Getting Married Without a Groom Part 13

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Chapter 13
I began my NYSC year in 2014 still in singlehood.
It had now been 2 years running since I told God I would stay single for a year so I could draw close to Him. I didn’t think that I would be single for this long but it wasn’t that bad.
I was a single girl who REALLY was in love and totally satisfied with Jesus.

I had gotten the revelation that God is my husband before any man and the revelation had plunged me into a deeper depth in my relationship with God.

“For your Maker is your husband, The Lord of hosts is His name; And your Redeemer is the Holy One of Israel; He is called the God of the whole earth.”
Isaiah 54:5 NKJV

In the course of the year I met a guy. He had sat close to me during my church conference and we started talking.
He would call and we would chat. You know the works… and then I asked him what he wanted and he said “a relationship leading to marriage”.

I didn’t want to make that kind of decision alone so I involved my pastor and started praying concerning it in tongues. I prayed in tongues because we had been talking so much that my heart had started “catching feelings” and I couldn’t trust my heart”. I had waited for God too long to just be carried away by anything.

So I prayed and my Pastor prayed. The guy said he was sure and he had “peace” but I watched him. I wasn’t going to step in with an answer cloaked in “peace”.

One day he visited me in my house (wrong move which I allowed him pressure me into).
And pecked my forehead. Jesus was so jealous for me. After that encounter, He told me “I haven’t given him permission to peck your forehead”.

Then He led me to Romans 12:2 and led me into making a decision not to kiss before marriage. A decision that still stands today and lasted even through the time I courted my husband  (by God’s grace).

This guy on the other hand had struggles with purity.

We went out one day and two things were mighty red flags to me:
1: A girl’s call he was ignoring; who he had borrowed money from

2: His struggles with purity even up until that present year.

This guy said he was called to ministry and I don’t dispute his call but his lifestyle raised up a red flag that I couldn’t shake off.

I didn’t tell my Pastor about those two red flags but then the very next day I received a text from him asking to borrow money from me a corper.

I told my Pastor and he promptly said “Frances this isn’t your husband”.

The guy had issues with purity, issues with discretion and wisdom and then a track record od mishandling funds from people.
All these he showed out even without ne digging. It was a red flag God has simply shown brightly to warn me.

I heeded and told him “no”.

I felt so bad but there was no way I would have gone against what I knew in my spirit just because a man said he wanted to marry me.
His behaviour left a lot to be desired.

God used him to teach me about the Ephesians 5:25 man.

“Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself for her, that He might sanctify and cleanse her with the washing of water by the word, that He might present her to Himself a glorious church, not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing, but that she should be holy and without blemish.”
Ephesians 5:25‭-‬27 NKJV

Jesus told me that His man for me would be like Him. It would be His desire to offer me up in purity to God and no matter what, His heart would beat as one with mine in the area of purity.

Jesus also taught me not just to watch for gifts of the Spirit but also the fruits of the Spirit.

That a man was rushing off to WORK for God doesn’t mean that he has a WALK with the Lord.

And with all these lessons, my anxious heart at another suitor slipped away and so also did my single state continue.

YOUR TURN:
1: What is your criteria for judging a man?
In the light of the word of God or in the light of your own physical eyes?

2: Do you pray for God’s leading when you are approached for a relationship or do you just plunge in with no thought for direction from God?

3: Red flags in our spirit concerning a relationship shouldn’t be ignored.

Confusion about a relationship should not be ignored.

The Bible says:
“For God is not the  author of confusion but of peace, as in all the churches of the saints.”
I Corinthians 14:33 NKJV

A good way to gauge a potential relationship is by the peace in your heart.
Not peace given by physical attributes or circumstances but one given by God.
Sometimes the lack of peace is God screaming at us to stop. Wait. Seek me more about this.

Sometimes the presence of peace even in the atmosphere of storms is God’s yes even when it doesn’t make sense.

Learn to commit your way unto the Lord even in relationships, discern what the Spirit is saying and OBEY.

“Commit your way to the Lord , Trust also in Him, And He shall bring it to pass.”
Psalms 37:5 NKJV

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