Poetry Aside

I'm in an interesting mood this morning.

Who ever decided that "romance" was the be-all, end-all of life?

I have a boyfriend for the first time in my life, and I'm expecting to marry him sometime this year. But there is so much more here than just the "I'm in love with you, let's get married" thing that drives a lot of people I know to the altar. There's even more here than the "We can serve God better together than we can apart."

See, it's like this. I love Pete. He's my best friend and my brother and my boyfriend and the person that I would like to be my husband someday. He's gentle and caring, crazy and spontaneous, and a man after God's own heart.

Still, things are far from perfect. Things with his family aren't peachy right now--and I honestly don't understand it. I know in my head why they are saying the things that they are saying, and I feel as though I should have lived a different life, had different parents, had a different philosophy on life.

Can I really, truly want God if I want to get married too? I think so. I think that God created me to live, and part of that "living" involves just walking day by day with Him through the things that happen in my life. Paul says, "Whether therefore you eat or drink, or whatsoever you do, do all to the glory of God." That kind of includes a lot there. I thought I could just live for the glory of God.

Of course there are some lines that can be drawn: I'm not going to bed with a guy before I get married. I am to put anger, wrath, malice, and deceit far from me. I'm not going to sin for the glory of God.

But the question that keeps hitting me--Am I really a woman after God's own heart? Do I really want God enough to be thinking about getting married? Can I keep wanting God after I marry? Can I encourage Pete to want God after we marry? It's not about a system or a method. Sarah trusted God, and so she obeyed her husband Abraham. I HAVE to have a relationship with God, or I will never be able to walk with Pete and "follow him to Caanan" at the call of God.

For the first time in my life, I'm not looking for a direct call from God. When I was younger, I believed that in creating me to be a woman, God wanted me to be a helpmeet, to follow someone in following God, and encourage him, so that he didn't have to be alone, because it wasn't good for man to be alone.

But now I find from so many other people that it's better for a man to be alone until he is ready to support a wife--but Abraham packed up and left for parts unknown after he married Sarah--the only thing that was in place was his relationship with His God, and even THAT needed refining.

I think I'm afraid that I will have to trust God without getting to talk to Him the way I have the last couple of years. He has been my Abba, my Shelter, my best Friend. He's been the only person who loves me just as I am, who has been so gentle with me, who knows how to draw me to Himself as no one else in the whole world ever could. After knowing that love with God, I know that nothing I ever feel for Pete here will measure up to that specialness of being chosen by the God of the universe to be His friend.

I'm afraid that I'll lose that friendship in a whirl of necessity, trying to bring people around to accept the relationship between Pete and me, learning what submission is because of course it has to be done in order to be a good wife, freaking out about my health and the affect it could have on our lives--even before we get married.

I am praying that God will show me what it means that there is no shadow of turning from the Father of lights who has given me this gift. It's a gift that right now I feel like others are trying to force open, shaking the box and tearing at the paper. I can hear something shattering inside--Is that my innocence?

I don't understand, God. I always wanted this to be happy. Doesn't everyone? Why is happiness something that has to be programmed? Why don't I understand everything that You want or have for me? Why do I have to walk this one moment, one day at a time? Why can't I remember how to talk to You?

Learning to breathe again...