Over the past year, God has done quite a work in me. He has also brought a young lady into my life. This was no coincidence. God has a perfect plan for us individually and in relationships. My girlfriend, Sarah, has a ministry for young singles called “Ladies in Waiting.” I don't claim to be an expert on the courting/dating subject, but I thought it would be helpful for me to share an article I wrote about a guy’s perspective on dating. First, I'll talk to the girls and then the guys. It will take several posts, so keep coming back!
Ok ladies, as you wait for the man God has for you, you may ask, “Is it worth it?” or, “is anyone looking for girls with high standards?” For singles, these are pressing questions. Each day you feel more and more alone. You wonder if a godly leader will ever show up. The thought might cross your mind that perhaps you might need to lower your standards. You've seen movies and read books where “The Guy” comes, sweeps his girl off her feet, and they live happily ever after. You know other girls who found their guy before they were 20.The dream you have of getting married seems just like that, a dream that will never come true.
Before I answer those thoughts, let's look at what a “Lady in Waiting” is. Webster's Dictionary defines “lady” as “a woman of refinement and gentle manners.” A lady acts properly in formal situations. She does not make a scene or draw undue attention. A lady is also gentle in the way she talks, acts, and treats others. She isn’t trying to keep up with the guys. That doesn't mean she can't play sports or joke. Almost every guy appreciates a girl who can throw and catch a football. So that’s a lady, but a lady in waiting is more. A lady in waiting is obviously waiting for her man, but what should she be doing while she waits? While waiting, a lady should prepare for married life. Knowing how to cook, sew, keep house, decorate, and even garden are all things that most guys will find attractive in a prospective wife. Marriage is a time of learning about and interacting with your mate. Learning as much as you can now about the mundane aspects of life will help you be ready when Mr. Right arrives.
We have now completed our definition of a “lady in waiting,” right? Almost. If you are just looking for any guy, then yes. But you don't want just any guy. You want the guy God has for you! Okay, so, being a “lady in waiting” isn't enough. Let’s add another word. Let's add “a godly lady in waiting.”
When you put God in front, the basics may stay the same, but the purpose changes. Living for God means putting Him first in your daily life. A godly lady in waiting must be closer to God than she will ever be to her boyfriend, fiancée, or husband. Before God gives you someone else, He wants to make sure that He is the permanent, number-one guy in your life. So when God is your closest friend, you know how to handle yourself socially, you are gentle and learning all you can about homemaking, then you're ready, right?
Maybe, and maybe not. God's timing is perfect. Sometimes we try to hurry God, but that usually falls flat. Other times we go too slow, and God prods us. You might be ready, but your man might not be.
Brian Green
That's good Brian. Thanks for working through the words to say all that. ~Lori Heston
ReplyDeleteHi, I'm a friend of Rachel's and visit here to keep up with what she writes. I have a few thoughts after reading your post. I appreciate your points, but we need to be careful as Christians not to put too much emphasis on "preparing for marriage." The truth is, we can't prepare for marriage. The concept denotes that it is manageable and tidy, something that can be perfected. But it is none of those things. In the Bible, God never calls us to prepare for marriage. He calls us to be holy as He is holy. He commands us to love our neighbor as ourselves. He tells us to prepare for spiritual warfare and for temptation. Our emphasis needs to always be on preparing ourselves for life. If God's plan for our life includes marriage, then we will be prepared. You wrote, "Learning as much as you can now about the mundane aspects of life will help you be ready when Mr. Right arrives." However, mundane aspects of life will be no less mundane after marriage. We should be womanly, be skilled, be content, and above all be godly - but we should be these things because it honors God and makes us better people.
ReplyDeleteElizabeth, I appreciate your comment. In this article my target audience was single ladies who are waiting for their Prince Charming and I was giving a guy perspective. As my girlfriend can attest, marriage and the hope for their "Guy" can often preoccupy the minds of single ladies, especially when they keep getting older and there seem to be no prospects on the horizon. Preparing for marriage is definitely not something that can be mastered. Similarly preparing for life and the plan God has for our lives seems sometime a totally useless endeavor However being as prepared as possible for is something that every single person who aspires to be married should do. In the next section of this article I state that then number one thing girls should do in order to be prepared for marriage is to make sure God is number one in their life. That would include being Holy as He is Holy and loving our neighbor as ourselves etc. I agree that the mundane aspects of life won't become unmundane once one is married, but having those thing being second nature will definitely help with keeping a tidy home and entertaining family and friends. Honoring God should always be the number one goal, but being prepared for marriage is a pretty is a pretty good number two goal.
