done. God is king. Jesus is Prince of Peace. Lord of Lords. Duke of Heaven (I made that last one up. Sorry, I couldn’t resist)

2)       A kingdom to ride off to at the end of the day – done. The kingdom of heaven, where happiness abides for all eternity. BOOM.

3)       A prince who seeks us out, no matter the cost – done. God wouldn’t care if he had to try shoes on every woman in the world. If it meant he could have you, he’d do it. Oh wait, you fell into a coma and everyone considers you dead? God can raise people from the death of sin to the life of grace! You’re trapped in a tower with your evil stepmother? God will take you from the clutches of evil every single time if you let him! You’re anatomically disadvantaged like Ariel? God can heal you and return you to your proper state of being! He has that power! Don’t sweep it under the rug Cinderella! (I don’t know about you, but I think I’m swooning over here …ijgarihgerhioarekjsjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjj Oh, sorry! Swooned right onto my keyboard. Moving on…)

4)       A prince who will never leave us – done. Must I define the word “never” again?

5)       A damsel in distress – done. Hello every girl in the world.

6)       A fiat – can be done. You just need to say yes.

7)       A happy ending – done. See above.

Did you see how God did that? Oh hey, God, you’re a super genius.

There’s only one problem left to resolve: we can’t fall in love with someone if we don’t allow ourselves to actually fall. Let Jesus sweep you off your feet. Let him lead you to your happily ever after in eternity. Let him show you what true, authentic, perfect love is. Let him pursue you, and you will find the fairytale ending you’ve been searching for.

Your swooning, fellow fairytale princess,

Ashley