Hello! If you know anything about me, I enjoy watching reality TV and blogging about it.
Read my thoughts on season 4.
Read my thoughts on season 2.
(Why did I skip season 3? I think I just forgot to write one about it.)
Here we are in the 5th season. For anyone new, here’s a brief Wikipedia summary of the show’s premise: “The series follows fifteen men and fifteen women, all from the same metropolitan area, hoping to find love. For 10 days, the men and women date each other in purpose-built "pods" where they can talk to each other through a speaker but not see each other. They are initially paired in a speed-dating format, but later can choose to have longer dates. The daters may extend a marriage proposal whenever they feel ready. A couple meets face to face only after a marriage proposal is accepted. The engaged couples then head to a couples' retreat at a resort. During this trip, they spend time getting to know their partners and have their first opportunity to be physically intimate. They also meet the other couples participating in the experiment.
Following the couples' retreat, the engaged couples move to the same apartment complex in the city where they live. While at the apartments, they meet their partners' friends and families and learn more about their partners' lives, exploring issues such as finances, recreation, personal habits, and their ultimate primary residence. They also plan weddings to be held at the end of four weeks. During this wedding planning period the group of women go wedding dress shopping and the men go suit shopping together, bringing a few friends and/or family members along. They also make choices such as the design and flavor of their wedding cake. At the altar, each participant decides whether or not to say "I do."
JP & Taylor: Judging a Book Only By It’s Cover
The pods are where the couples date without seeing each other, and it’s supposed to be different because you can’t judge someone on their appearance. Literally “love is blind”. I think that it’s a fun premise, but in reality we do judge a book by its cover!
Something valuable I took away from this season, honestly all seasons, is that judging isn’t always negative. I judge the prices between produce, and I pick what’s best for the cost. I judge the stitching and zippers of a jacket before buying it so I don’t end up freezing in the winter. I look at how the people around me treat others, and I assume I’ll be in a similar boat when it comes to how they treat me.
I think judging someone’s appearance can become very shallow if we focus on the wrong things, but I believe that appearance can say a lot about a person. How they view the world and themselves. There’s a reason doctors wear scrubs or professional attire. There’s a reason companies put their logo on their items.
Although, it’s not the whole picture. You can dress the part of a police officer without actually being one. You can look one way and be the complete opposite. I think judging a book by its cover can be useful when we’re open to being surprised and not stuck to our interpretation of the book without even reading it.
In the show, there was a couple, JP and Taylor, and JP said that the reason he was being so cold and standoffish to Taylor was because when he first saw her she was wearing make up. He found her to be fake and high maintenance. Even though that was the first and only time she wore makeup (at their first meeting to get engaged), he was stuck on the narrative he had about her wearing makeup. He refused to be open to being wrong or that one specific action didn’t have one specific meaning.
Eventually, when he expressed his disgust with make-up on her, he was further upset that she didn’t appreciate his comment as a compliment. When she decided to end their engagement because their communication and their compatibility was off (to put it nicely), he stayed true to his convictions instead of seeing her for who she was he saw her as the way she looked and the meaning he attributed to that.
Being a judge of someone’s looks is often a reflection of ourselves and what we value. It’s also important to start judging more important things like character and consistency. People can be just as shallow inside and out. We can look at the wrong things as indicators for chemistry and compatibility. What feels good isn’t always what is good. What looks good isn’t always what is best for us.
Regardless if you go on a blind date (literally) or not, if you’re looking at the wrong things to evaluate what’s good then you’ll always be with the wrong person. I think attraction is multifactorial. It’s beyond a picture or a face/body. It’s how someone carries themselves, how they look at the world, how they see others, and how they view their purpose and goal in life.
We also have to judge ourselves and our intentions too. Are we coming from a place of lack? Do we want someone to make us feel better about being single or to finally check the “plus one” box for our friend’s wedding? Recently my pastor talked about dating and the purpose of relationships to bring us closer to God and His purpose for our lives. I think that relationships are beautiful and I pray for my own love story, but I know that coming whole and as completely satisfied in Christ, my life, and my purpose is paramount to any relationship I’ll have.
Making good choices comes in small moments. Choosing to be honest when it’ll cost you. Choosing to follow through when you made a promise. Choosing to wait when everyone looks like they’re passing you by. Choosing to trust God when you feel like you could just get what you want by your own strength. Good choices come from faith. They come from knowing God, knowing yourself, and knowing your need for others to be part of your decision making journey.
