One of the joys for us as “mature” (PC for “old”) students at a place like Westminster is being around young people. Karyn and I have long felt drawn toward the college/grad school age group, and continue to have some of our deepest and most rewarding relationships with people in that stage of life.

Some of those young friends have persisted in staying in touch with us even as we’ve moved from place to place. Among the dearest is Michaela Forbes, presently living, learning, and ministering in Scotland. From the first time we met her, we’ve viewed her as a “kindred spirit.”

When you spend a lot of time around twentysomethings, it’s inevitable that the topic of boy-girl relationships, and marriage in particular, comes up. Karyn and I sometimes find ourselves discussing a certain wonderful young single person and agreeing that we can’t believe no one has “snatched up that one” yet.

Michaela is one of those. One of the ones we can’t believe hasn’t already been taken by some wonderful, adventurous, Christ-infatuated, intelligent (and heck, good looking to boot!) young man.

So it is tonight that I have opened the Sacred Journey to dear Mic as her personal ISO ad to the world of eligible young Reformed guys. I’ve decided to print what she’s written exactly as she wrote it because…well…because it is who she is.

As Mic will explain, this is half tongue-in-cheek…but that leaves the other half of the cheek very open and perhaps serious in intent. If you read this and don’t unsubscribe your feed to my blog, perhaps you are the man Michaela dreams of. All inquiries may be sent in strictest confidence to me at trappermark AT gmail DOT com. I will forward them on to Mic. Her very entertaining blog is This Beautiful Mess. And now, with no further introduction…here’s Michaela!

———————————–

A Good Man Is Hard To Find

Hi, my name is Michaela, and I’m a single white female.

I am your guest blogger today here on Sacred Journey.

If you’ve visited here at all before, or if you are lucky enough to know Mark and Karyn in person, you’ll already know they are two of the greatest people, ever, on the planet. If I had the opportunity to pick my parents when I was born, and my parents were already taken by some other little brat, The Traps would be my choice, no question.

As most “adopted” parents, the Traps are constantly trying to get me married off. Each Thanksgiving, Christmas, Easter, Martin Luther King Jr Day, and National Pancake Day, we gather round the table to the ringing chorus of “Why aren’t you married yet?!” Or, I’m sure we would, if I ever went to their place for the Holidays.

Actually, I exaggerate a little bit. The reality of it is – and if you ever repeat this, I will deny it to my death – I’m just aware that the Traps know all kinds of attractive and marriable Reformed men. And I’m the one bringing this up in conversation with them. In one such conversation yesterday with Mark, he tells me:

“Hey, we tried to get you to come to Westy. Your mistake, honey. Guy ratio is still probably 30 to 1 here, and our guys never wear skirts or take you out to eat food made from cow’s bladders. Karyn and I keep meeting fantastic, handsome, intelligent young Reformed guys (who aren’t Reformed jerk types) here about whom we say, “oooh…that woulda been a nice one for Michaela!”

I’m not sure what’s worse….living in a country (Scotland – hence Mark’s comment on guys wearing skirts and eating food made from cow’s bladders) where there are few Christian men, or knowing that somewhere in the world, there’s a couple meeting guys FOR you, who are apparently suited to you, but whom you will never meet.

A few months ago, I joined the discussion here on Sacred Journey about Dr. Enns’ book, Inspiration and Incarnation. I was later told that no less than three eliglible bachelors asked The Sage about me. Nice and all, but does me no good, really, since I never heard from them.

Soon after, Mark suggested I post an ad up on the campus at Westminster. At the time, I was on my way to begin my MTh at Covenant Seminary, so surely I’d meet a guy there….right? Thanks Mark, but I mean…I’m not quite that desperate yet. So I passed on that idea.

Which brings us to…yesterday. Mark and I were discussing our Reformed Super-Powers. He claims his is Super-Offensiveness. Mine is Smoking. (That’s right, I said it. I enjoy a good pipe, cigar, or even a cigarette now and then. Run away now!!) He proceeds to tell me that he and Karyn discussed setting me up with someone whose Reformed Super-Power was Drinking, as our combined powers would have “…been known to send the Fiendish Fundamentalist screaming back to his lair deep beneath the Bob Jones University Prayer Chapel!” But then, the one in mind up and got engaged, so they kinda failed at that.

The new idea from Mark:

Tell you what. You want to write a guest post on my blog? I guarantee you three marriage proposals in 24 hours!

So there you go. I’ve now spent one half-hour of my life and half the entire essay justifying this post, which is sure to be read by brilliant professors and authors and defenders of the faith at WTS, which is all about finding me, Michaela Forbes, a nice Reformed man.

(Please note this is mostly tongue-in-cheek. I’m not *quite* over-the-hill yet, though in many Reformed/Christian circles, I may well be. I should be working on having my 3rd child by now. But I’m not that worried. Yet. Please note too, that this little reminder comes not just from me, but from many such women like myself. You probably know some of them, and may even be thinking of asking her out. Go ahead and do it – because we don’t like pansies.)

