Since it’s the month of February, the month when us singles are reminded of our singleness, I thought, why not do a post about being single as a Christian. If you scroll back to my first year of blogging, I spoke about my celibacy and my desire to follow God and abstain. I had just grasped the importance of purity, and I was all in! Coming from a world that encourages sexual liberty and freedom, you can be sure I was waist deep init before the Lord saved me. So, for me to then decide to go cold turkey was a big deal, and cemented my faith because I was truly convicted that sex outside of marriage was wrong. I am happy to say I have never stumbled in that department, I still remain celibate on my journey. Speaking over the few years with other Christians, it’s been very interesting to see how they feel about dating and celibacy. It became very clear, very quickly, how not all were as convicted as me. Now, I understand that the desires of the flesh can be strong in this area, so it takes a strong will to live a life of celibacy when we live in a world where everything is overly sexualised. But God gives us this instruction for a reason, not because He hates us or doesn’t want us to have fun, but because He wants and knows what’s best for us! I definitely didn’t need convincing of this because I could look back at my promiscuity and see the damage it had done to me spiritually, not to mention physically. I could have avoided so much trauma and bad life decisions if I had only done it His way instead of my own, but you know what they say about hindsight!
I used to be the queen of online dating when I was in the world. I always wanted relationships and was on a constant pursuit of love. But because of the lack of value I had for myself, I found myself in situationships promising the boys sex in exchange for love, as the boys promised me love in exchange for sex. A very poor transaction that is still in circulation today. So of course, when I became a Christian, I still wanted a relationship but now I had to do it differently, so I joined up to the Christian dating sites thinking that it would be very different this time. Oh, was I wrong! There were a lot of non Christian “christians,” and a lot of guys were just looking for a “good” girl. When you have to start asking guys who Jesus is on a christian dating site, you know you have a problem. It all became very triggering, reminding me of my past life, and I felt like God say “leave online dating alone.”
So here I was back to square one, wanting a relationship but being unsuccessful in finding one. I felt the Holy Spirit nudge me to find out what it meant to be in a relationship, a healthy God breathed relationship. It occurred to me that I had no idea! I still had a worldly view of what a relationship was, what a role of a husband and wife was, what marriage was! I had to go back to the word of God to see what He said about it. When I truly understood Gods view of marriage, I got scared and decided maybe marriage wasn’t for me! Just like we have to die to ourselves when it comes to the Lord, I realised I would have to do the same with my husband, and that made me uncomfortable. It seemed hard, and I couldn’t understand what I was getting out of it. The word “submit” kept creeping up, and the idea of it felt wrong! Submission wasn’t the bad guy, but my warped idea of submission was. The culture had defiled the word and its meaning. God showed me that being a Christian was centred around submission, and I had to submit to God first! And that was what I had committed to do. So, if I could submit to God, He also required me to submit to my husband. If I had a problem with that, I clearly still had some work to do when it came to submitting to my Father in heaven. I knew then that I had no business looking for a relationship until I got the most important relationship right first.
Sometimes, our desire to find a partner can almost become an idol in our lives. We become willing to throw wisdom aside in our impatience, forgetting that the Lord’s way and timing are always better. We become so consumed with no longer being single, no longer being treated like the sad spare wheel among our married friends that we stop listening to His voice, we stop including Him in the selection process in fear that He may turn away the only person that has shown us interest in what seems like forever. We start to entertain the wrong people, then find ourselves in compromising postions down the line, that all could of been avoided if we just trusted in the Lord our God and not leaned on our own understanding. GENESIS 2:18 THEN THE LORD GOD SAID, “IT IS NOT GOOD FOR THE MAN TO BE ALONE. I WILL MAKE A HELPER WHO IS JUST RIGHT FOR HIM.” God never wanted us to be alone. Finding someone to become one flesh with is the way God intended it. But in this evil world we live in, where satan is working overtime to draw us away from God, we have to be vigilant and don’t let our desires become more important than pleasing our Father.
