Several of my friends are single parents and raising children on their own. For some of them, relationships have been a revolving door. Some of those relationships looked promising, as if they were going to end in marriage, but things didn’t work out. While we don’t talk about it too much, I know that some of my friends no longer want to be carrying the load of life on their shoulders alone. They desire to journey together with someone that is supportive, caring, and dependable—someone that will fit into their children’s lives with grace and respect. My friends, like most of us, want a home filled with the unity of Christ, but how do they get there? How do single parents make the transition from feeling like they’re carrying the load alone to maintaining a relationship that will ultimately lead to a good and stable marriage?
To be honest, none of us are ever alone. God has brought us this far, and it is because of His goodness, mercy, and grace that we’re here today. Heavenly Father also makes it clear in His Word that marriage is His institution, and He desires everyone who wants to get married to have a good and Godly spouse. Ecclesiastes 4:12(NLT) says, “A person standing alone can be attacked and defeated, but two can stand back-to-back and conquer. Three are even better, for a triple-braided cord is not easily broken.” This verse affirms the journey of transitioning from one to two. It’s understanding God’s expectation, covering, and wisdom regarding unity. He is the One that has set the standard, not us. When a man and woman are committed to Christ and committed to each other, and they stand back to back, they are poised to conquer. Their allegiance to put Christ at the head of their union makes a triple-braided cord that will withstand enemy attacks.
The Non-Negotiable Choice
Heavenly Father wired all of us for happiness. We desire it probably more than anything else, and we understand that relationships with God and relationships with others are direct links to this happiness. It doesn’t take much to understand our desire for marital partnership, because unified connections make life sweeter. God set the precedent for this because it’s what He wants from us, connection! Long before any of us came on the scene, we were in God’s thoughts. He knew about us and predestined our existence according to the good pleasure of His Will and Plan. Even before He created Adam, He knew humanity would need a Redeemer in the person of His only begotten, Jesus Christ. God did all of this why? He did it because He wanted a family. He wanted children, and we are the apple of His eye. He created us because He wanted connection with us, and it makes sense that we would want connections with each other.
Our desire for a unified family is baked in, and God understands this desire more than anyone. We must let the truth of this marinate in our hearts and minds. Knowing that God desires our dreams of marriage, family, and unity to come true must be the foundation of our believing. Some of us struggle to believe this, and one of the reasons that we struggle with it is because we’ve grown used to trusting our own shoulders. In our gut, many of us think our shoulders have carried the burdens of single parenting alone. This has bred a sort of independence that causes us to make decisions and choices without consulting Heavenly Father and without trusting His guidance.
The truth is that our shoulders could never have carried all the complexities and burdens that come with being a single parent. It was challenging, but God carried the weight for us. Jesus Christ tells us in John 15:5 that apart from him, we can’t do anything. With some of us, there’s a place in our hearts where we connect personal confidence to the struggles we’ve been through. The rewiring is to connect confidence to faith in God and His grace to bless us to make it, even though we didn’t always put Him first. Sometimes we put the man first, the situation first, our own physical and sexual need first, and we didn’t even think about what God’s Word says.
Our faith in God and His Word must have first position in our minds and hearts. Our commitment to stand on what God says must be relentless, especially when it comes to bringing someone new around our children. Faith is not negotiable. We must be fully persuaded and sold out to God’s commitment to bless us in the area of family and marriage. A half-hearted conviction will not do. If you believe God’s desire to see you blessed is not greater than your own desire for the same, there is more work to do to increase your faith.
You are not a martyr, and your sacrifice or struggle is not required for your happiness. Jesus Christ has paid the price in full. Faith is the requirement you must meet. This means your confidence in the plan God has for your life and the lives of your children must be unshakable. He knows the right person; therefore, the choice to leave this totally in His hands is non-negotiable.
You Determine Your Level of Blessing
Past relationships can teach us many things, but one of the most important lessons is seeing the mirror they hold up regarding our faith. They reveal what was most important to us and they show us how much of God’s wisdom we employed. We should learn from them that building a relationship on the foundation of Jesus Christ is the only way to have confidence that it will continue. You and I can only be blessed to the level that we believe and trust in God’s Word.
Hebrews 6:1(NLT) tells us, “So let us stop going over the basic teachings about Christ again and again. Let us go on instead and become mature in our understanding. Surely we don’t need to start again with the fundamental importance of repenting from evil deeds and placing our faith in God.” Transitioning from single to married requires us to stop going back to old habits and making the same relationship mistakes. As single parents, we should be way past the elementary stage of believing and faith, because we have seen God do so much for us and our children. The greater blessing will require a greater commitment to God and His Word. This is what spiritual maturity is all about. It’s growing in Christ so that we can have his unity and peace in our families and in the marriage that we are believing God to make a reality.■
Scripture quotations marked (NLT) are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Wheaton, Illinois 60189. All rights reserved.
“The Journey of Becoming Two” written by Kim Times, edited by Reverend Fran Mack, for Sundie Morning Sistas ©2020. All rights reserved. All done to the glory of God through Jesus Christ, our Lord! SMS is dedicated to inspiring and encouraging Christian Women through the Word of God.