Saving Your First Kiss

“Actually”, she said with confidence, “I’m saving my first kiss for my wedding day”.

I’ve heard my daughter say this dozens of times.  And while it’s been met with positivity, that doesn’t happen often.  The feedback is usually quite disappointing.  Normally the response she receives is laughter, ridicule and mocking.  She has been on the receiving end of many jokes because of it.  She has been not only made fun of, but been mean to because of it.  And she has had friends make it their mission to get her to kiss before her wedding day.

She’s heard statements of  “What? That’s crazy!”, “You’ll change your mind once you start dating” and she’s even heard “You’ll never get a man that way”.

I’m just going to be honest here, I didn’t save my first kiss for my wedding day.  As I’ve said before, I wish I had heard that not kissing until marriage was an option.  I wish I had heard that purity was beautiful.  Valuable.  Precious.  An amazing gift given to us by God to give to our spouse.  I wish purity had been a bigger topic among my circle.  I wish I had been told that God’s grace is bigger than the choices we make.  I wish we had been talked to instead of talked at.

I’ve always been open and honest with my children (age appropriate of course).  Throughout the years during our talks I took the things I wished were different, and the lessons I had learned, and coupled that with God’s Word.  We were also blessed while she was growing up to have an amazing all-girl program at church called Daughters of the King, led by our Pastor’s wife.

During that time, God set it in my daughters heart to save her first kiss for her future husband on the day of their wedding.

We live in a day and age where kissing is the norm for elementary schoolers.  Losing your virginity in, or by, high school is expected.  Because of that culture it seems absurd and ridiculous that anyone would possibly save their first kiss for marriage.

Kissing is a gray area.  You won’t find a single spot in the Bible that says “Thou shalt not kiss”.  And because of that, we are left to seek biblical wisdom along the relationship journey.  Gray areas are not subjects where God has simply forgotten to give us insight and direction.  These are areas where God leaves room for difference and invites us into personal conversation with Him to determine how best to follow Him in these areas in our lives.  Each one of us has different convictions that God has laid on our hearts for the gray areas.  You will have to seek wisdom, study God’s Word, pray and discuss with your boyfriend what standards and boundaries you will put in place.

Just know if you choose safe standards, you are bound to hear backlash and criticism from friends and relatives.  Sometimes even strangers will chime in when they overhear a conversation.

But you have to remember that your decision is a good thing!

Instead of viewing your kiss as something meaningless and cheap, I want to challenge you to view it as a very expensive treasure box.  It’s your job to keep your treasure safe until the person with the right key comes to unlock it.

If you are deciding to save your first kiss my encouragement to you is don’t give up.  Don’t let the world tell you that’s dumb.  Don’t get scared when people ask you why.  Please don’t compromise your convictions based on peer pressure or others’ expectations.  If you want to save your first kiss for marriage, do it because you want to and because you feel God calling you to do so.  Stand firm on that decision.

And don’t be ashamed of it!

I also want to encourage those around someone that is saving their first kiss.

We want our kids to enjoy healthy relationships placed in the hands of God.  Relationships that focus on drawing closer together emotionally and spiritually before they enjoy the physical part of their relationship that is reserved only for marriage.

While saving your first kiss for your wedding day is clearly not popular, that doesn’t mean it’s wrong.  It just means they are following what God has called them to do.  They aren’t weak, naive or inexperienced.  Are we really going to fault these kids for following what God has set in their heart?

And those of you who are saving your kiss, please don’t look down on those who aren’t.  Saving your kiss doesn’t gain you salvation.  And kissing while you’re dating isn’t a sin.  Those who choose to kiss before marriage just don’t share the same convictions you do, which isn’t a bad thing.  We all have different convictions laid on our hearts by God.

I want you to remember, you don’t have to kiss frogs to find princes.  Princes don’t need physical confirmation of a woman’s value.  They already value you for who you are.  We need to recognize the kiss as an incredible gift that God has given each one of us to fully embrace and enjoy in the right context.  Instead of lowering its value and blowing it off as just-a-kiss let’s view it as a precious, sacred gift.