Lessons From When I Almost Dated An Engaged Man Part 4

My dearest single ladies and gentlemen,
Hope your week was filled with great things like mine was?
And great things don’t have to be “big things”, the fact that you have a life secured in the palm of God’s hands is a great thing.

 

Today’s letter might come as a surprise to those who are familiar with the series on Lessons from when I almost dated an engaged man.
I know, for months I couldn’t write on it after H’s death and now in one month I am writing two letters based on him 🙂
The grief is basically dim now and I could name this letter something else but it shouldn’t be so because this lesson basically sprung from my time with H.

 

Ok.
Last week’s letter struck a chord with a lot of persons and that was great because the aim is still to get as many people as possible into the #TeamGod’sWillOnRelationships.
Yep, there’s a team like that… seriously, I am on it and I hope you are too.
The team basically consist of those who are waiting on God’s best for their marital spouses and marriage and not leaning towards their own selves or thoughts on how marriage et al should be.

 
So as I was saying, after last week’s letter, I realized that a lot of persons who might have gotten into relationships without God’s approval and now know that they have to break things up, just don’t know how to go about it.
Yes, they don’t have peace or rest in their souls anymore but they simply don’t know how to tell the other person “NO”, I can’t go on with you.
And that’s a dangerous place to be in because as long as you are roped in a relationship or love tangle with one who isn’t God’s choice for you, God can’t bring the one He wills for you to you.
Remember this previous letter?

God cannot give your heart to His chosen man/lady for you when your heart is occupied.
So I understand that you don’t want to hurt that person by breaking up with him or her but who would you rather hurt?
God or man?
So today I thought to write on some lessons I learnt on how to pull away from relationships you have no peace about without necessarily leaving bad feelings behind…

 

When I was in Law School, I was wrapped in this “friendship” with H and was told to leave by God. (You can read the story here).
I struggled and struggled with God for a long time, cried all the way to Redeem camp and back and tried to rationalize things left, right and centre but God was having none of it.
Finally, I agreed to break things up but I didn’t know how to do so!
For one thing, I was attached to H.
I’d say I don’t want to pick his call and the next thing we are laughing and gisting.
And it didn’t help that he was such a good guy. I mean I can be mean but he would always be calling me to say “I’m sorry”. I was the one in the wrong but then he was practically doing everything to get in my good books and it just was hard to break away.
And he just couldn’t understand why I had to break up the “friendship” no matter how hard I explained it.

 
I remember the first time I ventured to obey God and break things up… H didn’t let me rest. He was practically calling every time and sending me messages of “I am sorry”.
And then the guilt trip in my heart like “why am I treating this guy like this??”.
But I had an instruction that I had to obey from God.

 

Can you imagine laughing with someone and the Spirit basically nudging you and giving you a restless kick throughout the whole conversation?
It was crazy.
I couldn’t talk to him without the not so subtle (actually it was full blown) conviction in my heart that I am not supposed to be doing this.
Like “God has told you to leave, why are you still placing man above Him?”

 
So I remember the day I finally broke things up.
It was before we went for externship and after a particularly hard day on convictions from the Spirit, I called him and told him we can’t be “friends” anymore.
And as expected he was so sad.
So sad.
He said something’s… “but what did I do wrong? I’ve gone out of my way to do this and that…”
And the painful thing was that he was right.
And it tore at my heart but I couldn’t live with the unrest I had in my spirit anymore.
He didn’t understand why I was breaking things up and to be sincere, till today, I still don’t understand God’s reasons for His instruction to me about H.
And H never understood the reason why I left but I discovered that that was ok.
Sometimes, the fact that God has told you to leave is reason enough to leave.

