She Is Not Waiting Anymore – Krystle’s Story

I am done with ‘waiting’. If you have been in the Christian circles long enough, grown up in church or been to youth groups, no doubt you have heard that ‘true love waits’. At some point I started asking myself the question ‘what is true love actually waiting for?’ The question stumped me. Why am I waiting around, like I have been told to do so many times? Wait for what, a guy to walk through the church doors, give me a look and live happily ever after? Well as I am weeks away from my 32^nd birthday that church pew is getting rather uncomfortable.

I have seen too many people play this ‘wait for your true love’ game. Eventually, they stop waiting and settle for any old, good Christian boy or girl or they stop waiting and walk outside the church doors and go looking. And frustratingly, all too often growing up in church, we can be made to feel like our ministry, calling, or anointing only really starts when you meet the ‘one’ and get married.

What about people like me who don’t quite fit into any church category anymore? We are not in the ‘youth group age’, we are a little past the ‘young adults’ age and don’t fit into the ‘married with kids’ group either. Is it any wonder, if the church defines your ‘group’ by these stages of life that people start to wander, eventually wandering outside the doors of the church and go looking for a place to belong.

What about the young people who pledged they would wait for Mr. or Mrs. Right? They believe God’s word where it says ‘God will grant you the desires of your heart’ and they continue to wait. These people have prayed since they were young for their partners and still they have not showed up. They have heard all the sermons, walked up to every altar call, bought all the books and tapes and recited all the verses in the bible and still they wait. Then the ‘words’ start coming. “Be satisfied in God first and he will bring you someone, when you least expect it, God will grant you your desire for a husband, he is coming, He is jealous for you.” And still we wait.

The sad thing is as we wait it’s easy to become disheartened. Our view on God starts to change. Not because God has changed, but because disappointment and expectations are tarnished. For some people this is the point where they throw in the towel, and possibly their virginity with it. Their view on faith is challenged.

“If God cannot do something as simple as grant my desire for a husband or wife then is he really worth following, is he is as powerful as I thought he was?”

I’m not sure whose fault all of this is? Is it the church leaders, the young people themselves or both? Were we not taught that if we put God first that he would grant us the desires of our heart?

And so I wonder, perhaps if we were taught to fall in love with God himself rather than with the ‘power’ that He has to grant us all our hearts desires our ‘young adults’ group may be a little bigger, a little more pure, carrying a little less baggage.

The Bible (Matthew 10) tells us that Jesus desired us to love him more than anything, and anyone else. Not so we could get what we wanted, but because He knew that the love He offered us was far greater than any other version that the world can give us.

So I’ve stopped waiting for true love to find me. I’ve already been found by God. Marriage is great but it is not my ultimate goal; Jesus Christ is.

My hope, desire and prayer is no longer ‘God where is my partner?’ My prayer has become ‘Jesus teach me how to grow and fall more in love with you.’

To read more of Krystles story check out her free E-Book.

Instagram @KRYSTLE_STYLIANOU

Twitter @KrystleLea