Lisa Barry: Have you ever had a crush on someone and in a weak, perspiring moment, you let that person know? Chances are things didn't turn out just the way you hoped they would. Well, today on Gateway To Joy, Elisabeth Elliot is going to read a letter from a young woman who wanted God's will, and she also really wanted a husband.

Find out what happens to her, as we begin this Thursday edition of Gateway To Joy. Here's Elisabeth.

Elisabeth Elliot: "You are loved with an everlasting love." That's what the Bible says, "and underneath are the everlasting arms." This is your friend Elisabeth Elliot, reading today what I consider a very interesting and unusual letter.

I think this should be of interest to both you men and you women who are listening to me. It's written by a woman, but it's, as I said, quite unusual and quite interesting. She writes:

"Dear Mrs. Elliot, when I read your books and make comments in the margin, I call you 'Liz.' I hope you don't mind." Well, I've had a number of letters from people calling me "Liz." Actually, I have never been called "Liz" by any of my friends, but that's okay. You can call me anything you want to, just don't call me late.

She says:

"I guess I'll start by telling you about my 'experience' with you." And she has "experience" in quotation marks. "I'm 23 years old and a teacher of sixth graders. It's a crazy job. While I was still in high school I found a copy of Passion and Purity in our senior lounge. No one ever claimed it, so it became mine. Now in retrospect, I feel as though it was a nice little parcel sent by God to me.

"I love getting good mail. I have often said my motto is 'I love to get good mail and I want a good male.' More about that later, I'm sure," she says. "Well, I started reading Passion and Purity, and then set it down for a short time--three or four years.

"I later read it through, highlighting the dickens out of it. The Mark of a Man (it's okay for a lady to read it, isn't it) has taught me a lot. There are 'amens' written all over it." She is referring to my book called The Mark of a Man, which I wrote sort of in response to letters that I got from men who had actually read my book called Let Me Be a Woman. You know, it does take a pretty tough guy to walk around with a book called Let Me Be a Woman under his arm. And so I thought it would make sense to write a book for the men, so that is the book called The Mark of a Man. It's what it means to be a truly masculine man for God.

So she says, "There are 'amens' written all over the book. It's sort of bittersweet, though, because as I read it I can't help but be discouraged. Men just don't know how to be men. I see this truth in my teaching every day. So many children don't have a positive male role model," she says, "let alone a father who is a real man. I would be so bold as to say that 90% of the problems I see in my students--and there are many--can be attributed to the fact that men are not fulfilling the calling of true manhood.

"I always felt that I never dated because I was not attractive, and I've always been chubby. But that's changing. I've been doing fine. I've been doing the Weigh Down Workshop," and she asks me if I've heard of it. Yes. Several of you have written to tell me about the Weigh Down Workshop. It's something done by a woman named Gwen Shamblin.

Then she tells me a little bit about the program:

"It's a very abbreviated version of the program, but I am becoming an abbreviated version," she says. "I've lost about ten pounds in two months, the first five of which I discovered were gone on February 14. What a nice Valentine's Day that was for me!"

She says:

"I want so badly--desperately would not be too strong a word--to be married and have a family. I'm notorious, or have been, for having crushes on every wonderful Christian boy or man that I've known. When you said women are doing too much of the seeking nowadays--phone calls, 'accidental' meetings--it really screamed at me. I realized that I am endlessly trying to initiate relationships. Notes are my specialty.

"I've been told that I am encourager, but I know that I have often used my gift of an encourager as a means by which to elicit the attention of a nice brother in Christ. I have even gone so far as to ask these men if I can pray for them. I might as well spell it P-R-E-Y," she says. "All along, what I was actually doing was trying to make them see a godly potential wife. It's rather disgusting when I think about it.

"Oh, on the surface it appears to be an act of Christian love, but really, so very often my motives have been awful. I have finally come to the point that I want to be the one sought after, and not the seeker. Well, I'm sure I've always wanted that, but now I have realized how I cannot be the initiator. Not only has it proven ineffective, it's just not the way it should be."

I'm going to pause here in her letter and inject a paragraph that I came across in one of Anton Chekhov's stories. The story is "Verotchka." And Verotchka is a girl who has fallen in love with a young man. And the young man is everything she's always dreamed for, but it doesn't appear that he has any particular interest in her. He is very gentlemanly, he is very kind, he is a good friend, and all that, but he has never made any advances in her direction.

And so the time finally comes when he is going to be moving away and they're out on a moonlight walk together, he still thinking of her as just a very nice sister, and she in an agony of desire for this man. And finally he begins to realize that something is wrong. He asks her what it is.