 

After that night, he still tried to call and I relented one time and picked his call (it was such a trying time trying to detach myself from him), but I noted that the more we talked, the more I got sucked in, so I had to discipline myself not to pick his call. Throughout the three months externship period, we didn’t talk. (sometimes I feel guilty about this because this was the period he got married and I wonder if maybe we had been talking I would have been able to advice him concerning his fears that he had confided in me about).
And when we resumed back at school, I had to make sure not to start spending extensive amount of time with him.
We said hi, gisted for a bit but nothing like before when we spent the whole time together. I did relent sometimes and called him/picked his call (yes, there was such an attachment), but generally I had to rely on God’s grace to break off like He wanted me to do.

 

So, if you are wrapped in a situation like i was with H, from my story above, you might have already picked out the lessons pertaining to how you can break off a relationship you have no peace about.
But let me still spell some lessons out below:

 
(1) You don’t have to have a reason to break things up with the other person.
The fact that you don’t have peace with them/God has told you to do so is reason enough to break up with them.
I still don’t know God’s reason for asking me to break things up with H and it’s been a year plus after the incident.
I think the fact that He is saying that person isn’t His choice for you is reason enough for you to step back and do what He is asking you to do concerning that relationship.

 

(2) Don’t stall if you have no peace about a relationship.
You strain your relationship with God when you do that.
I practically had no peace and couldn’t pray for the period I stayed in disobedience to God. It was a crazy time in my life. With God giving me no rest till I obeyed Him.
Looking back now, taking so long to obey God wasn’t worth it. Obeying promptly is still the way forward.
The longer you stay in disobedience concerning a relationship, the farther you are from God’s chosen spouse and will for you.

 

(3) You don’t have to be mean about the break up.
Break up the relationship but don’t break the person, as Mr Tobi Atte would say.
You need to be as gentle as possible with the person, explaining why the relationship can’t go on/your reasons for saying no to his proposal.
If you don’t know the reason yet, don’t be ashamed to say God has given you no peace concerning him/her so you just have to go with that.
You don’t have a go ahead and can’t disobey God.
Sometimes they might not understand but that’s okay. Again refer back to point one.

 

(4) Place God first as you make the decision to obey Him.
People will come to you with their thoughts about what you are doing.
No matter how much I explained, our friends (mine and H’s) just couldn’t understand why I said I had to break me and H’s friendship.
So I gave up on explaining and stuck with God.
I actually sat down after I broke things up and again told God that I have done what you asked of me so take control. I said that with tears in my eyes because it was so painful but still, only His decision and opinion should be first for our lives.
So focus on God if He has asked you to leave a relationship, not on people.

 

(5) You just might also have to break off communication with him/her for a while.
For me, I had such a tie with H, every phone call/chat sunk me deeper into it.
I didn’t even recognize this fact till God opened my eyes to see it.
So I stopped picking his call, deleted him from BBM, unfriended him on facebook… it was so hard but I knew that if I must break the emotional attachment with him, then I needed space to do so – space without him crowding into it.
So I had to cut off communication with him and you just might have to do so too. At least until a point where you aren’t emotionally tied to him/her anymore.
It works in reverse order that you are trying to leave a relationship but keep in constant touch with him or her.
There’s no way you can back track and obey God that way.
So if you have to stop the “I just called to check on you” deals, do so. And focus your heart on God and trust Him to heal and make your heart whole and totally His again.

And this brings me to my final point…

 

(6) Pray for grace all through the process.
Trust me, there’s no way that I would have obeyed God without relying on His grace.
Some days were so hard especially when my phone was ringing with calls from Him.
Fixing my eyes on God and His grace was what saw me through.
So don’t do this with your own strenght, rely on God in totality.

 

And as you obey God and honour Him, He will honour you also.
Don’t be afraid to step out of a relationship if He wants you to do so, He has better for you and even if you haven’t seen it physically yet, lay hold on it with your eyes of faith.
God has got your life planned and has a will for your life that’s worth waiting for. Believe in Him and let His will for your life play out as it should be.

 
As always you can hit the comment section below to reply my letter.
I would love to hear from you.
Any further lesson you learnt from this letter?
Do share!
God keep us all in His love.

 

 

Till my next love letter,
Love,
Frances.

 

 

Join Our blog family

[mc4wp_form]