269: the security

I look out over my kids (students) as they take their science standardized test. It is a moment of silence and calm in an otherwise hectic career. Having just taken some moments myself to reconnect spiritually via the last several day's devotionals in God is on the Cross (Dietrich Bonhoeffer), I am ready to  not just see the frustration of trying to educate willful and sometimes ignorant human beings, but now to catch a glimpse of the potential of each individual life that is sitting in these desks before me. Every person here is so unique, with their own interests, looks, desires--futures.

I pray, Lord--may they know You.

Why?

I mean, because that is the way of salvation, obviously. To have their sins covered, washed away, so they do not have to bear the punishment for their own sin.

But also--

That they can have the security that comes with knowing God.

With God, I am never alone.

With God, I have an all-powerful loving Father willing to work on my behalf.

Perhaps most impactful for me in my singleness, with God I have a reason for living, for every moment of my day. I live for a kingdom not of this world. I may not do it well. I may not live it fully. But I have an eternal purpose outside of my temporal circumstances. I do not find meaning only in loving a husband, in showing the world that God's design of marriage is good, in being sanctified as my selfishness is put to the test in living with a man to whom I've pledged my life, body, and heart. That's what we as singles want so badly. But--

Glory be! My life has MEANING and PURPOSE apart from my circumstances. Apart from any and every circumstance. Not just that *I* have value, but that my little life living at home with my parents, teaching at a country school, visiting with my friends, trying to hear God's voice through His Word and prayer--THAT life has meaning and purpose because the whole point of life is not either to endure xyz situations that seem to be the most spiritual OR to be blessed with xyz dreams, but rather in whatever we do, in word or deed, to live all for the glory of God.

Does it sound trite? Yes. But has it the power to change my perspective from despair over a wasted life because I'm not married to hope that God is still God? Yes.

And with that, I can hold my desire for companionship and intimacy and maternal satisfaction and separate it from the value of this single life that keeps slipping by with each birthday that makes me older. I can still want, I can still "need," all those physical things, but I don't have to feel subpar or under my married peers.

And that's simply from knowing the Lord.

So yes, I want my kids to know that they have value, no matter what family situations or future situations they face, simply because they are part of the kingdom of God. They have a Father to whom they are eternally connected, who directs the path of their lives, and who is with them every second, and wants their hearts.

268: between the realms + friendship

I was crying at the dramatic end of a show tonight (what can I say--
I'm tired!), and I found myself thinking of the guy I'm dating (boyfriend? can I use that word?).

It was another reminder that I am entering a season different than the one I've known.

A married friend once told me that getting married to her husband felt very natural. And, although I'm not even engaged, I can see what she means. I feel very much still myself. I actually like that. I don't wake up with dread in the pit of my stomach, like I have in the past. I don't have to wonder day by day if the guy I'm dating will change or if something will be revealed that will shake my world. His consistency is what I value. And in that consistency, I can trust and, yes, relax (now that I've gotten through the most trying stage--another story for another post).

But, back to feeling natural. I still feel very much like me. I haven't become someone else. I don't feel like I've attained something monumental by virtue of dating for 10 months. It's just...natural.

But I know that I am nearing the zenith of all the dreams of my singlehood. And not only mine, but the desires of all my single friends.

I know that if I were to marry, they would feel like they have been left behind. That they would feel alone, with unanswered prayers, and no companionship--or some combination thereof. Because that's how I feel so many times. Have felt?

See, that's where it gets weird. I'm like, oh, I so understand. But, then I go and think of my boyfriend instead of thinking of some mythical future guy or thinking about how it's just God and me, and it smacks me in the face that there IS a difference between single and not-single. It's frankly hard to reconcile the two--the friend I want to be because I'm single (ie. in the same season of life), and the friend I'll be despite not being single (in a different season of life). I feel the same. But I won't be the same. I won't be the same, but I wish I could be the same, and still not be single.

And the other problem is that God has brought me amazing settledness in the last few years of being in my 30s. Maybe even contentedness, if one can still strongly desire and still be content. But I don't know if that's because I've had sequential infatuations the last few years that have kept me from feeling all the pang of loneliness, or if it's that I've forgotten after almost two years of having my guy on my radar, or if it's just truly that I've felt more settled. (A friend in her 30s once told me that this decade was better than the 20s because you're more settled, and it's proven true. Now she's about to turn 40, so we'll see how that turns out.) So, sometimes I can't currently relate to my single friends who are in the thick of the desperate loneliness. Because I haven't felt that as much now as I used to.

More thoughts--

Part of me is like, once I'm married, I can hang out with all these married couples. My friend circle may expand.

Part of me is like I am still hanging on to my current friends! Don't you dare think I'm different just because I'm married!

Part of me thinks if I didn't make a point of hanging out with married couples when I was single--if they didn't include me, and I didn't make a point to try to be included--then it would be hypocrisy to join in the crowd now as if my status has changed my--or their--value.

*sigh* So many thoughts.

Meanwhile, I live betwixt the realms.