Trauma: Izzie & Johnnie
Another couple I learned a lot from was Izzie and Johnnie. Izzie and Johnnie have a great connection from the start based on their background of trauma. Being hurt can draw us to other hurt people because we feel understood, but the misunderstanding lies in that no one can understand us unless they’ve been hurt in a way we deem equal to the way we’ve been hurt.
You can still be understood by people who have had “less/no” severe trauma, they’re just different experiences. Someone’s past being similar to ours doesn’t equate to compatibility, what matters more is how we have handled our pain and how they receive ours. Izzie shared his painful past with Johnnie and she shared hers with him, and they understood that each person had gone through a difficult upbringing and familial dysfunction.
Just because someone understands us does not mean they are good for us. Being vulnerable isn’t always a sign of health either. Growing in maturity is seeing that how someone responds to us in grace, understanding, compassion, and empathy or lack of, is what marks compatibility. Also, it’s important to not dump our pain on someone at an inappropriate time in the relationship and expect them to receive us with open arms.
There is an appropriate time and wisdom to share ourselves. “If you can’t handle my story, you don’t deserve me” is wrong because being vulnerable is an action we should take when the person has already proven themselves worthy and capable of handling it. It’s also not when we’re on date 3 and not even dating yet. These things should take time and discernment.
Johnnie shared with Izzie how her ex, an addict, who passed away was the only man she ever loved and that her ex-husband was a rebound relationship turned marriage. Beyond the fact that she didn’t come to terms with that, Izzie was still on the fence about her. He never shared an intention to choose her as his only person or propose to her. He was still seeing someone else, his later fiancee Stacey. We think if we show our darkest secrets and fears right away and someone accepts them then they’re the one for us, but in reality, ESPECIALLY healthy and secure people will feel like it’s an inappropriate and burdensome weight for a relationship that hasn’t even started yet.
Trauma dumping is often confused for being open and vulnerable, but in reality it’s a way to get ourselves out of the discomfort of healing and actually dealing with our pain. We want to be accepted for our brokenness, and that is a good, normal, and healthy desire. But it’s not fair to give it to someone at the wrong time, without any regard to who they are and their commitment to us, and for it to be unprocessed.
I’m not saying we should be fake or hide ourselves, if anything, God accepts us like that. He loves us like that. He’s not going to feel like we’re too much of a mess, and He will always receive us fully. However, it's not fair to treat other people like that. We’re allowed to be real and messy, and we should be with the people who love us but that isn’t license to expect them to carry our burdens or to fix us. That’s God’s job, and they can be vessels of that healing but they are not emotional garbage cans. You aren’t an emotional garbage can, I’m not, and they aren’t.
We don’t need to come whole and perfect, but we should come with progress.
Izzie’s trauma comes in the form of his expressed desire for unconditional love because his family’s love was conditional on following religious rules and standards. He craves being accepted for who he is by the woman he loves, and he wants to get the family he’s always wanted through her.
His desire for unconditional love is completely good and normal. It’s just not going to be found in a person, a place, or a position. Your desire or my desire for unconditional love is like the physical hunger we feel for food, we need it and we will look for it where we can find it. The truth is that real, true unconditional love stems from the person of Jesus. A family, even a good loving family, cannot provide us with perfect love. They’re just people too. A partner, even an amazing beautiful good partner, cannot provide us with perfect love either. In fact, they crumble under the unfair pressure, and we’re left hurting and wondering if we’ve made the wrong choice when we just misplaced our hope.
When we look to someone or something finite for the infinite, we’re chasing our own tail. We’re never going to get there. That person will disappoint us, and we’re gonna disappoint them. Love that goes beyond ourselves is found in God! Romans 5:8 reads, “But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” Izzie, like all of us, can finally be satisfied in our longings when we encounter Jesus. When we see how deeply He loves us, we find peace in our soul from running around looking for love in good but not perfect places.
When we find that love from God, we are able to love and be loved from a healthy and full place. We don’t need the other person to be perfect or mend the broken parts of our past. We can accept them too, and we find space for their wounds and needs. We can look at the relationship as part of God’s redemption and work in our lives. We don’t weigh each other down with a responsibility that only God was made to carry. It helps us to not just live coping with our trauma, but we can actually experience hope and a new life that God brings by using what happened for His good and for our good too.
