As a single Christian woman, I am constantly bombarded with articles written by smart and well-meaning people about singleness, and inevitably, articles on the subject are some of the most popular on various Christian websites. Now, I am not knocking those articles, as most are good with great, valid, and Biblical points. However, many also imply through omission that to be a single Christian and greatly desire a spouse is wrong or sinful. And thus, many women try to convince their desire away by affirming that Jesus is all they need or even worse, referring to Jesus as their boyfriend.
Part of the issue with “Jesus is my boyfriend” is that we must be careful about using human descriptors (particularly those not exampled in Scripture) for God. Now obviously we are allowed to use some human descriptors, such as using male pronouns or the reference to God’s feet in Exodus 24:10, even though as God, He has not a gender nor feet. This is God’s way of allowing us, as finite beings, to understand and explain a little about our infinite Creator. But we must be careful not to limit God based on these things. For many single women, myself included, the word “boyfriend” doesn’t bring entirely positive things to mind. (And if I’m honest, I hate the term because of its extreme misuse and overuse in our society, especially by those way under the age of 18. And I should know, because even way back in elementary school, much of my focus was on getting a “boyfriend”). Words like ‘ex’, ‘break up’, and ‘heartbreak’, among others, are often associated with it–words that are completely inappropriate and just plain untrue about God and Jesus.
Now I understand that whoever came up with the “Jesus is my boyfriend” thing had good intentions and likely used it as a modern twist on the Bible calling Him our Beloved or Bridegroom or Husband. But saying that those two are the same is a misunderstanding of Scripture. The Bible doesn’t call Jesus our Bridegroom in order to make us feel better about our singleness or to make us think our desire for a husband is wrong. The Bible calls Jesus our Bridegroom because God created marriage as a picture of His desired relationship with us. As marriage is to be a permanent covenant or commitment and vow that actively chooses to love another no matter what, so is His relationship with us. You might say ‘I love you’ to your boyfriend, but dating isn’t a commitment or covenant and is entirely conditional, as it can end at any time for any reason (quite literally the opposite of ‘no matter what’), and in our culture, dating can mean several different things, including the complete opposite of commitment and being a picture of total self-serving-ness and selfishness–NONE of which are true of God. Unlike one of my relationships in which there were many I-love-you’s and even I-want-to-marry-you’s thrown around before resulting in a broken engagement, when God says that He loves you and wants to be in a covenantal relationship with you, He means it and never takes it back or changes His mind, no matter what you do. Thus, any wording that even suggests the two to be similar is an incredible disservice to God.
So know this, beautiful woman of God: Your desire for a husband IS NOT wrong, and you don’t need to call Jesus your boyfriend.
On the flip side, of course, I would be doing a complete disservice to you if I didn’t also mention the danger of getting caught up in that desire, and thus, putting your hope in your relationship status and/or making marriage an idol–a topic that I personally know extremely well (it and I are way above first-name basis…in fact, I’d say it has a key to my house and is the type of “frenemy” that will randomly walk in, open my fridge, and start eating all my food, HAH).
Being single is about balance–knowing that your desire for marriage isn’t wrong and is God-given, but also not making it your focus and sole goal in life. There are many women who put their lives, dreams, callings on hold because they want to get married first, and again, I totally get it. It can be hard to be a single female in many various career paths, especially ministry. It’s not easy being a single female missionary; while I haven’t personally, co-workers of mine have had people straight up ask them how they’re going to successfully meet a husband while on the mission field (of course, we can then point out the 20+ couples we have on our staff that met while on mission with us). There’s a stigma (even if goes unsaid) that single women can’t or won’t make it as long-term missionaries. Not to mention that although I am a part of the absolute greatest missions family EVER, it’s not a total replacement for how super nice it would be to have a permanent partner to walk through all of it with.
BUT to delay my calling simply because I’m single would be a total injustice to God, myself, my team, and people all over the globe–frankly, it’d just be plain selfish. I believe that this is one of Satan’s greatest tactics against women–to make us feel inadequate to fulfill our calling if we’re single, or making us think that if we focus on our callings, we’ll somehow miss our future husband when he passes by. Satan is one male being who KNOWS how powerful a woman on fire for and chasing after God is.
In fact, before God got me to sign up for my first mission trip, my excuse for not going on one was that I wanted to be married first so that I would have someone to go through it with, someone that I knew, someone that could help balance out my weaknesses, someone for emotional and spiritual support. If I had stuck with that instead of stepping out my own in faith, I’d still be waiting, over three years later.
Don’t buy the lies. PLEASE. Again, your desire–my desire–for marriage IS NOT WRONG. But don’t let it keep you from living your life the best that you can. If you feel God calling you to something, don’t wait, do it now. Keep running the race that God has for you, right now, as a single woman, and any man worth marrying will run his hardest to catch up with you.
“A woman’s heart should be so close to God that a man should have to chase Him to find her.” – CS Lewis
And on that note, I know I’ve mentioned this previously in another post, but please love yourself enough to wait for a Godly man. I don’t give a bovine-fecal-matter how “respectful” he is of your beliefs or religious activity or your desire to wait for marriage. A man who isn’t fully surrendered to the Lord will NEVER EVER EVER (did I mention NEVER EVER?) be able to love you like Christ. And your job is NOT to love him until he does; that very rarely ever works. So please, don’t go there. The fixer upper song from Frozen shouldn’t be the theme song of your relationship; if you want to be someone who fixes fixer uppers, then go work with Chip and Jo.
Sorry, rant over. (Okay, I’m not really sorry…but rant over).
Dear beautiful Godly woman, I wish I had answers as to why you’re single, despite all your prayers for your husband to come your way. I wish I had answers as to why I’m still single despite all my prayers for my husband to come my way. But I know without a shadow of a doubt that it will be so much more than worth the wait.
So again, keep running as hard as you can after God; force your future husband to have to run as hard as he can to catch up with you, just to even ask you on a date, let alone to put a ring on your finger. And in the meantime, let God romance and captivate your heart (see the Redeeming Romance series) and continue to teach you who you truly are and what love truly is.
Jesus may not be my boyfriend, but He’s still my Beloved, and I am His. (Song of Solomon 2:16)
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