It’s been almost six months since I was blessed with an opportunity to contribute regularly to SingleRoots.
Realizing that, I went back and perused several of my posts. Each one, from cats to fictitious letters to my future wife, reminded me of what was happening in my life during that week. Reviewing the progression of time brought some introspection.
Not until now did I realize how this collective effort has impacted my spiritual development.
God has used this community to reveal to me His beauty and wonder as well as the amazing connection that can develop among like-minded people in the same station of life who share a passion for Christ. Looking back, I realize I went in with selfish motivations, yet it is obvious that SingleRoots has brought growth and awareness to me that has more to do with what He has done to me through this community than what I’ve contributed to it.
A by-product has been that I’ve become aware of my singleness more than ever. Even as we endeavor to make this a daily discussion of substance pertaining to much more than simply defining ourselves by our dating lives, it’s only natural that each time I apply for a new insurance license at work the marital status box seems to scream a little louder. I don’t make that statement to complain or place it in a negative context whatsoever. It’s just the truth.
Even as someone who is secure in defining myself more in who God made me to be rather than who isn’t on my arm, it’s natural to occasionally ask questions.
I have multiple cousins barely out of high school in loving, healthy relationships getting married and yet, I’ve not once in my 30+ years experienced anything similar.
“How did I get here? What did I do wrong?”
They’re questions we are all bound to ask at least in a moment of weakness or insecurity. Frankly, it’s a healthy thought process. I’ve asked myself those questions before and as I repeat them today, suddenly I have different explanations.
I’ve always viewed immaturity and bad choices as the reasons I find myself sleeping alone at night. What if that is completely wrong? Granted, I believe there is constant room for improvement and as I work to just simply get a little better every day, I become more attractive for when I meet my future spouse. I’ll be better positioned to be a boyfriend, a fiancé, and a husband.
However, what if I’m single just because…just because I’m single?
What if everything that has happened in my life, bad and good, is viewed through a lens of the journey that eventually will lead me to my wife rather than stumbling blocks and diversions away from the path to her?
The older I get the more I realize what a disservice the church has done in its spread of Christianese. Anybody that grew up similar to me understands those clichés that seem like they’re Biblical when really they hold zero truth.
“Well, Brandon, maybe you’re not married yet because you haven’t become everything God made you to be.”
If I were everything God made me to be, you wouldn’t be reading this. You and I would be racing through the garden to see who could make it to the Tree of Life first…naked. And we wouldn’t think a thing of it.
I won’t ever be everything God made me to be.
Adam and Eve took care of that for me. The best thing I can do is accept that I’m imperfect and whatever beautiful gal I am blessed with down the road is going to be completely incomplete and imperfect as well.
All that other junk from my past has only better contributed to the urgency that I now have to live my life intentionally and spend each day trying to get a little stronger. And, when the time is right, I’ll get to check a different box.
[Editor’s Note: We wanted to re-run this article that Brandon wrote in the early years of SingleRoots. He has since married and is the father of 2 children but this is no less true now than it was back in 2012 when he wrote it and had yet to even meet his wife.]