ReplyDeleteAs far as I can tell, both Brian and Elizabeth are pointing out that obeying God has a lot of ramifications. Actively growing as a Christian and a person qualifies you for a variety of functions. The point of difference is the audience. Elizabeth is going for a universal audience, while Brian is targeting young ladies who have not experienced the responsibilities of taking care of a household. Those girls definitely need exposure to the hard-work side of married life. But marriage should not be an idol that girls look to as a burden bearer - thus Elizabeth's comment is also relevent.
ReplyDeleteAgreed. Well put Rachel.
ReplyDelete(friend of Lori, Liz, and Rachel)
ReplyDeleteIt sounds like everyone here has good points. It is always interesting for me to hear the male perspective in everything. Thank you for your thoughts on that.
While I (a single in my 30s) agree that single ladies need to be learning how to keep house, garden, and yes, maybe even throw a football (though I prefer soccer personally…), I agree with Elizabeth that there is a danger in the mindset of “I’m doing all this to prepare for marriage.”
Example: a girl who is on her own, does her own cooking, laundry, cleaning, etc. She has certain career goals and life goals set, based on how she believes she can best glorify God. One day, she meets a guy she really likes (let’s call him Norbert). He seems interested in her, but never really pursues her. She thinks he’s just being shy or he’s not ready yet. So, instead of pursuing her goals, she decides to “put them on hold” because Norbert is just taking things slow. Then one day, Norbert announces his engagement to someone else. Girl crushed. (seen this happen more than once).
Personally, I don’t want to be waiting for my Prince Charming to come and sweep me off of my feet. I want to be living a life focused on Christ. Doing what pleases Him. Even if it means I stay single the rest of my life. Even if it means I get married in the future. I want to learn how to do the mundane things of life (cleaning, home maintenance, etc) because it is being a good steward of what God has given me, not because I want to impress some guy.
To kind of rephrase/adapt what you said, “When you put God in front, the basics may stay the same, but the purpose changes. Living for God means putting Him first in your daily life.” So much so that a lady will no longer be concerned about a husband or lack thereof. She knows that God is her satisfaction, and if He chooses to bring a man in her life, it will be in His perfect timing and way. If He chooses to have her remain single, He will use her alone in His perfect timing and way.
I want to throw a challenge in here to single ladies young and younger ;). Don't be afraid to learn something that you may think is a "man-only" task. For example, dealing with car repairs (change a tire), how to use a caulk gun (to install a tub surround), to change the sink drain, or how to change the blades on the lawn mower. I will add, parents, don't hold your children back from learning these things if they are inclined to do so! Every woman has a mind to learn certain things. There is also the category of learned helplessness which says, "I know nothing about how to repair a car, I'm not even going to try."(Rick Lavoie) If you're not inclined to learn a certain area, don't worry about it, but if you do want to learn something, don't let the fact that it's portrayed as a "man-only" task deter you. You do not know if you will ever be married. It would be better if you continue to grow and expand your knowledge to be able to live life. You will not always have parents to oversee your life. The Lord puts things in your path. Learn from them as much as you can. If you are not inclined to learn then the Lord knows that too and has promised people for your life. When something comes up that you don't know how to handle, reach out for those experienced to help you. Ruth has an interesting perspective on this idea when her dad realized she wasn't going to get married any time soon (though she's still available :). As a machinist and inventor, he began teaching her how to do maintenance type tasks and when she landed at BJU for school she worked in maintenance, expanding her inclination toward learning these areas. Now I am learning while being the loyal, faithful assistant handing various wrenches, pipes, drywall, and potting soil in our various projects. Don't be afraid to live life. It's what God has called us to do and in doing so you reach others around you in amazing ways.
