{"id":39823,"date":"2017-06-26T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2017-06-26T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.christianitytoday.com\/pastors\/preaching\/sermon-illustrations\/college-senior-has-flings-but-longs-for-true-love\/"},"modified":"2017-06-26T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2017-06-26T00:00:00","slug":"college-senior-has-flings-but-longs-for-true-love","status":"publish","type":"sermon-illustrations","link":"https:\/\/www.christianitytoday.com\/pastors\/preaching\/sermon-illustrations\/college-senior-has-flings-but-longs-for-true-love\/","title":{"rendered":"College Senior Has Flings but Longs for True Love"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\n\t\t\t<em class=\"citation\">The New York Times<\/em>&#39; &quot;Modern Love College Essay Contest&quot; featured a &quot;finalist&quot; article by college senior Lauren Petersen. Ms. Peterson met Michael on a dating app where women make the first move. She wasn&#39;t looking for a relationship, let alone love. &quot;Everything about us was temporary,&quot; she wrote. &quot;We would talk a little, watch a little and then go to bed. In the morning, I would zip up my coat while he asked, &#39;Heading out?&#39; I would nod and say, &#39;Thanks for the toast.&#39; There was a rhythm to it. Monday night, pack my bag. Tuesday morning, walk home.&quot;<\/p>\n\n<p>But then she broke the rules: she started to want more out of the relationship:<\/p>\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\">\n<p>I started daydreaming about how the moonlight trickled in while he played me his jazz records, how he chuckled and buried his face in his hands after I explained my odd internships, and how he held up a picture of his family and described each of his brothers.<\/p>\n\n<\/blockquote>\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\">\n<p>For a second, my future brimmed with Michael: his records, his quiet demeanor but abrasive sense of humor, his shamelessness in recounting the time he was struck with food poisoning at a hostel in San Francisco. Then another text appeared: &quot;It&#39;s just that I&#39;m apprehensive about the commitment.&quot; When I clarified that I didn&#39;t expect a long-term commitment, with our coming graduation, he expressed his real concern: &quot;Monogamy.&quot; I wanted to leave the game behind and develop something special, if only for a short time. Yet Michael hesitated. It struck me that the &quot;fling&quot; was dead.<\/p>\n\n<\/blockquote>\n\n<p>Petersen concludes on a sad note, longing for something more&mdash;true love:<\/p>\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\">\n<p>A mere six weeks after our first date, we were over. I&#39;d broken the rules; my glimmer of expressed affection had led to a fatal imbalance in the game. Feeling a little dispensable, I opened Bumble to pause my account. &hellip; A notification flashed, indicating that I had been right-swiped by a few people: 1,946 people. As the saying goes, there are plenty of fish in the sea, and it turned out my sea held 1,946 of them. The &quot;play again?&quot; button glowed brighter than ever. And yet, almost comically, I wanted to date only one particular person.<\/p>\n\n<\/blockquote>","protected":false},"author":30,"featured_media":0,"template":"","tax_ctp_audience":[],"tax_ctp_authors":[],"tax_ctp_categories":[165],"tax_ctp_format":[171],"tax_ctp_illustration_types":[411],"tax_ctp_multimedia":[],"tax_ctp_point_editor":[],"tax_publications":[140],"tax_ctp_tags":[3631,3640,3726,4013,4222,4242,4395,4489,4695,4856,4858,4955,4958],"tax_ctp_topics":[],"class_list":["post-39823","sermon-illustrations","type-sermon-illustrations","status-publish","hentry","tax_publications-ct-pastors","tax_ctp_tags-cohabitation","tax_ctp_tags-commitment","tax_ctp_tags-culture","tax_ctp_tags-fornication","tax_ctp_tags-immorality","tax_ctp_tags-infidelity","tax_ctp_tags-love","tax_ctp_tags-monogamy","tax_ctp_tags-premarital-sex","tax_ctp_tags-romance","tax_ctp_tags-romantic-love","tax_ctp_tags-sex","tax_ctp_tags-sexual-immorality"],"acf":{"scripture_references":[{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null}]},"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v22.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>College Senior Has Flings but Longs for True Love - CT Pastors<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.christianitytoday.com\/pastors\/preaching\/sermon-illustrations\/college-senior-has-flings-but-longs-for-true-love\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"College Senior Has Flings but Longs for True Love - CT Pastors\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"The New York Times&#039; &quot;Modern Love College Essay Contest&quot; featured a &quot;finalist&quot; article by college senior Lauren Petersen. Ms. Peterson met Michael on a dating app where women make the first move. 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