A love triangle between two brothers at a beautiful house by the beach, car crashes, first loves, surviving the death of a mother, engagements, cheating, a trip to Paris, and yearning – a lot of yearning; the summer I turned pretty (TSITP) has taken the world by storm and I’m no exception. It’s made me wonder, what is it about this show that has captured our hearts? Is there anything that is true, noble, right, pure, lovely, admirable, excellent or praiseworthy? And are there some things that are capturing our hearts away from Jesus?

This is by no means conclusive, but I’ve tried to think about what is good and also consider what is potentially unhelpful about this show. Feel free to share things you’ve spotted too!

1. The right, lovely and admirable

Faithfulness, commitment and yearning:

Ok – I wasn’t sure whether to include yearning here! The internet has gone crazy making videos of Conrad longing for Belly. Whether it makes you want to be sick or find your own Conrad (or Belly), there’s something appealing about his unwavering commitment to her and 'all their infinity stuff'. He commits to her wholesale, rejecting other girls even when he’s not with her and in season 3 he famously (and finally!) confesses 'I love you. I will never not love you'. In a world where break-ups are normal and commitment is optional, having complete confidence and security that someone would commit to you that wholeheartedly, no matter what, is super appealing.

Spoiler from the Bible: we might not have an infinity necklace but if we’re Christian, God chose us before the world began. He says to his people 'I have loved you with an everlasting love, therefore I have continued my faithfulness to you' Jeremiah 31:3. I think that beats an infinity necklace.

Sacrificial love

I’m not anti-Jeremiah – but he doesn’t excel at this. He smokes weed even though Belly doesn’t want him to, he leaves her to do all the wedmin (wedding-admin) alone and he insists on that mirror glaze wedding cake ('Cacao is the bean, it’s what chocolate is made of. Look, the whole flavour profile depends on the bitterness of the dark chocolate and the tweet tartness of the raspberry'). And, to top it all off, he sleeps with Lacy Barone on spring break (more on this later).

On the flipside, enter Conrad, who secretly delays (gives up?) his internship because he hears Belly crying, spends a day helping her plan her wedding to his brother (despite being in love with her himself) and even goes out of his way to persuade Belly’s mum to support the wedding he doesn’t want to happen. Even though he wants Belly, what he wants even more is for her to be happy. Society tells us to fight for our rights, put ourselves first and never settle for second best - but we are still stopped in our tracks by selfless, sacrificial love. Because it is undeniably beautiful.

Spoiler from the Bible: Jesus loves us even more sacrificially and faithfully than Conrad, he doesn’t just give up his summer job, but his life. 'This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us' 1 John 3:16. And Jesus calls us to love others – not just people we’re in love with – like that 'and we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers and sisters'.

2. Some things to be cautious about

Sex isn’t casual

Something I have felt really uncomfortable with is how lightly sex is treated. Belly sleeps with Conrad and then a month later starts dating his brother. Jeremiah is in a 'committed' relationship with Belly and then after a break/argument sleeps with someone else. I’ve seen people post about wanting Belly’s body count (how many people she’s slept with) to increase. It made me so sad – reducing sex to a purely physical bodily experience, without acknowledging the attachment that comes with sex.

The characters have these relationships where they basically act like they are married, sleep together, make promises ('you’re it for me Belly'), but the commitment isn’t actually there, and so inevitably when they break up it’s incredibly painful. I’m team Conrad and yet when Belly and Jeremiah break up, it’s devastating. They had built a life together. Their breakup was awful. When Jeremiah cheats, even if they were on a break, we all agree it was a betrayal, because we feel like Jeremiah and Belly were committed. Except they weren’t.

It makes me wary that a TV show pitched at teenagers presents such a casual view of sex, when God’s perfect design for sex is so much better.

Spoiler from the Bible: 'Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh. And the man and his wife were both naked and were not ashamed.' Genesis 2:24-25. God designed sex and lifelong commitment to go together, and that’s really for our good. When the two are separated, we see just how painful that can be.

The idol of romantic relationships

TSITP is not alone here. Our whole society is obsessed with romantic relationships. As a romantic, it’s easy to get swept up in it all. 'For Belly, Conrad is the sun. And when the sun comes out, the stars disappear.' Ok, that line is cheesy, but I think lots of the appeal is a relationship that is so wonderful it eclipses everything else.

But it’s good to remember that Conrad (and Jeremiah and even Cam Cameron and French Cam Cameron) are fictional characters made up by girls to be that ideal partner that we long for. Conrad doesn’t exist in any boy or man. Plus, in Ephesians 5, the Bible says that romantic relationships exist to show us Jesus’ love for us. More than Conrad yearns for Belly, God yearns for us. And he made us to yearn for him. I think yearning is a really classic experience for girls (we hate it but we also love it) but we can make it more useful when we use it to yearn for God. Psalm 119:37 says, 'Turn my eyes away from looking at worthless things; and give me life in your ways'.

Our hearts can only be fully satisfied in Jesus. 'Your maker is your husband'. (Isaiah 54:5). Looking for that satisfaction in a romantic relationship drags us away from Jesus and leads to disappointment. It isn’t good for us and it isn’t good for our (potential future) partners to carry that kind of expectation. We are all sinful and selfish. Every person will fail us, just as we will fail them. But Jesus doesn’t fail. He understands and sympathises with our weaknesses fully yet is himself completely without sin (Hebrews 4:15). Unlike any boy, Jesus can carry all our hopes and expectations and we won’t be disappointed.

Spoiler from the Bible: One day God’s people will be joined in a perfect relationship with God. This is how it is described: 'God will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God. He will wipe every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, not crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away… Behold I am making all things new'. Revelation 21:3-5.

It’s going to be even better than the TSITP finale.