ReplyDeleteLori has a great point. All of my sister (I have three, Mindy, Sharon and Saundra) know how to change a tire, mow the lawn, and can handle a hammer if they have to. Now Sharon and Saundra are more apt to doing that kind of thing than Mindy is, probably because they had older brothers to teach them, but they are all capable of doing things that most people would consider a "man's job". On the other side guys shouldn't be afraid of doing things that are considered a woman's job. Cooking, baking, washing the dishes, sewing on a button are all things that I think every guy should know how to do because seriously, if a guy doesn't get married he'll need to know how to do these thing just to take care of himself, and if he does get married his wife is going to be sick sometime, either with the flu or something else, so he'll end up needing to cook, do the laundry, wash the dishes etc...
ReplyDeleteAs to the "danger in the mindset of 'I’m doing all this to prepare for marriage.'" The only danger is making preparation for marriage more important that one's walk with the Lord. The purpose of this article was to encourage young ladies who are waiting for "Mr. Right" to show up an are losing hope as to if he will ever arrive and I'll spoil the next post by saying that Yes there are Godly young men out there who are looking for Godly young ladies. I believe that if a young lady is walking close to God and she still has a burning desire to be married and have her own man that God will provide that man. Everyone is different and a young lady that God has planned a single life for will be able to live that life for the glory of God. Others whether it be their upbringing, things that happened to them as a child or teenager, or just their personality are incapable of living life as a single person, but would make a very capable wife. As long as Christ is the center of a young lady's life God will guide their path and their desires. Having the goal of marriage as a number one priority is dangerous. One must keep their eyes fixed on Christ, and for some preparing for marriage is what they should be doing. There isn't a cut and dry line here. I have a Aunt who is almost 50 and is still single and I my sister in-law started dating my brother when she was 18 while my girlfriend and I didn't start dating till she was 26. Some are called to a single life, and some are called to marriage and some are called to marriage a little later. I would be careful about calling out someone's ambitions and dreams as dangerous. Just because it's not the way God planned it for you doesn't mean it isn't the way God planned it for someone else.
Again, God needs to be number one, no matter what. After that everyone is different. Some need to pursue a career while others need to prepare for marriage and there are those who need to do both. Each person is unique and God's plan for them is unique. I guess what I'm trying to say is "Don't try to make someone plan for life outside of marriage if they are convinced God has marriage in His plan for them" On the other side I'm not saying every single girl should spend every waking moment getting ready for Prince Charming to ride up on his white steed. It isn't going to happen for every girl, but for some (not literally of course) it will happen and she needs to be ready.
To those of you girls who are convinced that God has a man out there for you, keep your heads high and stay close to your Lord and someday you'll get your man!
Perhaps I was misunderstood. It’s not that I don’t want to get married. Just the opposite. All through my growing up years, I had planned on getting married just out of college, and then going on to raise a family, etc. Well, obviously God had other plans. There was no marriage right after college. Up to that point, I had been living with the “preparing for marriage” mindset. While the desire for marriage didn’t leave, the mindset had to change.
ReplyDeleteHad I kept the preparing for marriage mindset, I would have become extremely discouraged as years went by and no man came. The Lord had to change my thoughts from preparing for marriage to preparing to serve Him no matter what. To be content being single (not always easy!). To be totally focused on Him and serving Him regardless of my marital status.
Just because someone desires marriage, does not mean that God has that in His plan for that person. That does not make God evil, vindictive, or mean. It just shows that His plan is greater than our desires, and He knows what is best for us. He knows exactly what we need to most glorify Him.
I understand, Tracy, that it's hard to continue a "preparing for marriage" mindset when time keeps ticking by with no guy in sight. Each of us handle that different though. Some ladies I have known can push that out of their mind and concentrate on serving the Lord alone. Others I know who can't get the "preparing for marriage" thing out of their mind.
ReplyDeleteIt wasn't until I was almost 26 when I was asked out for the first time. I never lost my preparing for marriage mindset, even though several times I tried very hard to because I was tired of waiting. I was not just waiting around, I was serving my Lord and others, as well as preparing for marriage. Each person is so different. So often we try to cookie cutter how singles should be, perfectly content in their singleness. But the Lord doesn't have singleness for everyone. Some will also struggle with their singleness more than others. The Lord has a prefect life plan for each one of us, and each is so very different.
Brain,
ReplyDeleteEagerly awaiting your comments for "men".