I never thought I’d be writing a blog on singlehood.
I tend to despise blogs on singlehood…
I might despise this one…
Yet here I am…and it’s time.
I wanted to write this while I actually am single. While I am actually very single with not a pursuer on the horizon…because I tend to hate articles or books from women who USED to be single…it’s not the same. It is so not the same. Everything looks different when you’re reflecting compared to when you’re in it.
When you are smack dab in the middle of it…when you have moments of shouting, “Wahoo, I’m free!” to sobbing uncontrollably about how deeply you desire someone to hold you and know you.
Where singlehood feels more like a forest that just keeps getting thicker with each passing year, and you begin to wonder how in the world someone could even find you in there.
Smack dab in the middle.
* * *
After 9 months on an all girls team, I’ve been present for every conversation imaginable on future husbands, marriages, weddings, good dates, bad dates, proposals, dream homes and jobs and lives and children and lists…I could never forget the endless lists of what would account for that perfect one.
I remember hearing what the Myers-Briggs test said regarding the letters my husband should have as his personality type…what letters I would be most compatible with…to which I just looked at my teammate, and stated, “I already know what letters my husband will be…M-A-N.”
I’ve been around single lady after single lady out here on the mission field: happy ones, sad ones, worn out ones…and I’m not going to lie, each one that I meet, I have that thought, “Oh my gosh, the Lord’s preparing me for this…” and my heart sinks.
Typically in conversation, I would preface any talk about that ‘one’ with an “if”. If marriage is what the Lord has for me, I hope he’s like XYZ.
And to the ‘if’, I would get the response, “You are going to get married…isn’t that something you desire? God will give you the desires of your heart…”
But down in my heart, the question remains, “And what if He doesn’t? What if I don’t get married?”
People don’t like that question.
And that’s when I get the follow-up response of, “God loves you…He would want you to get married…”
Would He?
I have found that people like to believe in a God that gives them the desires of their hearts. It almost sounds like a fairy tale…and what girl doesn’t like a fairy tale? Shoot, I think even most men like a good fairy tale ending.
But there’s something that comes before and after that promise.
You must know that I fully believe in the words penned that say He’ll give us the desires and secret petitions of our hearts, yet I also must believe in its surroundings.
We’re commanded to delight ourselves in the Lord. To find our delight IN the Lord. Not in what He can do for us. And just following that verse lies this:
“Commit your way to the Lord; trust in Him and He will bring it to pass.” Psalm 37:5
Commit your way. A way committed to Him. Committed to Him even if it doesn’t include marriage. Committed to His purpose for this life.
That part doesn’t stitch as nicely on a pillow.
It’s not as easy to swallow.
A God that meets our desires just because we have them is easier to swallow than a God who requires our complete commitment…who requires us to sacrifice a dream…a desire.
Why would He do that? Why would He require that?
