So here’s the deal – the honest truth – I really liked having a boyfriend. I was the girl who was either dating someone or talking to someone or texting someone or crushing on someone. And here’s the problem I found with that – when one relationship would end, I would feel like I had lost my identity. Like I was incomplete. Sure, there were times when I went a few months without having a boyfriend, but having a man was always the end-goal. Looking back now, knowing what I know, that seems so silly.
A few years ago, I ended the most serious relationship I had ever been in. It was an unhealthy relationship. We thought we loved eachother, but he had trouble being faithful and we had a lot of drama. I should have ended things much sooner, and he probably should have too, but we didn’t. Not too long after that relationship ended, I felt a still, small voice telling me that it was time to be alone. Time to stop dating and time to “figure things out”. So I obeyed. I made a commitment to myself that I would not date (even if asked) until after the New Year.
I set out on a journey to become more in love with Christ and less in love with myself and the guys around me. It was a truly amazing time in my life. Each Friday night, I would have a “date night” with God. I would begin by preparing dinner, thanking God for giving me great food to eat and for giving me time to spend with Him, in His Word. After dinner, I would go back to my bedroom and read my Bible and other Christian books (mostly books about being single and resting in the comfort that God is who He says He is). I would listen to Christian music, and then fall asleep praying, thanking God for who He was and what He was doing in my life.
I was travelling a lot for work during that time, and during my long commutes, I would listen to podcast sermons about what the Bible says that dating, marriage, and healthy relationships should look like. Most of these podcasts came from Watermark Community Church. They currently have a few different series on their website under “The Porch” section: Boy Meets Girl, Cupid: Dating Myths, The Dating Game, and Summer Lovin’ are a few of the series that I recommend. As I started learning what healthy relationships looked like, I realized that my whole mind-set had been wrong. I had been looking for someone to love me rather than being confident in Christ’s love for me and searching for someone who loved God.
I also read several different books about being comfortable in singleness. A few of these are: Passion and Purity: Learning to BringYour Love Life Under Christ's Control (Elizabeth Elloitt), Singleness Redefined:Living Life to the Fullest (Carolyn Leutwiler), and Your Knight in ShiningArmor: Discovering Your Lifelong Love (P.B. Wilson). Here’s the deal – I wasn’t comfortable being alone. I was literally defining my life by the wrong things, and that led to confusion, heartache, drama, and real emotional consequences.
For the several months leading up to the New Year, I did not date. I worked on drawing close to God, and just like James 4:8 promises in the Bible – He drew close to me. When the New Year came around, I realized I was very comfortable with remaining single. I prayed that if God had someone out there for me to date, that he would show me who that was, and I knew that if there wasn’t anyone, I would be ok. Well, on January 3, my husband sent me a Facebook message asking “What you up to?”, which turned into a phone call and a date request. We went out for the first time the following day. (See blog “Our First Date”). While dating my husband, I continued having a “date night” with God. Spending time with my Creator had become a priority, and Christ became the center of my relationship with my husband. The biggest difference this time was, I knew that even if Phil didn’t love me and didn’t want to date me, that the God who created this universe loved me more than I could imagine, and for the first time, I was content.
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