Rejection: Izzie + Johnnie + Chris
Johnnie, who has been seeing Chris and Izzie, decides to end things with Chris to pursue things with Izzie without Izzie’s expressed desire for exclusivity. When Johnnie ends things with Chris, his shock and pain come from seeing how well things were going. I think that’s the thing about relationships: there are two sides to the coin.
It can be going well overall and for you, but the other person has the power to walk away and not want to be with you. Why did Johnnie end things with Chris if they were good? She just liked Izzie more. That doesn’t mean Izzie was better than Chris, it’s just what she wanted for her life.
Depersonalizing rejection and just not taking everything so personally is something I strive for in myself. Maybe I wasn’t chosen for that position because someone had more experience than me in that field. Maybe that guy didn’t look at me because he’s not in a season where he can prioritize a relationship. Maybe? But I choose not to drive myself crazy figuring out the reason, it doesn’t matter why if it’s nothing you can help. Even if it is something you could change, that could be healthy, it's not your job to try to guess what that is! The other person should be able to communicate that maybe they need more from you emotionally or want you to be a better communicator, for example.
Maybe if we had been too harsh to a potential love interest or we showed up late to the job interview, then we should take an appropriate reflection of ourselves and work on those things. But if it’s something we can’t control, I think it’s even better not to know and to move forward. We shouldn’t internalize those rejections because one person’s opinion really has the same weight as another. It’s just what we decide to focus on. If I decide to focus on the people who do love and accept me, the people who don’t aren’t evil, they’re just not right for me and I wasn’t right for them. You feel relieved because you don’t need to make anyone stay. You can bless them as they go and meet the right person for them! You can have room in your heart for the right person for you.
When we don’t personalize things, we don’t leave people with a bitter taste in their mouth and they don’t leave one in ours. We can’t control what happens, but we can control how we handle and respond to situations. It takes a lot of prayer, effort, and wisdom in ending things on both sides.
Sometimes people (including us) can leave by ghosting/not communicating to the other person. I realize the cowardice and selfishness of the times I’ve done that to someone in the past, and how that signifies a lack of maturity, communication, and compassion. Detaching ourselves from unhealthy situations is a case by case basis, especially if it could be harmful to ourselves if we talk with that person, but with normal people who we just don’t fit with anymore -- it’s important to have the talk and speak truth in love. When we end things with respect and giving due dignity to the other person involved, we show God’s love as well.
After Johnnie leaves Chris, Izzie decides Johnnie is not the girl he’ll be leaving the pods with, they break up. No matter how or why, a relationship ending hurts. Even if you weren’t “officially” boyfriend or girlfriend. Even if it was a short relationship. Even if…insert your own situation. It hurts to not be chosen, period, but especially if it’s because someone else was chosen.
“What does she/he have that I don’t?”
Again, it’s not about that because we like people for such varied and unexplainable reasons. Maybe we want someone older than us because we attribute that to security and financial stability. Maybe we want someone from the same racial or cultural background because we want to feel like they can share those things with us. Maybe we want someone who would look good because everyone will be impressed that we’re with them. There are a million reasons why we say yes to one person and no to another in work, friendships, and relationships.
Again, if it’s a reason relating to an area of sin (gossiping, lying, cheating, stealing, being rude, stubbornness, pride, jealousy, abuse, racism, sexism, etc.) then we should take that into our trusted community and go through a season of repentance and receiving grace. But if he doesn’t like how you smile or she doesn’t find you funny, it’s really a matter of finding the right fit for you.
Sometimes in the quest to be chosen it’s easy to forget that the chooser is also another broken human being. We give them the power to value or devalue us. We decide that because we want someone, if they don’t want us we’re unworthy of love or we’ll never find a relationship.
It’s important to come in with a healed sense of self that’s based on God’s love and forgiveness over you. This is because you will know your unworthiness before God has been paid for on the cross. Then you will know that your worth is apart from what you’ve done and due to everything Jesus has done for you. You did not become worthy of love nor were you always worthy of love, God chose to love you for His own goodness and His own sake. Someone else decided because of who they are that they love you, that’s how God is to us, and you can come into any situation holding your value high. Someone else may not want you, but not only does Jesus want you, if marriage is something God has for you, then the right person will want you too.
