Wowee.. Saying No to pre-marital sex - Couple narrate their experience

From:	Kemi Filani

Rebecca and James got married two years ago ad have a son. In a new interview with 1 + The One, they disclosed how they successfully scaled through the pre-marital sex temptation, enjoy!
Rebecca: Hello! We are Becky and James Aladiran and we lead a prayer movement called Prayer Storm: www.prayerstorm.org. I lead worship and James leads the Intercession. We are in love with God and running after a grace enabled lifestyle that is holy and set apart to Him. We love to seek and worship Him and are on a journey after His presence. We also have a baby who turned 1 recently! I am 24 and James is 30 and we celebrated our two-year anniversary on the 28th of July which is the day after our baby's birthday. Our son is named Justice.

Hiya! I'm Justice Aladiran :-) Cuteeee!

I also train two days a week as a seamstress working for a Christian business called Wedding Angels (http://www.theweddingangels.org) that helps couples get married with everything they need. Hopefully in two years I'll be able to make a wedding dress from scratch!

James works full time at the Message Trust as their Prayer coordinator and splits his time there to also establish Prayer Storm which he will be transitioning into full time as it becomes a registered Charity in September!

James: Like my wife has said, I'm James and I lead a Christian Charity called Prayer Storm, I've been married for two years :-)

Thank you guys! Lovely to meet you.. So tell us James, how did you meet Rebecca?

         The Worship Leader & The Intercessor! :-D

James: I met Becky through prayer Storm. At the time I was looking to connect with musicians/worship leaders who had a heart for Prayer. I worked with her mum at The Message Trust and mentioned to her one day that I was looking to connect with young people with a heart for prayer. She recommended that I got in touch with Becky because she is a worship leader and has a heart for prayer.

..What was the attraction for you?

James: Her heart for God and the vision she had for her life was the same as the vision I had for mine.

And Rebecca?

Rebecca: I loved James' passionate pursuit of Jesus. I started out really respecting Him as a man of God and later fell in love with Him in a Prayer meeting! There's nothing more attractive than a man after Gods own heart!

That's really beautiful Becky. 

How did you know that "This is the person I want to spend the rest of my life with?"

Engaged!

Becky: I knew I wanted to spend my life with James because I knew he was God's best for me and our destiny was a powerful one together. I know that for me not to have married James would have cost me God's best for me in terms of my destiny and purpose in God. 

James: We became best friends and I fell in love with her. I felt in my heart that my destiny was connected with hers. Plus I felt God speak to me about it.

That's wonderful.. Now to the main question, what inspired your decision to wait? 

James: For me, I wanted to honour God and honour Becky. I knew it was the right thing to do.

Rebecca: When I hit puberty and started to develop and experience hormones, (wink wink nudge nudge) because of my lack of maturity and understanding...plus media exposure, I said to God "I don't know why it's important to wait, I only see sex as a pleasure thing but people call it making love and until I can understand the concept of making love I don't think I'm mature enough to make any kinds of decisions on sex." So I waited for understanding and prayed for Grace to keep myself pure because I knew I could easily have just given into very strong temptation + a truck loada hormones! 

Anyway when I was 17, I felt God tell me to leave College to do a gap year called Challenge Team UK which was a charity which sent a bunch of 18-25 year olds to tour the UK delivering assemblies and school & college lessons on saving sex for marriage. Although this charity was run by Christians, it wasn't a Christian charity and had no biblical content to its material shared in schools. They gave Christian training to us by a lady named Pam Stenzel (Sex Has a Price Tag) which was awesome and we went into schools and talked about the physical and emotional consequences of sex, the damaging effects of pornography, and how to build long lasting healthy relationships. We did it in a way that made sense and was fun and hilarious for the kids and young adults. We talked about sexual health, as well as pregnancy and contraception and their user failure rates which was scarily high man! But so many kids would thank me at every place I went to saying "I never knew I could just say no."

