Chemistry

      Have you ever met someone and you just clicked?  Things they said resounded with you, and vice versa.  You shared a good rapport.  With some people, you just have good chemistry.  

     First Samuel 18:1 recounts, After David had finished talking with Saul, Jonathan became one in spirit with David, and he loved him as himself.  Their friendship and loyalty are reiterated in further passages.  While some have read homosexuality into this, I believe that is poor scholarship, and there is quite enough evidence that David liked women.  I believe this verse just shares how David and Jonathan met and become fast friends. 

      I remember meeting my friend Jill the day we arrived at ministry institute years ago.  As soon as we met that first day as we unpacked in our dorms, it was as if we just connected, and the friendship thrived our entire time there.  We were instant best friends.  I think that's what David and Jonathan experienced.  Jill and I were very good friends as young college students and starting out in ministry, and our friendship flourishes today (though she's in Illinois and I'm in Arkansa, so we don't get to see each other in person often).  Some people are just on your wavelength.  Jill is certainly not the only person in my life with whom I have shared this connection.  She's just the first example I used.  

Jill and Janelle at Institute, 2002

     Chemistry can be completely platonic, as in the examples I've already shared, but they can be romantic, or even seem romantic when they really aren't.  I had a few boyfriends prior to meeting my husband, and with two in particular, there was a strong, almost overpowering chemistry, which made it hard to let these relationships go.  We shared that strong David-and-Jonathan rapport, on top of a romantic attraction.  That's powerful stuff.  That's partly why ending relationships--romantic as well as friendships--is so hard.  When your soul has collided with someone else's, its hard to disconnect.  When a relationship needs to end (such as the boyfriends I didn't end up married to, or past friendships that were unhealthy), only God can help us to move on.  

     When I met my husband Walter at a party, we started talking, and suddenly looked up and four hours had passed and the party was over!  The chemistry between us kept us engaged, and we didn't even notice the passing of time or what was going on around us!  I love that story!  A few nights later, he called me, and we talked three hours, and only ended the call because I had to work in the morning and needed to get some sleep!  Our first date (a few days after the call), we talked in a restaurant until it was closing time and the manager had to nicely ask us to leave.  We then continued the conversation in the car.  We just had that chemistry.  That connection.  We still do.  We talk at night, and it's hard to tear ourselves away and go to bed.  He is truly my best friend, and I love that.  

A recent picture of us

     In solid friendships and a healthy marriage, chemistry is a gift form God.  It certainly was for David and Jonathan's friendship.  But chemistry alone can deceive in the wrong situations.  What if you met someone besides your spouse that you felt a chemistry with?  Some people have taken this as a reason to divorce their spouse and go with this new person, which is clearly not godly or biblical.  This is why people hold onto their high school sweetheart in their mind as "the one who got away" and fantasize about this person, instead of moving forward in life.  They might marry someone else, but they kind of hold onto this past relationship, remembering and reliving the chemistry, and maybe even spying on them online to see where they are now.  We often act as if this chemistry we feel with someone is the determination of truth, or more powerful than our choices or ability to do right.  A person may use this as a reason not to deny themselves, taken up their crosses, and follow Jesus (Matthew 16:24).  The Bible is clear that we are to move forward.  Philippians 3;13 urges, forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead.  Sometimes, people are in your past and not your present for a reason.  A really good Christian movie about this topic is the 2008 film Me & You, Us, Forever.  I'll put a link to watch the movie free online at the end, if you're interested.  

     What if your chemistry with an unhealthy friend who is bringing you down causes you to remain in the friendship, and leads you to bad places?  I believe chemistry can happen with anyone, but people misread it.  I have known of people who were in heterosexual marriages, but met a friend of the same sex they shared a deep chemistry with, and they decided they must be gay and left their marriage to be with this friend.  Chemistry doesn't mean sexual desire, though in a biblical marriage, it can certainly be part of that.  Chemistry doesn't mean your connection to the person is right or good, nor does it mean it is necessarily wrong.  It's what you do with it.  Chemistry has led to lifelong friendships, beautiful marriages, and close families.  It has also led to extramarital affairs, codependency, dysfunction, experimenting with unbiblical relationships, and teachers and students having inappropriate relationships.  Be wise.  Be guided by the Holy Spirit.  Just because there's chemistry doesn't mean the connection is of God, or right for you.  