How to Find Secure People: Lydia & Uche & Aaliyah:
I could write a separate blog about this trio. Let me give you a super condensed summary. Lydia (yellow tank top) used to date Uche, they met again in the pods, and Uche rejected Lydia’s advances to start their relationship again. They don’t tell anyone else about their past relationship. Uche falls for Aaliyah (white blazer), and after Aaliyah tells him that she had cheated in a past relationship he hypocritically judges her for her past (despite having a similar one). Lydia comforts Aaliyah and gets closer to her. They become best friends. Uche and Aaliyah continue to date in the pods, then Uche reveals his prior relationship with Lydia. Lydia then confesses it’s true. She begins to harass Aaliyah by basically saying she’s her replacement and spilling all the dirt on Uche (including the fact that they had sex 3 months ago, ouch). Aaliyah leaves the show. Uche confronts her harshly about leaving and confronts Lydia by calling her a psycho. It’s a mess.
There was so many topics I could’ve delved into here: guilt tripping, ego, narcissism, hypocrisy, delusional behavior, etc but I found myself drawn to the idea of writing about finding secure people. Finding insecure people who are not safe to be around is easy, they’re a dime a dozen.
Secure people are treasures, sometimes they’re treasures in the rough, but they’re marked with progression and sincere apologies followed by their response.
At first while Aaliyah and Uche are getting to know each other, they are head over heels. They’ve found their person, that’s until Aaliyah reveals her past of cheating on her ex and never telling him (well, I’m guessing he knows now). Uche’s response is to berate her on how wrong she had been. He pummels her with his words (he’s a lawyer FYI), and the judgment pours like a torrential storm over her.
Pause. Is it wrong to be upset to hear that someone you’re seeing/dating has a past of (insert wrong doing)? No. Do I believe that past behavior can and does reflect future behavior? Yes.
I can believe both those things to be true, and I can also be upset without vilifying someone. You don’t have to be with them, but you don’t need to beat them over the head with their sins. It’s easy to look at all the things they do wrong and all the things we did right.
It’s also easy to condemn judgements. I don’t think it’s wrong to “judge” people, but I do thing it’s wrong to judge others from our high horse.
Matthew 7:3-5 is a beautiful summation of how we can judge well. We should take an accurate look at ourselves. Uche shared that he had cheated “but he had been 18” and “he had told the girl” which somehow made him better than Aaliyah. It gave him the moral high ground of judgment. Instead of judging her as a good fit as a partner by looking at her honesty, how she felt about that choice, and how she handles future decisions -- he attacks her as a person because he sees himself as a better one.
A secure person follows the Biblical example of judgment. In this case, Uche could’ve shared as a moment to connect NOT compare with Aaliyah that he had cheated in the past, that he felt ashamed and judged, and that he was different now. He could’ve graciously accepted her for her past because she had made a similar mistake, and that he hopes they both could work towards loyalty and exclusivity in their relationship.
He could still say he didn’t want to be with Aaliyah because of her history of cheating on her ex without judgment on her character. He could’ve addressed how she didn’t hold accountability to her actions or how he feels that her confession has changed how he felt. It didn’t have to be this condemnation of her.
Secure people don’t accept everything, I think that everyone is allowed to have their own standards and boundaries. I personally have chosen not to be close friends with people who have been hurtful to other people in my life who haven’t reconciled with them. That’s my judgment call. They could be wonderful friends to me! It doesn’t mean that I’ll be mean to them or bring up their conflict with my friends. It also doesn’t mean I can’t say hi, have small talk, and genuinely wish them well. It just means that I’ve drawn a line on certain behaviors and standards I require of the people around me.
Secure people also know how to respond to someone else without shaming them. Secure people don’t need to ride in on their moral high horse, they know that they’re human and susceptible to similar mistakes if they had been in the same shoes. Secure people have nothing to prove and therefore they won’t be harsh or unkind even if they don’t agree with someone.
Embrace the Differences: Milton & Lydia
Milton and Lydia initially start off with their love of rocks. As much as they geek out over their love of the metamorphic stuff (they're both science, rock nerds), Lydia is quickly turned off by the fact that Milton is 24 and she’s 7 years his senior. Understandable.
She’s also infatuated with Izzie (yes, the same one from Johnnie's story). I wanted to briefly touch on how she was out of touch of her reality with Izzie. Maybe it’s just because we’re the third party POV, but even listening to them it never sounded like Izzie was very interested in her.
She would constantly tell him how much she liked him, how she dreamed about him, and confessing to him basically. He, in return, gave brief answers, never reciprocated her feelings verbally or emotionally, and eventually when he ended things with her to pursue either Johnnie or Stacy, she was shocked. She started telling him how much she liked him and how this always happens to her.
