Saturday ~ Don't Rain on My Parade

**This post is long, but it is also something that is very near and dear to my heart right now. I want to know your thoughts - from the marrieds and the singles!!**

We were sitting around the dinner table the other day, eating and laughing as we discussed the news of the day – Scott passing his driver's exam, hurray! That's pretty big stuff! As we talked about his new-found freedoms, Mom said to him “Hey! Now you can be the one to make those quick runs into town when we need something!” Inwardly I grinned – yet another driving-happy brother to hopefully run some of those errands instead of me! Across the table from me, Karis began commenting “I can't wait until I can drive. It sounds fun.” Instantly, I opened my mouth to say it, the thing I always say. Because I always respond to comments like this with the same reply: “Driving is not all it's cracked-up to be.”

{OLD PICTURE ALERT!! Me at age 18 **cringe** on the day I passed my driver's exam}

Like I said, I've been a certified licensed driver for eight years. The first few years I was the first person who volunteered to make any trips into town or run any errands...because I just loved to drive! It was freedom, it was speed, it was “grown up,” it was just so much fun! But now, on this side of eight years, I've reached that point where driving has lost a lot of it savor. Oh, I still love it and I always want to be the driver in whatever vehicle I happen to be in...but somewhere after getting my job that's twenty-five minutes away from my home and having to drive that all alone every day, and then getting my own car where I've spent what feels like half of my waking life in all alone....it's just not as exciting anymore.

When Karis made her comment about wanting to be a driver herself,  I went to make my usual reply. But something inside me stopped...because I recognized something in my reply that I didn't like. Hang with me.

{the best nail polish brand}

Every American person is expected to drive. You never hear a red-blooded teenager saying “Ah, I don't want to get my driver's license.” Neither do you ever hear an adult telling said teenager that a driver's license isn't necessary. It just what everyone does. Everyone will pursue and ultimately achieve getting their own driver's license.

I say this because....marriage is like getting our driver's license. It's what we do. It's what we work towards, some more passionately that others, but looking at life in a big picture, we're all heading towards marriage. And single girls are like teenagers who want their driver's license – we really, really want it. Because it's what we do.

But so many married people respond to the single girl's desire in the same way I was about to reply to Karis: "Marriage isn't all it's cracked-up to be.” If I had continued in my reply to Karis, would it really have made any difference? Would she really have suddenly decided that “Oh okay, you're probably right. I'll just forget about getting a driver's license.” And when Marrieds or even single people with good intentions, say that “marriage isn't all it's cracked-up to be,” that doesn't change our desire at  all and at times, it can be hurtful and demeaning.

 {current reading...and the fact that all the books are about firefighters, policemen, etc....may or may not have everything to do with it **wink & a grin**}

As a single woman, the issue of “contentment” comes up a lot. It's been so heavily pushed at us single girls that it's becomes a prison, not a liberation. We're told to be “content” so much and so forcefully that when we feel those twinges of marriage-longings, we're slapped with a load of guilt that we aren't abiding in Christ, that we're not seeking Him hard enough and that we're not pleasing Him.

It is important to be content in Christ, and that goes for everyone, not just single women. But this pressure of “contentedness” for single women breaks my heart....because the message is wrong. Yes, I'm basically going against everything anybody has probably ever told you about singleness and boy, let me tell you...does it feel good. Stay with me. :)

First of all, when did wanting-marriage become something to be ashamed of? The desire for marriage isn't like an unwanted disease - why do so many people treat wanting-marriage as something to rid ourselves of? Most especially, why do married people always try and convince us that marriage isn't going to fix our problems? I've considered myself eligible for marriage since I graduated high-school and turned eighteen. That was eight year ago. Why do the Marrieds so often seem to think that in the eight years of being single I haven't caught on to the fact that marriage isn't easy? I'm not blind to marriages around me. I've seen my friends marry and experience the difficulties, I've seen my parents work through stuff in their marriage, I've seen my siblings work though stuff in their marriages, too. Trust me when I say I know that marriage isn't easy and I know that marriage will not solve my contentment issues.

{these babies are getting me back into work on Monday after this entire week being out sick}

But here's my second point and it's very important: the very purpose of the entire female population even being created in the first place on the sixth day of creation...was to be a help-meet. The very core of the existence of women is to get married and have a husband. It's not just something we tend to want to do. It's what we were designed to do. Marriage isn't just a want. It's a purpose, the heartbeat at the very reason for women.

Yet Singles are repeatedly told to deny the very longing that God created them with. We're constantly told to suppress the very purpose of why we're here on earth as created beings. When the truth is...you can't. As in literally....you can't. Just like I can't stop being female, I can't put a stop to the desire for marriage.