     God knows we need friendships.  God knows we need chemistry with other people.  He designed that, and we can trust Him to bring us those relationships that He knows we need.  Philippians 4:19 promises, But my God shall supply all your need according to his riches in glory by Christ Jesus.  If God has removed a relationship from your life, it may be because He knows it isn't the best for you anymore.  

     Years ago, I had a mentor who was used miraculously of God in my life.  I loved her, and would have done anything she said.  I'm not usually very easy to control or sway, but the chemistry I shared with this wiser woman had a lot of power over me.  I'm ashamed of that now.  For a long time, the relationship was godly, and Christ-honoring.  I learned and grew so much, and I wouldn't be where I am now without that time being mentored by her.  But there came a point when this woman started making unbiblical choices.  I was very uncomfortable, but I didn't have the strength to confront her, because of that hold she had on me.  I eventually did speak the truth to her, but it took a long time, and was very hard, because the chemistry between us kept me at a place where I didn't want to offend her and I let that outweigh what was right.  Eventually, this woman went too far, and crossed too many personal boundaries with me, and my husband had to help me expel her from my life.  It was one of the hardest things I've ever gone through.  That chemistry between us had become an idol to me, to the point that I wasn't able to do what was right without help.  I repented of this, and continue to grow.  But this experience shows me just how powerful chemistry can be.  

     A few years before I met my husband, I found myself sharing an intense chemistry with a male in my life.  He would have been 100% wrong for me to get involved with, but that chemistry was powerful, and it was really hard for me to deny myself, take up my cross, and follow Jesus--but He gave me the strength to do right in that case.  I didn't fail that test, thankfully.  Chemistry is powerful, oh so powerful!  

     The opening song in one of my favorite movies, Back to the Future is called The Power of Love.  I'm just going to use it as an example, because it is one of billions of songs that claims to be about love.  The lyrics appear to be describing chemistry more than actual love, and this is a common theme.  Observe a few of these lyrics: The power of love is a curious thing.  Make one man weep, make another man sing.  Change a hawk to a little white dove.  More than a feeling, that's the power of love...It's strong and it's sudden and it's cruel sometimes.  That's the power of love... This is just one of unlimited songs about these emotions we call love--but it's really more chemistry than love.  What is love?  

     While true love may include chemistry with the one you love, the characteristics of love are much more enduring than the lyrics we read above.  Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never ends. (First Corinthians 13:4-8a).  Take time to read that list slowly, considering what it really means.  If you love someone, you are patient and kind, and want what is best for them.  You want them to do right, and are committed to their wellbeing, even if that means staying away from them.  You care about their relationship with the Lord.  You are grieved when they sin, and rejoice when they are right with God.   Jesus Himself said in John 15:13, Greater love hath no man than this, than a man lay his life for his friends.  It is putting someone else's needs ahead of your own.  This is a far cry from the obsessiveness chemistry can bring.  If I really loved my long-ago mentor in God's way, I would have told her that what she was doing was sin, regardless of the consequences, and I would have done what I could to point her back to righteousness.  The truth would have had more power over me than our chemistry.  That is convicting to me now.

     Chemistry is not bad.  It is beautiful and wonderful.  It adds a dimension to relationships.  Never feel ashamed for feeling a chemistry with someone.  It doesn't mean you're sick or crazy.  But it also doesn't mean you should follow-up on it.  If a married man attends his high school reunion and runs into his old girlfriend, who is also now married, and feels all that old chemistry come back, it isn't wrong for that chemistry to exist, but it would be wrong to dwell there, or invest in it.  If two close friends have such a deep chemistry that they become dysfunctional and enmeshed, it wasn't a sin that they had that chemistry and propensity for closeness, but it is a sin to allow these unhealthy patterns.  If a twenty-something high school teacher feels a chemistry with a teenage student, it isn't wrong to feel that--but it WOULD be wrong to do something with that!  The relationship needs to remain that of a professional teacher-to-student relationship, nothing more.  In all these cases, the feelings might be real, but it would be wrong to act on them, or indulge them in any way.  That is true of any number or relationships.  If you feel a chemistry with someone, and that relationship isn't God's will, shrug it off.  It's real (don't pretend it isn't, because that doesn't help you put it behind you), but that chemistry isn't a determiner of the truth.  Deny yourself, take up your cross, and follow Jesus in your relationships.  Don't be deceived by chemistry.  Let Jesus show you how to demonstrate real love with those He brings to you.  

Watch the Christian movie Me & You, Us, Forever here.