Waiting is Hard to Do

What do we do when we simply don't know what to do? I've spent my short 20 years waiting: waiting for prayers to be answered, waiting for maturity to come, waiting to be noticed, waiting to feel loved, and most of all, waiting for someone to love me. It's hard waiting when it feels like everyone around you is falling in love! At Freed-Hardeman University, there's no escaping the love; it's a small campus. They're not only falling in love with each other here, but they're also falling in love with God by studying together. I see it happen and I long to worship with a someone special on that special spiritual level, with my special someone! I'm no fool, love is a choice; love isn't all happy endings. But I want someone to fight over a future with. I want someone who will grow with me both spiritually and otherwise. I want a spiritual leader who will motivate me to motivate them to motivate the world to becoming more like Christ! 

Do you ever feel like you're just one step behind? Yeah, that's me, every time! Like you're just shy of what you want? I have a history of being just too late in affection or choice and, in these low spots, I wonder why I keep getting left out. I've heard it all: He'll come along, all you can do is pray, when you're happy with you only then will you be happy with another, God is saving you because you're special, etc. I hear it, I know it, I hate it! All of it. My friends are splitting off and getting married and I'm just that girl in all their weddings. 

In a few short months I'll be headed out to the big world with no second income, no second opinion, and no second pillow in my single lonely bed. I deserve what I deserve but I feel like I'm wasting myself by hoping for this nothing. I'm not like Paul (1 Corinthians 7:8), I can't  be single until the end! My life requires a mate to fully achieve that level of spirituality beyond what I have now. I need someone to fulfill my spiritual completeness just as the church did for Christ, being that she was his bride (Ephesians 5:25-33). It's hard sitting, waiting, watching. I pray daily for my future husband-as I believe all women should-and I pray for him to be strong in the Lord, to love all people, to hold his tongue when he's angry, to love his parents, to have a gentle mind, heart, and spirit toward the young and old, and to be willing to be the leader God asks him to be (Ephesians 6:4; 1 Corinthians 11:3; 1 Timothy 2:8; 1 Peter 3:7; Psalm 1:1-6; etc. etc.)! 

I love my future husband already and I don't even know him! I write to him because he is my story! You get in to these fits, like I do on these days, where you forget that love withstands time. I want his love so badly now that I find it so difficult to wait for him to come! I struggle with putting myself out there to meet men because I think that if it's meant to be, that God would just let it happen, wouldn't he? I know it requires work from me, but it really gets to me when I finally let myself show any form of vulnerability only to be shut down! I want a man to look at me and see me as Christ saw his bride the Church! Isn't that a beautiful love story?! I want to be a Proverbs 31 and a 1 Peter 3 woman and support my husband. I want God's voice of Truth to be our marriage architect, blueprint, and product! Call me old fashioned, but that's how God desires our lives to be! I'm just ready-I'm ready and waiting for my husband-one who loves me to my core but never as much as he loves God because I will help him love God more! How is that selfish? It's not selfish... It's Self-Less and that's what God commands!


Scriptures
English Standard Version

1 Corinthians 7:8
"To the unmarried and the widows I say that it is good for them to remain single as I am."

Ephesians 5:25-33
"Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, so that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish. In the same way husbands should love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. For no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ does the church, because we are members of his body. 'Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.' This mystery is profound, as I am saying that it refers to Christ and the church. However, let each one of you love his wife as himself, and let the wife see that she respects her husband."

Ephesians 6:4
"Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord."

1 Corinthians 11:3
"But I want you to understand that the head of every man is Christ, the head of a wife is her husband, and the head of Christ is God."

1 Timothy 2:8
"I desire then that in every place the men should pray, lifting holy hands without anger or quarreling."

1 Peter 3:7
"Likewise, husbands, live with your wives in an understanding way, show honor to the woman as the weaker vessel, since they are heirs with you, of the grace of life, so that your prayers may not be hindered."

Psalm 1:1-6
"Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the wicked, nor stands in the way of sinners, nor sits in the seat of scoffers; but his delight is in the law of the Lord, and on his law he meditates day and night. He is like a tree planted by streams of water that yields its fruit in its season, and its leaf does not wither. In all that he does, he prospers. The wicked are not so, but are like chaff that the wind drives away. Therefore the wicked will not stand in the judgment, nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous; for the Lord knows the way of the righteous, but the way of the wicked will perish."

Proverbs 31