The grass isn’t always greener on the other side. The grass is green on the side that you choose to water.
-Someone, somewhere, at some point in history
For the purpose of this blog it means that as a single person the grass doesn’t have to be greener on the other side. Marriage doesn’t have to be the greener side. The grass will be green on the side that you choose to water and cultivate.
When the topic first came to mind it was for my high school girls in youth group who want to meet Mr. Right and fall in love. Then it was also for the girls that as the years go by see singleness as a curse and something to wish away. Time is focused looking for “the one” to spend the rest of your life with instead of using it to focus on your relationship with the Lord. A desire to be married isn’t a bad one unless it becomes a priority more than your relationship with the Lord.
Let me start by clarifying that I do want to be married some day. I want to wear the white dress, walk down the isle and say I do. I want to be a wife to stand beside my husband as his partner, his encourager and confidant. What I don’t want to do is spend my time between now and then on the constant look out for the man I will marry. I made this realization in November of 2013 when it became official that I was going on the World Race. Part of that was signing a commitment form saying that if I wasn’t already in a relationship I wouldn’t choose to pursue one between then and the end of the WR. It would end up being a total of 19 months. This is just simply so that a relationship wouldn’t be a contender for my time in the 11 months that I chose to set apart to draw closer to God.
Something I didn’t expect was the freedom I felt in that. I didn’t consider myself someone who spent a lot of time thinking about getting married but knowing that for the next 19 months a relationship wasn’t even a possibility changed something in me. There wasn’t time spent hoping that a crush would ask me out, or wondering when I would meet “the guy”, or even asking God about it. I wouldn’t have believed that just letting go of this desire for a period of time would change my relationship with God. It has.
I don’t want my youth group girls, or my friends or anyone to wish away precious time waiting for their future Mr. that they could be using to focus on God. There are blessings to being single. (As well as being married, this isn’t an anti-marriage blog.) There are things that God has to tell you and show you before you are married. Please don’t wish past all of that.
I understand this now but I’ve also learned it doesn’t just have to do with trusting the Lord with the desire for marriage but trusting the Lord with all of our desires. At the end of that 19 months do I need to start wondering about getting married again? No. In Nepal a few of my teammates and I got to go to prayer and worship night on Saturdays at a missionaries house down the road from us. One of the songs that played was “You won’t relent until you have it all” followed by a song that talked about surrendering all to God. So, like I surrendered my relationship status to the Lord 13 months before that He was now calling me to surrender everything; my hopes, dreams, and plans to Him still at the end of this 11 months.
I am the one who gets to decide what the grass looks like that I am walking on. I am the one who gets to decide that the grass underneath me will be green, and well cultivated. I am the one who gets to choose to allow God to use this season of singleness for His name.