Married's will tell us single women that marriage is a beautiful thing...but then turn around and tell us that we need to die to that desire and serve God only. This is wrong – because our main service to God, by right of purpose at creation, is to be married and be help-meets to our husband. There is nothing wrong with wanting marriage. There's nothing shameful in admitting it, nothing shameful in praying for it, there's nothing shameful in telling someone that marriage is your goal. What's shameful is denying the very reason God created us. To suppress the desire for marriage as an unwanted disease, is to say God created us with a wrong desire. That's saying God goofed and God never goofs up.

{Poof in the grass}

Anyway, this word “contentment” - who started that? Because it's wrong, at least the common understanding when relating it to Singles is wrong. Because being content doesn't mean letting go of our desire for marriage. I used to think it was and so I'd continually be sacrificing my desires on the alter of God's good pleasure, trying to do the right thing...when it was a no-where road, because it was impossible to let go of that desire to the point where I no longer wanted marriage AND all it got me was guilt and shame that I wasn't being a good, “content” Christian single woman.

I will tell you a truth:
When someone says they are longing for marriage, that doesn't always express a discontent with their life; someone can feel the dull ache and loneliness of singleness without be discontent. When I blog about those days that are kinda hard because I want to be married, that doesn't mean I'm expressing discontent or that I'm not finding my fulfillment in Christ – it merely means....um, that I want to get married!?! Nothing more, nothing less. I can be content in Christ to it's fullest potential and still long for marriage. There's nothing wrong with wanting marriage. There's no hand-cuff between “content” and “wanting marriage” that keeps them always together; they can be two separate entities. I can want to get married, plan for that day, hope for that day, even ache for that day...while still finding my satisfaction in Christ.

{"my one weakness"}

I dearly, dearly long to go to Europe some day and when I tell you that, the last thing you'd even think about telling me is “Europe isn't as wonderful as you think it is. I've been there. I know. You'd be better off learning to be satisfied with the United States.” That's ludicrous. The issue of being content where you are doesn't even cross our minds.

But when we single girls say “I dearly, dearly long to be married,” it' s like the world rises up against us with pitchforks and branding rods, backing us up into a corner saying “Marriage won't fix your problems! You'll still struggle to be content! Marriage is hard!” You want to know what I want to say when well-meaning married's say that? This is what I want to say:

“I KNOW marriage is hard, I KNOW marriage will not take away my every longing, I KNOW that I will still always be striving for “contentment” even as a married women. But did that stop you from wanting to marry your husband? Did that stop you from getting married?”

That's what I want to say. And I want to say it with tears in my eyes. Married's forget so quickly what it's like to be single. They see the hardships in marriage, and forget that there's hardships in being single, too. Either way, there's going to be hardships. But God created me for marriage, so isn't it natural that I should want to get married and face those hardships myself?

{flannels in the wind}

Being satisfied in Christ is vastly important and being content in Christ has no lesser value. But here's this: I am content today, while wanting and longing someday for marriage. There is nothing wrong with them co-existing. Especially as He admonishes the one and created us for the other. They go together in blissful harmony.

So, if you've had people tell you that to be content means that all thoughts and desires for marriage are inappropriate and should be exterminated...that's not true. If you are a married person and you find yourself falling back on telling single people “Marriage won't satisfy you,” you don't need to. I'm not looking for marriage to make me happy, fulfilled and content. I'm desiring after the very purpose of my creation. I know marriage will be hard, a husband won't fill the God-sized hole in my heart and that I will still have to work to be satisfied in Christ. But I will be doing that all my life anyway...and there's nothing wrong with wanting to be married/fulfill your created calling while daily learning to do all those things.

{sticky note reminders}

Bottom Line:
My sister wants her driver's license and I want to go to Europe someday (the sooner the better!), but I'm content today in the United States. I want to get married (the sooner the better!) but I'm still content even in my longing today. To want marriage is not to be discontent. There is nothing shameful or wrong in wanting to get married or even aching for it.

Bottom Line #2:
To anybody married...rather than give advice to a Single from the perspective of a Married, instead give advice from your experiences as a Single yourself. Remember. Remember what it was like for you as a Single. That will go a much farther way in encouraging us.

**bonus thought: how come when there's a young married woman at church who wants to have children, but is having a difficult time conceiving, the women of the church will rise up around here, praying for a child? But when a single woman wants to get married, all they get from the married women is “you should learn to be content.” You'd NEVER tell a woman trying to have a child to “just be content, it may not be God's will for you to be a mother,” but it's the “right answer” to tell a single girl “just be content, marriage may not be God's will.”

I smell a rat.