Elisabeth Elliot: It's human nature for us to want to be loved, and it's reasonable and right that we should want to be loved. But it's much more important that we should learn to love.

Lisa Barry: It's very common these days to find single adults who essentially put their lives on hold while waiting for God to bring them a mate. They worry that if they get involved in a ministry or missions project that Mr. or Miss Right will come and go and they'll never know it. But Elisabeth Elliot is here to remind us that love isn't something you wait for. It's something you do. Find out more as we head back to Dallas, Texas for another lesson on love next on Gateway To Joy.

Elisabeth Elliot: I want to start out by talking a little bit about this quest for love thing, about which I've written a book. St. Francis of Assisi prayed, "Teach us not so much to be consoled as to console, to be loved as to love. For it is in giving that we receive; it is in pardoning that we are pardoned; and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life."

The most important thing for every one of us who wants to walk with God and be a Christian is surrender to Jesus Christ-giving yourself up to Him and just telling the Lord, "Here I am, Lord, all of me for You forever. Do anything You want with me."

It's human nature for us to want to be loved. That's why there is such a thing as a quest for love. It's reasonable and right that we should want to be loved, but it's much more important that we should learn to love.

In my book, I've collected stories. Most of them are nice ones, good ones, about the marvelous ways in which God does bring men and women together today. But there are also some horror stories about the crazy, wild ways in which young people are going about looking for a mate. I'm certainly hoping that my readers will have the discernment to know which examples to follow.

There's one quite remarkable little chapter called, "He Can Search My Girl Among the Nations." It's a letter from a young foreign student in the States. He felt that it was time for him to get married. He came from a country where marriages are normally arranged. He was quite appalled when he saw what the dating scene was in America.

I have also another chapter from an Indian woman whose marriage was arranged. She speaks with a great deal of authority, because she spent ten years in America observing the dating scene. She had made up her mind she did not want her parents to arrange her marriage. She was a Christian; they were Christians, and they would have arranged a Christian marriage for her. But she had decided to reject all that and come to America, where everything is so exciting and romantic, because she had been filling herself with romance novels from America.

She observed for ten years. I don't know if she ever went out on a date. But after ten years, she decided, "This is rubbish. It's not working. It certainly is not leading to happy marriages." In fact, the thing that I see happening in the dating game is that it establishes intimacy and break-up, intimacy and break-up, intimacy and break-up. Then what happens when they get married? It's exactly the same thing all over again, because they have gotten too close.

One of the things that I always want to say to young people, when I have an opportunity to talk to them about sexual purity, "Keep your clothes on. Keep your hands off and stay out of bed." Do you want to be His disciple? Do you want to do the will of God? Do you want God to lead you to the right mate? Well, "If you love Me," He says, "do what I say."

So let me read you what He says in 1 Thessalonians. "Finally, brothers, we instructed you how to live in order to please God, as in fact you are living. Now we ask you and urge you in the Lord Jesus to do this more and more, for you know what instructions we gave you by the authority of the Lord Jesus. It is God's will that you should be sanctified."

God wants every one of us to be made holy. We are not holy by nature and we can't do that by ourselves. But it is God's will that we should be sanctified. So we have to surrender our will to God in order that He may give us the grace to make us holy.

But then Paul gets very specific about this holiness thing. "It's God's will that you should be sanctified, that you should avoid sexual immorality. Each of you should learn to control his own body in a way that is holy and honorable, not in passionate lust like the heathen, who do not know God. For God did not call us to be impure, but to live a holy life."

I had an opportunity not too long ago to speak to a bunch of high school kids. It was wonderful to see the response of those kids. They were willing to listen to this old lady that comes from some other planet, a thousand years ago. They listened. Several came up to me, a number of them came up to me, and said, "Thank you. We really needed to hear that."

I always want to ask these young people-well, they ask me a question, "Well, is it okay to hold hands?" My question to them then is, "Why do you want to?" "Well, because it's exciting. Come on, lady, you're not going to say there's something wrong with holding hands, are you?"

Well, I'm going to ask you this question: "Is there any difference between shaking hands with the minister at the door of the church as you're leaving and holding hands with a member of the opposite sex who is very attractive to you when you find yourselves alone or in a dark place? Is there any difference at all?" "Well, yeah. Like, you know, wow."

