Lessons on Love #2: So this is love...

I think I'm falling in love...

Aug 01, 2022

Hey guys,

Hope you’ve been well, you know I love you, ladidadida… let’s get right into it!

(Sorry y’all, I think Rae’s Substack “Cut The Small Talk is rubbing off on me lol. If you haven’t yet, check it out and subscribe! Click Here )

But for real though, I do love you guys, and I’m always humbled that you take the time to read these - often messy - thoughts of mine. Thanks for being a part of this <3

Getting Caught Up

This writeup is somewhat of a follow-up to my previous writeup “Lessons on Love #1: Unrequited”, so if you haven’t read that one yet please go back and do so because it will give this writeup a lot more context.

So as you guys know, I’ve never been in a romantic relationship with anyone, and after continuous failed attempts at getting a guy, I began to think that maybe I was cursed. I worried that I would never find love, that I would be single forever and that I would be relegated to being the rich aunty whom my friends’ kids loved.

Is It Really That Bad?

From conversations I’ve had with quite a few others, I know this isn’t an uncommon fear, however, sometime last year I began asking myself some very tough questions:

“Why would singleness be such a bad thing? If God does not will you to have a spouse does that mean He isn’t good? Would you continue to serve and love Him? Or resent Him?”

It’s funny because I had never really envisioned the possibility that God may not have a husband in His plan for my life. It just felt like such a natural thing. A no-brainer. Everyone always talks about marriage as a when, not an if. But God doesn’t owe me a husband. He never promised me one, so who am I to arrogantly demand one? It makes me think about something my friend Rachel once told me. Christ already gave us everything when He died on the cross. That was the ultimate gift - salvation. Everything else is a bonus. If God never did another thing for us He would still be good. He would still be more than deserving of all the glory, all the honour and all the praise we’re meant to give Him.

A Rocky Start

As these thoughts and convictions settled in my mind I came across a video on the channel Wonderful Acts where Alyssa talked about her “Me, Myself and God Year” which was the year she literally fell in love with Jesus. Not just theoretically but actually fell in love- they went on dates y’all! Seeing as I had miserably failed at having a year of singleness and devotion to God in 2021, I decided that 2022 would be my year to fall in love with Jesus. However, as is the case with most things in life, the declaring of a thing is a lot easier to do than- well, the actual doing.

I started out with good intentions, trying to read my Bible regularly, trying to have conversations with God, trying to avoid tempting content that would lead me to sin. The usual. But it wasn’t long until I craved a person’s touch. Craved to have someone to look me in the eyes and affirm me. Craved to have someone I could just pick up the phone and call whenever I wanted to. These are just a few of the struggles that come with trying to date someone you can’t see, can’t always feel and can’t always hear clearly. It sucks to say, but after a while I got tired and went back to what was familiar. At least the guys I liked were tangible humans I could relate with, even if they didn’t reciprocate my feelings. But God is never one to give up on those He loves and that’s when something amazing began to happen. God literally began to sweep me off my feet!

Wooed and Pursued!

A lot of words come to mind when we think of God. Powerful. Helper. Father. Even friend. But we often forget that Jesus is also our bridesgroom, and I’ve come to discover that God’s got game. He can be quite romantic.

I slowly found that in my quiet time Jesus began to speak to me, and lead me to Scriptures I had never seen before. There are so many I could delve into but I want to focus on three of them.

“Return, faithless people,” declares the Lord, “for I am your husband. I will choose you—one from a town and two from a clan—and bring you to Zion. Then I will give you shepherds after my own heart, who will lead you with knowledge and understanding. - Jeremiah 3:14-15 (NIV)

Despite all of my unfaithfulness with putting the validation of men above God, when I read this I felt God telling me that I am His. He is my husband. I may have rejected Him countless times, but He hadn’t rejected me. He wants me. He chooses me. He loves me. The very thing that I’m craving, I already have. And what particularly struck me was the realization that if God gives me a husband to marry, that man would merely be a shepherd to whom He has entrusted my care to. Jesus is meant to remain the original groom. My first love.

“Therefore I am now going to allure her; I will lead her into the wilderness and speak tenderly to her….“In that day,” declares the Lord, “you will call me ‘my husband’; you will no longer call me ‘my master.” I will remove the names of the Baals from her lips; no longer will their names be invoked. - Hosea 2:14, 16-17 (NIV)

In this verse God talks about how He will take His bride into the wilderness and basically woo her. He would remind her of His love and He would remove the name of any idols from her lips. This made me look at the wilderness season that many of us Christians dread, very differently. Sometimes God separates you from others and the noise so that He can remind you of His love and help you let go of idols you’ve placed above Him. Couples often have to go on getaways to spend quality time together and rekindle their love- it’s no different with Jesus.

…“you will be called by a new name that the mouth of the Lord will bestow. You will be a crown of splendor in the Lord’s hand, a royal diadem in the hand of your God. No longer will they call you Deserted, or name your land Desolate. But you will be called Hephzibah (my delight is in her), and your land Beulah (married); for the Lord will take delight in you, and your land will be married. As a young man marries a young woman, so will your Builder marry you; as a bridegroom rejoices over his bride, so will your God rejoice over you. - Isaiah 62:3-5 (NIV)

There’s so many beautiful promises in this verse but what I couldn’t get over was the facts that although I may feel barren, desolate and deserted - which is often the case when you’re lonely - God still looks at me and delights in what He sees. He delights in me. He looks at me and is just overcome with joy. Every. Single. Time. There’s no greater affirmation than knowing that my Creator takes great pleasure in my existence. I don’t have to do anything, or prove anything. He just loves me. As is! Honestly, I’m still grappling with being able to believe it as truth, but that doesn’t change the fact that it is. Too often I find myself falling into the old pattern of trying to earn His approval, when He’s already freely given it to me.

Heart > Hand

Like in any relationship we have our ups and downs (which are mostly my fault tbh), but it feels good to be actively try to get to know Him. When people would talk about how God’s greatest desire is to have intimacy and relationship with us, I didn’t really get it. But I’m starting to see that He really isn’t looking for perfect people, He’s looking for people who want to get to know Him. David made a lot of mistakes but he was a man after God’s own heart and I’ve decided I want to be a woman after God’s heart too. Too many people just want to get close to Him for what He can give them (sometimes I struggle with that too); but don’t forget that when you know and love Him, He wants to give you everything that is His anyways. Why choose when you can have the best of both? Why pick a part of Him when He wants to give you His all?

How Can I Get Started?

Now to be completely frank with you, how you connect with God will likely be an individually tailored experience. However, here are a few things I like doing with Him - in addition to praying and reading my Bible.

God loves to speak to me through music and so a lot of the time I’ll open up Spotify and I’ll ask Him to pick a song using shuffle or I’ll scroll until I feel led towards a particular song. I can’t tell you how many times Jesus has serenaded, comforted, and even directly spoken to me through my playlist - and I love it!
I also love to write God letters. So when I make an entry in my journal instead of saying “Dear Diary”, I say “Dear God”, or sometimes even “My Love and My Lord”. I find that when I’m writng directly to Him the words really flow and I’m able to be honest and vulnerable instead of it just feeling like an exercise.
Final one I’ll share is dancing. Slow dancing, jumping around, throwing our hands in the air and waving ‘em like we just don’t care. I enjoy dancing with God. I know it’s hard to imagine. Even harder to explain. Just try it :)

I’ll close out with a quote I heard that really hit home for me.

“Don’t chase the hand of God in your life and miss out on His heart”

Sincerely,

Elsie :)

p.s. As always if this writeup blessed you in some way please share it with someone and subscribe for more.

With Abang!

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