As much as I learnt and became wiser through these times I never became so thankful I waited until after marriage. After nearly 2 years I still say to my James, I'm so glad I waited! I'm not gonna get graphic but the first time we had sex, even though we had little idea of what we were supposed to do, it will always be my favourite time. Your 'first time' is probably the most vulnerable thing you'll ever do. To expose your whole self to someone for the first time is the time that usually sticks the most and I'm so blessed to have shared it with my James on our wedding night. 

I shudder at the thought of someone else knowing me that way. You'll never realise how precious your first time is until you've experienced it. I can't even stress it enough. It's more than just pleasure. Media and pornography have made it so impersonal and distorted. I remember a friend of ours who believed in waiting but just didn't, and ended up living with their spouse before marriage and he said to us after he got married (when we were engaged) that he never knew how important it was to wait until he got married and he wished he'd just waited and now I'm married I completely understand why. 

You know there are so many facts and statistics I've heard and known over the years that tell you saving sex for marriage is the best way, the most biblical, the safest and healthiest. Which I totally agree with, but I just wanna share with you from my experience that there's no greater gift than sharing your first time together with your spouse, and until you experience your wedding night for yourself you're just gonna have to take my word for it. :-)

Also, I have to say that it's NEVER too late to start waiting if you haven't. 

Thanks for that in-depth response Becky and for sharing your personal experience as well! Was it difficult though, like did you get to any point when you wanted to just let go and give in?

Becky: Oh Lord! Is that a rhetorical question? I don't understand people who find it easy. My advice to anyone is to find accountability that knows where you are and when, and asks you tough questions because you will want to let go and you will make it happen if you aren't accountable. Things that worked for us - Find someone you are honest with but you'd be way to ashamed to do something and then have them know. Cover yourselves in prayer. Don't stay up late. Try to be in public together. Guys don't think you're 'safe' around your lady because we can be just as horny as you fellas! Put a time limit on how long you spend time together. Watch where you put those hands! Girls dress extra modest around them. Leggings are not trousers you may see it that way but guys don't! lol. Guys be honest about your struggles with things your lady may be doing or wearing which is causing you to stumble. 

Honesty is key - Be honest and open with each other

James: No, I didn't just want to "just let go" lol. Yes, it was difficult, but we were both committed to staying pure till we got married so we made ourselves accountable to people around us. We both knew we had to fight for purity. In our eyes the victory was much more greater than momentary pleasure.  

I believe the power of sin is in secrecy. So, what we tried to do was to walk in the light and not have things hidden. We made ourselves accountable to people who could ask us the hard questions. We had physical limits i.e. no go areas in terms of touching, kissing etc... We set time limits too.

Thank you for that. Any advice you would give to yourself as a single person in preparation for marriage now you've crossed that line?

Rebecca: You're gonna be married for the rest of your life, singleness and waiting is quickly finished. 

James:  Let God do so much work in you that when you get married it is easier to reflect His heart and love to your spouse everyday. Surround yourself with Strong, Godly, pure men of God.

Nice one, noted! In 3 sentences, what's your experience of being married?

"Doing life with my best friend"

Rebecca: Doing life with your best friend and being one in everything. Dreaming together and for each other. Falling asleep in each others' arms!

James: Dreaming together, companionship and growing in God together.

Beautiful! Finally, before we go, it's PDA time! We always like to encourage you to publicly affirm each other -

Rebecca: James we've been through so much together and I'm glad it's you I've been through it all with. I never stop thinking about how perfect we are for each other and how I've never respected or looked up to anyone like I do you. I love doing life together and growing up together. I love you so much and can't wait for the future!
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James: Thanks Becky for challenging me in so many areas to be more like Jesus. I love spending time with you and doing this thing called life together. I'm excited about the future and all that's ahead of us. I love you!!

"I love you!"

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Like Rebecca responded when we asked if it was difficult, "Is that a rhetorical question?" lol.. Don't get it twisted, it ain't easy (at all, at all!) - Attraction is a wonderful blessing and managing it could be quite dicey! But by God's grace it's very possible..