1 CORINTHIANS 7:32-34 “I WANT YOU TO BE FREE FROM THE CONCERNS OF THIS LIFE. AN UNMARRIED MAN CAN SPEND HIS TIME DOING THE LORD’S WORK AND THINKING HOW TO PLEASE HIM. BUT A MARRIED MAN HAS TO THINK ABOUT HIS EARTHLY RESPONSIBILITIES AND HOW TO PLEASE HIS WIFE. HIS INTERESTS ARE DIVIDED. IN THE SAME WAY, A WOMAN WHO IS NO LONGER MARRIED OR HAS NEVER BEEN MARRIED CAN BE DEVOTED TO THE LORD AND HOLY IN BODY AND IN SPIRIT. BUT A MARRIED WOMAN HAS TO THINK ABOUT HER EARTHLY RESPONSIBILITIES AND HOW TO PLEASE HER HUSBAND.”
Paul talks about singleness as being a gift. Not because he believes everyone should remain single, but because of the relationship singleness cultivates with God. Being single is a time we can grow in our faith, a time to get to know Jesus and understand who we are because of Him, all without the distractions that relationships bring. It’s a time to ground ourselves in Him and His word, a time to mature spiritually. When we become affirmed in Him, we start to date better. Why? Because we start to operate under His will instead of our own. We hunger to please Him, so we honour Him in our choices. Satan struggles to turn our heads because the Lord has our hearts. Bad relationships draw us away from God. Good relationships draw us closer to God. It’s like that one friend who, every time they get into a new relationship, you never hear from them again until they find themselves back to being single. That’s us when we are not grounded in God. When we marry, our priorities change. As the scripture says, we have earthly responsibilities. In the end, we are here to serve. God first, then each other. We sometimes get confused and become self-serving. Our flesh is constantly crying out to us to put ourselves first. But it’s the Holy Spirit that guides us away from ourselves. If we allow the Holy Spirit to guide us in other areas of our lives, why not in our dating?
I know that when you get to a certain age, dating seems impossible. To be honest, I feel like I might have a calling to be single because at 41, my dating life is non existant. My desire has always been to find a husband, have the kids, and all the trimmings that come with it. This time of celibacy and growth in the Lord has renewed my mind on marriage, and now I feel more ready than ever to submit! I actually can not wait to find that man who I can wholly submit to because they wholly submit to God! They have to love the Lord and be willing to love me like Christ loved the church, I mean, He did die for the church. It doesn’t get much better than that! But at the same time, I am willing to wait on God, I don’t feel pressured. Even if a husband is not what God has for me, will I curse Him? will that make Him not good? of course not! God is good regardless because I have eternal life in His son Jesus! It would only mean that God wants me undistracted because I have kingdom work to do. I can still find joy in that!
So, am I lonely? The answer, in short, is no. When I was in the world, I felt the seasons of loneliness, the longing for someone to love me. It was an intense sadness. But I truly found love when I found Jesus. He took my loneliness away and gave me a feeling of completeness that I never knew I could experience by myself. This is the most content I have been single… ever! Like I said, I still would like to be married, but that desire is not the same, and I feel more neutral about it. If it comes, I will be happy, and if it doesn’t come, I will be happy. My desire to please God is greater than finding a husband. I want to be intentional about everything I do, and that includes dating. I don’t want to date for the sake of dating. I am not sure what that looks like for me, but I feel sure for now that it doesn’t include online dating just yet.
To all my singles out there, have patience and trust God with your heart. He will not break it. Let God fulfil you instead of looking for someone else to do that. If you want to date, then date! But keep God in your dating, He always knows best. Remember to test the spirits and look to the fruit they produce. If you don’t want to marry, that’s fine too. Being single and serving the Lord with all your heart is not bad. It is a beautiful thing! So don’t let this season get you down, focus on God, and pray about what you want. Be specific. It helps you to know what you actually want in a partner. Trust that in His perfect timing, when we pray for good things that please God, He will fullfill and we shall receive!
MY CONVICTIONS 