Words with Wise Women (Continued...)
The last Wise Woman in this series of interviews is Deanna Bridges! (She was our cover girl for The Beauty Issue.)
COB: You chose not to date and go to wild parties as a teen. Why did you make that choice?
Deanna: Let me admit - I have always desired to fit in. Whatever the popular kids liked to do, I wanted to do. Parties, clubs, you know...all the things the world light up as so much fun. On top of needing acceptance, affirmation and trying to find it by fitting into the “in” crowd, I have always loved to dance. I convinced myself and my parents that it was absolutely okay to
"club" because I just wanted to dance. (I didn’t tell them "how" I was dancing, then they would have forbidden me to go). Yes, I had a relationship with Jesus, but looking back it was very much at a surface level. When you “grow up in church” you know all the right things to do. I found myself doing the motions (going to church, and reading my Bible out of chore or habbit) and saying the right things. A dangerous game. If you truly do know Jesus, He will begin to make you aware of unhealthy choices and convict you of sin. Is clubbing a sin? Not necessarily, but it is spiritually unhealthy and can weaken your testimony. I don’t want to be one who merely talks the talk. I want my words, my clothes, my actions, where I go, and how I carry myself to clearly say, “This girl is madly in love with Jesus!”
That's why I stopped clubbing. But this is why I stopped dating.
After being so moved by my parents’ “true love waits” story, and knowing that it was God’s plan that His children remain pure until marriage, I decided to wait. The guys in High School didn’t care to date me because they couldn’t have all of me. I really wanted to date. That was the cool thing to do. Here goes my fight again to fit in. Finally, I had a guy come by who was willing to respect my decision of purity. He was Latin, and oh so fun! After 2 years of dating, the ending of that relationship threw me into a whirlwind of downward emotion. I became depressed. Seriously? Over a break-up? But it all felt so real. Then one morning this hit me: GOD IS NOT THE AUTHOR OF DEPRESSION. That was my wake-up call. No more pity party! I made this conclusion:
If God doesn’t want me depressed, and it’s dating that led to a break-up which caused my
depression, I need to stay away from casually dating someone I will never marry.
Wa-lah! That made perfect sense.
Consumed in heart-ache and sadness, I cried out to God, “I never want to date again UNLESS it’s the man that will be by my side forever!” That was a prayer that God wanted for me, and He answered. Six years went by, and God was faithful to be my dearest friend. Jesus kept me focused on Him until He brought along my handsome Jerry.
COB: What was it like to finally meet and marry your husband?
Deanna: Oh wow, I felt it would never happen. Usually the way you think you’ll meet your Mr. Right will not be the way it happens. I had always thought blind dates were strange. Not anymore! Thank the Good Lord for blind dates, haha! Here’s my story...
I was working my first “real” job out of graduate school as a Nursing Home Administrator. From time to time, my friend Amy would come by, marketing her company’s home-care hospice services. One day she decided to market her single brother! Amy planned a blind-date lunch with the three of us. He was nice, but it was pretty awkward. Jerry was nervous. Really, you mean I can make a guy who is nine years older than me nervous? Afterwards, I just didn’t think he was the one. I guess it was more strange than anything, and I wasn’t feeling it.
After three weeks of being pursued, which every girl loves, I gave into an evening date…just the two of us. I’m not sure if it was the night sky, Jerry’s little red pick-up truck that snuggled us, or those amazing deep conversations where it seemed my soul was hugging his…or a combination
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