The thing that comes across clearly with Lydia is she wants to be loved. Don’t we all? I think when we’re starved for love, we find ourselves in a similar position as Lydia. Whether it’s with family, friends, or partners, feeling like no one will ever love you is a sure fire way to land yourself in messy situations.
We start to feel like anyone will do, even if they’re not a good fit for us. We just want a warm body. We’ll take scraps because “something is better than nothing”. The fallacy of that thought is that someone’s love is what gives and takes away our value.
I think about how quickly we all change our moods and feelings towards something. People change their minds all the time. If something as transitional as the weather is what gives you value or you rise and fall like the stock market demand then how can you ever be at peace?
I think it’s easy to make someone else give us our value, and it’s also easy to think that giving yourself your worth is the solution. Love yourself. See your value. Give yourself what you need. The truth is that the love we crave does come from an outside source, but it doesn’t come from another person like us (time and time again, the theme of this blog).
There is no one like your Creator. God knows you the best. Knows every hair on your head. Knows every breath full of air you take. Knows when you wake up and sleep. (Psalm 139)
He also knows your brokenness. He sees the mess we’ve made. He sure knows mine. All of us have failed ourselves, others, and God. (Romans 3:23)
It’s by His own grace and love that He loves us. It’s because He’s loving, not because we’re lovable. I take great comfort in knowing God doesn’t change how He feels about me day to day because of what I did. As much as I pretend, I’m not as wonderful as I seem. I carry around the burden of my own guilt and shame. I know I was mean when I should’ve been kind. I know I’ve turned a blind eye to people in need. I know that I’m far from perfect. Yet, God’s love surpasses that to reach someone like me. In my arrogance, in my selfishness, in my pride, He loves me. In my loneliness, in my anxiety, in all my inadequacies, He loves me.
You, my friend, are made to be loved. That’s the natural craving in us. We all express it in different ways. We think certain tools like money, power, fame, romantic relationships, success, and anything under the sun will provide the means for us to get more love, respect, approval, and acceptance.
I think that we can never get what we couldn’t give ourselves. We also can’t look to people like us to give us what we want either. We have to think bigger about the kind of love our hearts are craving. That’s on that.
Back to the show, Lydia’s desire to be loved fully blinds her (and it blinds us) to people who not only can never fully love us, but they’re not good for us either. Izzie’s disinterest should’ve turned Lydia off if her desire was to be loved. He didn’t have to outright say it, it looked clear that he was not feeling the same way she did. But when we’re starving, we’ll take anything, and we usually want a fast and easy relief from our hunger, not a nourishing meal that takes time.
I get it. I really empathize. It is so hard to wait. I bet Lydia saw her friends get married around her age. I’m sure she felt that deep pang of sadness every time it didn’t work out with a guy.
Why again? Why not me? What’s wrong with me?
You feel like no one sees you. Sometimes hidden feels more like forgotten. It’s also easy to focus on all the good things a relationship brings. Love, intimacy, companionship, friendship, etc. I forget how much hard work and enduring patience it also takes to be with someone.
I think the balance comes from knowing that the desire (or sometimes the lack of desire) for a relationship is good. It’s also not everything. It’s not the end goal of life to die in the arms of your beloved The Notebook style. It’s a good thing, really. It’s just not everything. It’s not why you’re alive. It’s not why God put you on this earth. It can be part of it, but it’s not the apex of your life to be with someone or get married.
It’s also not something you need to say to someone who is longing to get married. I think there’s a grace in just validating someone’s feelings and letting God remind them that there’s more to life in some circumstances. Maybe you don’t like that advice. I think I just don’t see the need to invalidate someone’s feelings. It’s okay for them to want to date or be married, we don’t need to come in with verses that say it’s better to be single because it is also good to be married.
Job’s friends in the book of Job didn’t win brownie points with God when they recited verses about suffering and God’s justice. I think they were the best kind of friends when they sat with him in his sadness. Yes, God can still be good and you can still be sad, hurting, confused, lonely, and lost. That does not detract from God’s goodness. That does not mean we all become unfeeling robots or robots of happiness when we believe in Jesus.
There’s a time to remind people of God’s promises, goodness, and the fulfillment that comes single or married. There’s also a time to sit and hold your friend who is struggling after another break up or season, maybe even lifetime, of singleness.