And faltering for a long time, refusing to answer, she finally says it's a dreadful thing. And he says, "But you must tell me. Can I help you?"

"It's a dreadful thing," she says, "but...but I am in love with you. I love you!"

And this is the crucial point that Anton Chekhov makes in this story, he said--she, having avowed her love and cast forever away her woman's enhancing inaccessibility, seemed in his eyes smaller, simpler and meaner.

I read that over and over again and I thought, That is putting it precisely the way I have always wished I could put it for these women who do the initiating and do the chasing. What is it that happens? I'll read this again--she, having avowed her love and cast forever away her woman's enhancing inaccessibility, seemed in his eyes smaller, simpler and meaner.

Think about that, ladies. When you let the man know, and you are the initiator, and you let him know perhaps by a lift of your eyebrow, perhaps by a little note that you stick in his box--you know all the wiles that women have for trying to get a man's attention. Do you really want to give up your enhancing inaccessibility? Do you want to be smaller, simpler and meaner?

Now this is not merely Elisabeth Elliot notions, I trust. It comes from God's Word. God created Adam first. God created a woman for Adam. Adam was not created for Eve; Eve was created for Adam. She was created literally from him. She was created for him and she was named by him. These define for me the position of a woman in relation to a man.

And in the New Testament, we find God saying that the husband is the head of the wife. Jim Elliot told me that one of the things that had most drawn him to me on the college campus was that he never could figure out what I was thinking. He watched me from a distance for a long time before he ever initiated a conversation. My mother had told me, "Never chase boys. Keep them at arm's length." Two very simple instructions, which I obeyed.

And you know, they work. You'll never find yourself pregnant by mistake. You gentlemen are never going to get that dreaded phone call when some female voice says, "Guess what? You're going to be a daddy." It's not going to happen, if the woman keeps her distance and does not initiate.

So this same girl, whose letter I was reading at the beginning, she says:

"I have finally come to the point that I want to be the one sought after and not the seeker. Well, I'm sure I've always wanted that, but now I have realized how I cannot be the initiator. Not only has it proven ineffective, it's not the way it should be." And I say hear, hear to that! I agree.

"I'm so tempted to call and say something like 'I just wanted to say that I hope you have a good trip home.' He is a college student at the local university." Well, she didn't call him.

"After he fixed my car, he used my sink to wash his hands." She is talking about another man here; I skipped some parts. "He used my sink to wash his hands. Well, I mentioned that the cold water was turned off because of a leak. What did he do? He started fixing the sink. Before he left, he said, 'Let me know if you ever need any help with anything else.' I could call him and ask him to fix something. But alas, I shall not!

"Help, Elisabeth! Why would God so strongly put these desires in me if I am meant to be single?"

That's a question that I'm often asked.

"I want to be someone's lifelong companion. I want to encourage and support a man. Not financially, you know what I mean. I want to do laundry and cooking. I want to rub feet and nurse a virus-infected, soup-slurping, sweaty man back to health. I want to put notes, of course, in his lunchbox. I want to take walks and eat macaroni and cheese by candlelight. I want to go where he goes and be part of his destiny. I want to hold his child, all clean and new, close to my heart. I know that God has His best for me," she says.

Do you believe that--that God has His best for you? Look at Psalm 84:11, "no good thing will He withhold from them that walk uprightly." You have got to let God be the One who chooses the good thing--not your whims, not your lifelong desires, but your surrender to Jesus Christ. There is the absolutely safe place to be.

"No good thing will He withhold from them that walk uprightly"--He may see singleness for you as a good thing.

Lisa Barry: I would have preferred to be married at the age of 22, but God's plan was 30. But how much better to wait and get God's best. If this is an area you're struggling with, let me suggest Elisabeth's great book called Passion and Purity. This best-selling book has been empowering young people with moral muscle for many years, and its message is timeless. Make this book a part of your collection.

For information on how to get a copy, get in touch with us. Our toll-free number is 1-800-759-4JOY. We'd also like to express our gratitude for your faithfulness, with a complimentary copy of a leaflet called "As We Forgive Those." Ask about it when you call 1-800-759-4569. Or you can write to:

Gateway To Joy, Box 82500, Lincoln, NE 68501. Our Web address is gatewaytojoy.org. Gateway To Joy is a listener-supported production of Back to the Bible.

Tomorrow, Elisabeth talks more about "Forgiveness." So I hope you'll join us then for another Gateway To Joy.