Can I just say how thankful I am that God is always willing to help me see beyond my own little world of sometimes self-pity to see the Brightside? He never runs out of new revelations to show me. I think that is one of the things I’m enjoying most in my life right now – the way I’m getting to know myself as God shows me new things.
It’s really cool to meet yourself – a version of you that you actually treasure. I think it’s pretty rare, and I am so thankful that I’m getting to experience that. I hear some people never do, and that makes me sad.
Even though I’m crazy busy these days between being a student, an RA, a friend, a sister, a daughter, and study leader, I’m still somehow finding time to fit in thinking about guys every now and then. It’s coming up on a year now since I’ve dated anybody, so I find myself thinking a lot about my future in the area of dating. And here’s what I came up with today.
I was writing a letter to my dear friend Stephanie Banks (Spoiler alert Steph: You’re getting a letter from me, and you now know part of what’s in it) and it somehow wound up with me talking about being loved by a man. I got so excited about it, because rarely ever do I see past the shallow dating “relationships” that are so typical in our culture these days, that thinking in this way just blew me out of the water. Here’s what I ended up writing:
“I can’t wait to watch some Godly man fall head over heels for you and your sweet spirit. And that love that is coming – for you and whomever boy – to love Christ so much that you love each other as Christ loves you. Just trying to grasp how beautiful and pure and so worth the heart-ache and waiting that kind of love can be is so mind-blowing.”
And I found myself thinking – “Wow. What would it be like to actually love someone and be loved in return by them as Christ loves us.” That isn’t something you see in relationships and marriage very often. The concept of caring for your significant other like Christ, and to be loved and cared for back like that? It’s an incredible thought.
That’s what I want. To love someone as Christ loves me. I don’t want to focus on a million little qualities – “Does he love his mom, is he romantic, will he make me breakfast in bed and bring me frappe’s when I’m having a bad day?” – No! Christ is not a self-focused person! I don’t want my goal to be – ‘How can my significant other make my life better?’ I want to be caught up in loving him as Christ loves me and doing everything I can to show him that every day in everything that I do! I don’t want to be a selfish, scolding woman (Better to live on the corner of a roof than share a house with a quarrelsome woman – Proverbs 25:24). I want to be a joy to him. I want to be a woman who dares to dream with him instead of tells him to be realistic – who encourages him to take chances and be a man of Christ that dares to do what most men won’t.
Lord, I know that this kind of love is rare. But I know it is out there. I know it isn’t a perfect thing – only You are perfect. But I know there is more out there than the shell of marriage and relationship that “culture” shows me. There is something real and deep that you created that is real and deep and beautiful.
I want a love like that.
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