So today I have begun reading The Young Lady in Waiting (Jackie Kendall & Debbie Jones) and surprisingly it restated my comments I shared on another blog post, ""What Your Father Forgot To Tell You": Vol 2. Age Aint Nothing But A Number". As I read the words of Waiting I thought "Wow. I have to share this with the other blog commenters!", but decided to take this to my own blog by the time I'd finished reading Chapter 1, "Young Lady of Reckless Abandonment", because it's here where I can expound a bit more comfortably.
The Young Lady in Waiting, a book my loving younger sister bought for me, caught my attention at a Christian bookstore because truth is "[I] have longed for love so much that [I] have given [myself] to some relationships that have been outside of God's boundaries" (Soul Ties: The Unseen Bond In Relationships (David Cross), another book I'm reading these days). And I am tired. A little lost in HOW to apply what I know about waiting for love (from a man). I know it. I'd pass the written test, but when it comes to applying my knowledge in the field... I have failed one too many times. Interestingly enough the whole "single" dilemma, I believe, is rooted in a lack of fulfillment, a lack of knowing one's worth. A lack of true love for self. This "cycle of the 'American way' that exalts a relationship with a man as the answer to life". And although I have never believed a man would be my answer to life, my sense of fulfillment, worth, love for self has been ... unstable. But, I digress a bit. I'm sure I'll share my story in more depth eventually. Today's not the day. Today's the day I share with you what was beneficial to me and hope can be beneficial to not only the ladies out there waiting, but men, too.
Excerpts from "The Missing Puzzle Piece" section of Chapter 1 (as written & styled in the book; excluding the format of listing the excerpts numerically):
1. Mr. Right is not enough to totally satisfy you by [himself]. God knows that you will never be complete until you really understand that you are complete in Jesus. Colossians 2:9-10 says, "For in Him all the fullness of Deity dwells in bodily form, and in Him you have been made complete, and He is the head over all rule and authority."
2. Incompleteness is not the result of being single, but of not being full of Jesus.
3. When two "incomplete" singles get married, their union will not make them complete. Their marriage will be simply two "incomplete" people trying to find completeness in one another. Only when they understand that their fullness is found in a relationship with Jesus will they ever begin to complement one another. You were not created to complete another, but to complement. Completion is Jesus' responsibility and complementing is a woman's privilege. A woman not complete in Jesus will be a drain on her husband. Such a woman will expect her husband to fill the gap that only Jesus can fill. Only the single woman who understands this means of being complete in Jesus is mature enough to be a helpmeet (complement).
"The Missing Puzzle Piece" includes a quote from Elisabeth Elliot's book Loneliness, "Marriage teaches us that even the most intimate human companionship cannot satisfy the deepest places of the heart. Our hearts are lonely 'til they rest in Him." It continues stating "Elisabeth Elliot has been married three times (twice widowed) and she knows from experience that marriage does not make one complete; only Jesus does." Sometimes it's best that we take the wisdom of those who have been there, done that and reap the benefits of their wisdom by using it as a guide. Ladies (and gentlemen) we will not, can not find completeness in a man (or woman). In knowing this, maybe, just maybe our idea of love and the nature of how we relate to people (a lot of times out of the order of God) will positively affect such abuses we inflict on others, but also ourselves in the name (or pursuance) of love--or, should I say, what we know love to be.
I hope the above excerpts were as a edifying to you as they were to me. Sometimes "truths" of life's circumstances, statistics found in scholarly articles regarding relationship/family dynamics, and images of "love" being imposed upon us in every aspect of pop culture coupled with our complexities, blinds us from the "life and prosperity" God has set before us. It's going to take us to live a life of "reckless abandonment". One of which we may need to reconsider the company we keep, the culture we embrace, and the truths (many of which I'm sure are false) we place our faith. Lord knows it ain't easy. I know because I've at times been recklessly bold in my pursuit of God but then grown too comfortable in my standing with Him--not feeling a need to pursue God daily (i.e. not "devoting as much time to Jesus as I would in a relationship with a boyfriend"--just to find myself bewildered by how I've recklessly lost focused, lost a hold of my spiritual & mental sustenance and therefore pursued my heart's desires--doing & becoming all that I never thought I could. All in the name of wanting to love & be loved--even when I knew full well that the conditions of the relationships couldn't foster such. Anywho, I've digressed a bit again, huh? *lol* The challenge is staying committed. And as singles what better way to practice commitment than to foster such relationship with God. It's great practice (fulfilling practice--the gift-that-keeps-on-giving kinda practice) that will be beneficial to our relationship with Mr. Right, if it's God's will, and, most important, with ourselves.
"Young Lady of Reckless Abandonment" mentions a quote of Gary Chapman that truly made me say, "A-MEN!" (No pun intended.) It's one of those quotes that I think every single should embrace. It reads, "I feel very strongly that marriage is not a higher calling than the single state. Happy indeed are those people, married or single, who have discovered that happiness is not found in marriage but in right relationship with God." Trust me, as a single who desires to one day be a wife, the idea of such manifestation not being the will of God is hard to accept. But Young Lady in Waiting really has opened my eyes a bit in stating the true sign of reckless abandonment to Jesus is "when the Lord gives you a difficult assignment, you receive His terms without resentment". So in our pursuance of God, we have to make sure that we aren't seeking Him in hopes that our doing so will result in the gift of Mr. Right (or anything else we may desire), but because "Without the way there is no going; without the truth there is no knowing; without the life there is no living,"as well stated by Thomas a Kempis (Imitation of Christ, iii, 56); for Jesus is "the way and the truth and the life" (John 14:6). [Probably doesn't mean much to some reading this post. Visit Blue Letter Bible and search "John 14" and "God is" for curiosity's sake.]
Again, I believe that such a desire to be fulfilled and the idea that such fulfillment comes from "a man" has much to do with our lack of fulfillment in ourselves, ladies. A lack of knowing ourselves. (We're more wonderful than we comprehend. [See Psalm 139.]) Young Ladies in Waiting mentions a quote that is said to be found on the back cover of the book Learning to Be a Woman. I will close this post with it.
"A woman is not born a woman. Nor does she become one when she marries a man, bears a child and does their dirty linen, not even when she joins a women's liberation movement. A woman becomes a woman when she becomes what God wants her to be."
God bless us all in our journey to find ourselves complete. In God.
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