Okay. There's a big difference. It's exciting, because that's exactly the way God arranged things. He arranged that women should be attracted to men and that men should be attracted to women. He created Adam and Eve and He brought Eve to Adam and they became one. So there is a logical progression. The first touch, holding hands, leads them to a squeeze. A squeeze leads to a hug. A hug leads to a kiss. A kiss leads to another kind of a kiss. What happens next?

I have so many sad letters from young people who say, "We don't know how it happened." I say, "It happens the same way every time." You've got to keep your clothes on. You've got to keep your hands off.

Jim Elliot and I made up our minds that we would not hold hands. Not because it's a sin in itself, but because it is exciting and you're playing along the edges. The first thing you know, it's not very difficult in this world, in this day and age, to find yourself in bed or in some dark place. Then all kinds of things happen. So I've written a little book for the kids between 10-16, just a very small booklet, 12 pages, called SEX IS A LOT MORE THAN FUN.

I want to encourage those who are of marriageable age, or teenagers who are really seriously hoping and praying that God will give them the right wife and the right husband, to remember the story of Abraham and his servant.

Abraham wanted to find a wife for his son Isaac. His son Isaac, of course, was his most beloved son. So he sent his servant to find that wife. There is a lesson here for us. We don't have servants to send out to find spouses for our children, but there's a very important lesson in this lovely little story.

The first thing he did-the first thing the servant did was what Abraham told him to do-to take ten camel loads of gifts for the prospective wife that he would find. He told him where to go and what tribe he was to look in. So the servant went, and when he got to the village he observed women in the one appropriate place where a man could observe a woman with propriety. That was the village well.

Of course, the young women came to the village well every day to get their water, and so he waited there. This is what he said. This is crucial. He prayed silently and watched quietly. So if there is any young man here who is hoping to get married sometime, do a whole lot of praying silently and watching quietly.

There are several places where it's possible with propriety to observe other people of the opposite sex. I observed Jim Elliot on the college campus, long before he and I ever had a personal conversation. I began to notice that he was an outstanding man and seemed to have the qualities that I was looking for in a husband. But of course, I knew that as a woman, I'm not supposed to be in a quest for love. I'm supposed to be completely centered on God. If God wants to give me a husband, God knows how to do that. But it's not for me to go after him.

Well, we've been confused by the feminist movement. Men don't know what men are supposed to do. Women don't know what women are supposed to do. Everybody says we're equal and interchangeable, so it's okay if the girls call the guys. I know some Christian homes in which the rule is that if a girl calls a boy, a boy in that Christian home, whoever answers the phone simply says, "Girls are not allowed to call boys in our family." I know another home where such a question is answered by, "Is he expecting your call?" That simmers them down pretty well usually.

But Abraham's servant stood there silently praying and watching quietly. He saw a beautiful woman and he saw her drawing water. He asked her if she would give him a drink. She drew water not only for him, but for his camels, which must have been a tremendous job. I have heard that camels can drink 100 gallons of water, or something like that. I don't know how many gallons it is, but if it were only one gallon and she had to feed ten camels, that was quite a bit of drawing up of her water jar.

So the servant immediately saw that here is a courteous woman, here is a gracious woman, she's a beautiful woman, and she's very obviously an industrious woman. Looks like the right kind of a woman for my master's son. The story goes on. But you can read that story in Genesis 24 and learn some great lessons from that.

Lisa Barry: You can also learn a lot from the two resources that Elisabeth mentioned today. The first is QUEST FOR LOVE, and that is a delightful, yet challenging, look at how God can and will bring couples together if it's His will. I think you'll learn how to trust God for that area of your life if you're having trouble doing so now. The other booklet is SEX IS A LOT MORE THAN FUN. That's for elementary-aged children.

For more information on either of those, you can write to us at Gateway To Joy, Box 82500, Lincoln, Nebraska, 68501. Or call 1-800-759-4JOY. That's 1-800-759-4569. Our Web ministry address is gatewaytojoy.org. Gateway To Joy has been a production of Back to the Bible.

Be with us again tomorrow when Elisabeth talks about God's love and a single person's quest for love right here on Gateway To Joy.