Little girls, teenagers, and women of all ages love love. We love talking about it and dreaming about it and seeing it all around us. We go to weddings and wedding shows and look at wedding dresses and rings online. We talk about it in circles of other women our age. We encourage this idea of love and matrimony to the girls younger than ourselves. Our families encourage the very thoughts that drive us mad and make us desire to be madly in love. The women of our nation are doing anything and everything we can to attract the attention of the men. Every magazine we look at and tv channel we turn on even to the radio stations we flip through remind us of what we are “missing”. So what are we really missing?
Being a single Christian woman in our day is a very tough thing, especially around the months of February, May, and December. These are the times we are remembering that we are single. Between Valentines Day, wedding season, and the holidays (mostly referring to Christmas) we see so many couples and are reminded that we are single. However, we forget that there are so many others just like us. We all face this struggle at some point of our lives. Recently I have become very aware of my singleness, seeing as it is the season for love (May, wedding season). Every weekend this month there has been at least two or more weddings of people I have known getting married. This is a very tough thought and sight. I would love to be married and believe that God has placed that desire in my life for a reason. Over the past year I have been going through the Old Testament. It has reminded me in a few places that God is my Heavenly Husband. This is something I am quick to forget. He is not holding me physically. He does not call to make sure I am ok in the middle of the night after a really rough day. He … well He is not a physical man. Although, as I am reminded of my Heavenly Husband and begin to understand Him better I see how powerful His word is and how blessed I am to be able to sit and read it with out fear of being murdered or hated. I take for granted every last thing I am given. Singleness is by no means easy, but neither is marriage. As I said before I have many married friends. They tell me of the struggles they have had in living with someone else. The struggles of being a sinful woman led by a sinful man. Two people butting heads to get what they want. They have also told me of the many wonderful things that their marriages hold. I love hearing both sides because it is such a great reminder that it is not a slice of cake that I am not getting to partake in. It is hard and it is humbling and sanctifying. Many of the books and articles I have read on singleness shed light on the fact that God has His own timeline. It is not the one I think I should have, it is the perfect, holy, divine will of God. He has planned out our lives so perfectly. If we had access to the knowledge God has we would not ask for anything better, because we know His will is perfect. However, because we are sinful and we do not know the extent of His will we try to fill ourselves with what we think is best or what we want. This can lead to many things that we did not know we were asking for.
Women are so desperate for physical relationships that in the day to day flow we get all sorts of people involved in our desire. One thing I learned early on as a believer is we talk about the things we love most. In recent conversations with girls and women the topics of relationships and marriage are the first things that come up. I am just as guilty as any of these women. I have found myself in situations recently where I am realizing that most of my friends are getting married and I am left behind. I am missing out on this amazing journey called marriage. A friend invited me to spend some time with him while he was on leave from the military. Our friendship before (when I was a very young Christian and he was at the time not following God at all) was very flirtatious. I thought things about him that I knew were wrong. I also knew that if he never came to Christ I would and should not ever enter into any type of relationship with him outside of sharing the gospel with him. So when we went out with another couple and a friend I thought it would be all right. There seemed to be expectations on our friendship that were not there before. There was a constant sense of something physical. In my mind I was going crazy. He is a very attractive young man. He is currently serving in the military fighting for our country, which is also attractive to me. And recently he has surrendered his life to Christ. My mind was racing with how close do I sit to him, can we hug on each other like we used to, and so many other things. I was taken back to the Old Testament and reminded of Christ being my Heavenly Husband. So here I sat thinking “if my husband were to hear the thoughts in my head and see the actions I am even considering right now, how would he respond?” Our God is a jealous God. He wants us to seek Him and Him only. As women we are to follow God and seek Him with our whole heart and not worry about Mr. Right. A dear friend of mine was talking to me about all of this, she was telling me that a man needs to be so founded in God’s word that He will “stumble” upon me through scripture. We do not need to be out there searching for a husband. We need to love God with all of our heart, mind, and soul. We need to be doing anything and everything we can to live for His glory. Without complaining and without a selfish heart. All we do should be in pursuit of Him. So why are we spending thousands of dollars every year to make ourselves more appealing to men? If God is attracted to us from the inside out, then should we not be purifying ourselves with His word?
Paul Washer spoke on having Christianity worth exporting. He was trying to get a point across by asking questions about our devotional life and our church life. We are running the metaphorical marathon of life. To train for such a run we should have a workout plan. In following Christ we should have some form of daily devotion with God. So is our devotion life worth exporting to other lives or even other countries? Am I living in such a way that is pleasing to God? My initial question at the beginning of this article was “what are we really missing?” We as single women think we are missing so much because we are single. We are missing out on the joys of exploiting our singleness for Jesus Christ our Lord and Savior. Let us stop living to please men but to please God. Let us stand up and walk with God more so than ever. Keep Him in sight and never push Him aside. Love Him with all of your heart, soul, and mind and you will have the most rewarding relationship of your entire life on this side of eternity as well as on the other.
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