page_title: When God Writes Your Love Story
section_title: Christian responses to the book's advice
hierarchical_section_title: When God Writes Your Love Story / Critical response / Christian responses to the book's advice
caption_attribution_description: English: Photograph of American author and speaker, Leslie Ludy.
context_page_description: When God Writes Your Love Story: The Ultimate Approach to Guy/Girl Relationships is a 1999 book by Eric and Leslie Ludy, an American married couple. After becoming a bestseller on the Christian book market, the book was republished in 2004 and then revised and expanded in 2009. It tells the story of the authors' first meeting, courtship, and marriage. The authors advise single people not to be physically or emotionally intimate with others, but to wait for the spouse that God has planned for them. The first edition was packaged with a CD single by the Ludys: "Faithfully", a song they had written specifically to accompany the book.
  The book is divided into five sections and sixteen chapters. Each chapter is written from the perspective of one of the two authors; nine are by Eric, while Leslie wrote seven, as well as the introduction. The Ludys argue that one's love life should be both guided by and subordinate to one's relationship with God. Leslie writes that God offers new beginnings to formerly unchaste or sexually abused individuals.
  Other American Christian authors, such as Mark Matlock and Jason Evert, wrote highly of When God Writes Your Love Story.
context_section_description: Christine A. Colón and Bonnie E. Field, two single women in their thirties, expressed their frustrations with the Ludys' book in Singled Out: Why Celibacy Must Be Reinvented in Today's Church. Colón, an English professor at Wheaton College; and Field, a former English professor at Wayland Baptist University, criticize Leslie Ludy's account of her own wait for God to bring her a romantic partner. They argue that "the language Ludy uses to describe her time of waiting and trusting implies a difficult and long struggle that is finally rewarded by God" and suggests that a long wait results in an even greater reward, a concept that Colón and Field, despite acknowledging as commonplace, disagree with and trace back to William Shakespeare's Cymbeline, which states "the more delay'd, delighted." Singled Out suggests that, because Leslie was only 16 when she met Eric, her story is unlikely to inspire hope in older singles.
  Colón and Field compare When God Writes Your Love Story to Derek Prince's God Is a Matchmaker, and argue that Prince's book better expresses the concept that God allows some people to receive their soulmates quickly, while requiring others to undergo a long wait. While the Ludys' book suggests that it is worth waiting for a soulmate because the wait indicates a better prize, Colón and Field favour Prince's reasons for advocating waiting for one's soulmate, which are that doing so tests one's faith and that "God has required many of His choicest servants to wait long periods for the fulfillment of His promise or purpose."
  Margaret and Dwight Peterson, an American married couple who are Christian Studies professors at Eastern University, teach a course together called "Christian Marriage" and were very critical of When God Writes Your Love Story. They responded to the Ludys' book by writing an essay called "God Does Not Want to Write Your Love Story." They write therein that, while they read When God Writes Your Love Story, "it began to dawn on us with particular clarity how different these stories of romance are from any traditionally Christian understanding of marriage." In response to Leslie Ludy's recommendation that a single woman should seek to be God's princess until becoming the princess of a human prince, the Petersons argue that this analogy makes young people see marriage as a fantasy comparable to that of Disney Princesses, and that this fantasy often results in disappointment. While referencing When God Writes Your Love Story specifically on several occasions, the Petersons acknowledge that the Ludys' book is one of many books with this premise and write that "it is the entire genre that is problematic."
  Rick Holland, an instructor at The Master's College and Seminary and pastor of College and Student Ministries at Grace Community Church, criticized the Ludys' description of dating, claiming it was based too much on anecdotes and not enough on the Bible. Nonetheless, he commended the couple on the relevant Bible verses they do quote and he argued that the advice the Ludys share in the book is sound and that their story is an encouraging one.
  When God Writes Your Love Story was received positively by some American Christian authors. In Freshman: The College Student's Guide to Developing Wisdom, Mark Matlock, an ordained minister and youth pastor recommends When God Writes Your Love Story to college students. He describes the Ludys' book as funny, honest, and candid. Jason Evert, a Catholic author and chastity speaker, wrote positively of When God Writes Your Love Story in his book If You Really Loved Me: 100 Questions on Dating, Relationships, and Sexual Purity. Evert commends Leslie Ludy writing about the importance of listening intently and regularly to God's voice in seeking discernment about romantic relationships. Also in If You Really Loved Me, Evert praises a passage from When God Writes Your Love Story in which Leslie Ludy recalls having spoken with a group of young men who all agreed that the most desirable women were those who were slow to establish strong emotional attachments to potential 
caption: Leslie Ludy (pictured) writes that it is important to listen intently and regularly to God's voice when seeking discernment about romantic relationships, and Catholic author Jason Evert commends her on this assertion.
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