FIRST THINGS FIRST!

The basics.

You already know the name. I’m 24, I have a Bachelor of the Arts in Youthwork with Applied Theology from International Christian College in Glasgow, Scotland. I live in Edinburgh, Scotland, the most beautiful city in the world….but I have yet to decide to stay here for the rest of my life. I’m here for now. Fingers-crossed-God-willing I hope to start getting my Masters of Theology – Urban Ministry from the University of Aberdeen here shortly. (If that falls through, I may eventually head back to Covenant Seminary, where I was, as mentioned, offered a place.) I love kids, especially the particularly bratty ones. I love the city. I love telling bratty kids in the city about Jesus.

I’m 5’11, which is enough to scare off most males.

I live in Scotland, but wasn’t raised here. I grew up in Kansas City, Missouri. After high school, it was either become a missionary or join the circus. I became a missionary, not knowing that it was basically the same thing. I traveled Asia and Africa for two years, and loved it. Then I came to Scotland, and fell in love with the place.

That’s the basics.

SECOND THINGS….SECOND!

Hello, Mr Reformed Hottie Dude. You know who you are. No, not you. You. Right. Listen here, this is *not* how our date will go.

1. We will not take a long walk on the beach. I like beaches and all, I do – but as a man once said: “Sand is overrated. It’s just tiny little rocks.” You can be more creative than that, I assure you.

2. We will not discuss I Kissed Dating Goodbye, Wild At Heart, Passion and Purity, Captivating, I Gave Dating a Chance or any other books on dating or singleness or the like. It’s been done. A lot. I’ve also put a hold on all discussion about Blue Like Jazz, but that’s just because Mark talks about it a lot, that may be revoked at a later date. Any reference to “Sexy Carrot” or “Penguin Sex” will be met with a disapproving glare for the time being.

3. We are not going to talk about your thesis project longer than 15 minutes. I’m interested, but I’m not your tutor. Besides, it’s likely all I can do is shake my head in approval at your treatment of “Belsham’s Socinian Influence on the Feminist Liberation Theology Movement in Eastern Belgium in the 1940’s”, because I’ll have no idea what you’re talking about. I’m sure it’s fascinating, though. If we make it through to, say, a 5th date, I may even read what you have down so far.

4. We aren’t going to talk about Tom Cruise or Katie Homes.

5. We aren’t going to go through your Hebrew or Greek flashcards.

6. We aren’t going to try to convert the waitress/theatre patron/man on the street to Calvinism. This would indicate to me that you are still in your “cage stage” and we should probably hold off on any further dating til you’ve worked through that. Any reference to “Accepting Calvin into your heart today” will end the date.

7. I don’t want to hear about how much more intelligent you are than all those Arminians and/or Emergents out there. This will, of course, be thinly disguised under some mumbing about your being totally depraved and all that, but I don’t buy it.

8. We are not going to sit in your apartment and sing Indelible Grace or Derek Webb songs. This comes only after the engagement.

I reserve the right to add anything to this list as nessessary.

I know the absence of these staples may frighten you, but you need not be. Just think of all the other possibilities there are. We can go to the local pub and drink beer and smoke cigars. I know a great place in St Louis, and I happen to think I’m a bit of a connessouir of both beer and Scotch whisky. We can eat at a greasy-spoon that is open all night and hires only overly-tattooed waitresses. We can talk about where each of us has been and where we want to go. We can talk theology (staying carefully away from your thesis, of course) and maybe even fight over it til one of us once to go home, and the other one relents, because the night was actually going so well. We can joke about how hard it is to be humble when you are as good-looking as we are, but we will secretly both know we are riddled with a million insecurities. We can sit on the roof of an old building downtown and eat cheesesteaks and talk about how insanely brilliant Bill Murray is, particularly in Wes Anderson films. We could visit a modern art gallery and discuss the stuff we like, pretend like we know what we are talking about, and make fun of the blatently ridiculous crap.

If we make it to a second or third or fourth date, we can talk about our brokenness and our desperate need for God and for community. And we can talk about it more honestly than we could have at first, because we’re less afraid of the other person running away.

And we might make it to a 32nd or 33rd date, and one of us will probably break up with the other. Something or rather about distance or not being ready for an actual relationship that takes risk, or just plain not liking the other person as much as we thought. Because let’s face it – only one of these relationships ever works out for the long-run.

But then maybe we won’t, and maybe I’ll stick around to see that ridiculous thesis get published.

A wise woman once said, a good man is hard to find.

——————

Read more of Michaela at her blog: This Beautiful Mess

This entry was posted on Sunday, March 12th, 2006 at 8:24 pm and is filed under Christian Community, Family & Friends. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.