For our friend Milton in Love is Blind, I think that he was most attracted to Lydia’s expression of emotions. From my presumed knowledge of his background, he came from a family that didn’t operate on love but functionality and business. He was starved for love too. He saw in Lydia what he lacked in his life, and I think that’s an important aspect of relationships. We admire and respect the traits we see in others that we often lack or struggle to express, and that was exemplified in Milton.
I think I’m drawn to people who also have traits I inherently struggle with. It’s just natural to like those parts we don’t have, but it can also be a great source of friction. What once made them attractive makes them frustrating because they don’t understand you. Before the difference was a nice contrast and how it feels like an attack.
Does this mean we should be with people who are just like us?
No way!
I also think there should be distinctions between healthy and unhealthy differences. We don’t need to have the same culture, background, or status to love and respect one another. We should and need the same life goals for a functional and thriving relationship. If someone wants children, it’s not healthy to be with someone who does not. If someone wants to go on missions in a foreign country, it doesn’t match the life of someone who wants to stay close to home.
For example, I’ve spent most of my life working to become an eye doctor. By God’s grace, if I become one, I would like to work. I wouldn’t suit someone who wants a full-time stay at home mom or wife. They also wouldn’t suit me. Things like that are important to address head on and sooner rather than later.
For Milton and Lydia, he found it difficult when she would have emotional outbursts, and she found him cold and rigid when it came to his feelings. I think a point of improvement in their conversation we could learn from is instead of telling the other person what we want them to change, we could also just verbally affirm how much we admire them for how different they are.
If I could live in a perfect world, this is how I wish they spoke to one another (and how I wish to carry out my own conversations):
“Milton, I like how you don’t just react, you respond. I think that’s something I lack, and I’m trying to learn from you. I’ll never be a carbon copy of you, and that’s not what I want either. I want to grow in that part of myself but I’m still going to be me, just a better healthier part thanks to you. It’s not going to be easy, but I appreciate how understanding and patient you’ve already been and will continue to be.”
“Lydia, I love how you feel, how you feel, and you’re not afraid of yourself. I don’t understand that kind of mindset. I grew up in a household where my emotions weren’t accepted. I look down on being emotional, and I know you feel that judgment. It’s not natural to me, and I’m sorry for how I’m cold or distant. I admire and respect how you feel, and I want to be more like that with you. You inspire me to bring out more of my feelings, and that’s part of why I love you.”
Is that not a beautiful (albeit, imaginary) conversation?
After appreciation and understanding, I think you can have better conversations about what we need from the other person. I think it's normal and healthy to ask your partner to make adjustments in their life for you, but it's also important to understand it takes patience and it's a team effort. Instead of asking, how can I change them -- what if we ask how can I make it easier for them to give me what I need? If you're someone who needs more space to process things after a fight and your partner is someone who needs to confront things right away, what if you both agree on a time limit "by tonight, I'll be ready to talk". In this example, you're giving yourself what you need (space) and your partner gets a reasonable time frame in which they know they'll get their needs met.
Obviously, emotions are fired up and tensions are high when we have these kinds of conversations. It takes a lot of humility. It takes us not thinking our way is the only way and the right way. It takes an open, receptive heart to have hard conversations. It takes raw honesty that is still mindful and loving. It takes something beyond ourselves and even our relationship to keep us together and growing.
Closing
I love this verse in the Bible from Matthew 10:7-9 “For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh. So they are no longer two, but one flesh. Therefore what God has joined together, let man not separate.”
God joins two broken messy people into one cohesive unit. They hurt, I hurt. You celebrate, I celebrate. They don’t belong to their families or themselves but to each other and to God. God enables us to be given the love we need to love someone like ourselves. God gives us His ability to sacrifice and lay down our lives. God fills us with His Holy Spirit because the fruit of the Spirit, not the man or his wife, is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. (Galatians 5:22-23)
A good marriage strengthens the couple so that they can go out into the world and live out God’s purpose for them. It could be raising children, serving at their local church/community, going overseas to preach the gospel, and many more avenues. A good marriage goes beyond being happy and comfortable with each other. It serves a deeper purpose that the two share as one mind, heart, and soul.
Maybe someone will think of me as very idealistic. I’m not married nor do I have any kiddies of my own yet. I think that’s true I could see things differently by then, but I'm open to that too. This is just me now. I pray that God would use my community and my experiences to shape me into someone mature and fruitful, single or married. I pray the same for you!.
Go out into the world knowing you are already seen, known, accepted, and loved. Know that God will supply you with everything you need for your journey on this earth and into eternity.
Love,
Grace
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