Learning to Live Selflessly

Over this Christmas break, my mom and I have been reading through a book called Emotional Purity by Heather Arnel Paulsen. As one can guess by the title, the book talks about being emotionally pure in relationships with the opposite sex. Although my mom and I would not agree with one hundred percent of what the author talks about—and how can we? this book is not the Bible—we have found that most of the general principles given can be applied to the believer’s life. It has provided many great discussions and has given me a lot of things to think about. Paulsen sheds some interesting light and gives different perspectives on dating and relationships that I had not considered before.

The particular chapter that I read today was called “God’s Plan for Your Single Years.” I know for me, my single years thus far have been spent with the mindset of looking ahead to the next thing God has for me; in essence, I have been waiting around for God to bring “the One” into my life so I can get married, start a family, etc while in the mean time I spend my days going to classes, doing homework, and finishing up my education so I can get a job. Now, I know that I have probably been informed before that this mindset is not biblical nor God-honoring, but—in all honesty—I have just really come to understand what these years are for. I feel very sheepish that I am 21 years old and just now realizing this, but I am thankful that the Lord is merciful and did in fact show me. =]

There have been at least four instances in the last four or so days that the Lord has been refocusing my mindset of what my purpose in life should be and where my eyes should be fixed. First, I listened to an old sermon given by a dear family friend—Chris Mueller—at The Master’s College in 2005. (Here is the link to it: www.masters.edu/pulpit/files/2005/Spring-%2705/20050225-ChrisMueller-mp3. I would definitely recommend listening to it!!!) In it, his final point was “What are we to do now while we are single and waiting?” His answer: Trust in God’s timing and enjoy this season of life. God will bring that person in His timing. He refers to 1 Corinthians 7:32-35 which says, “I want you to be free from anxieties. The unmarried man is anxious about the things of the Lord, how to please the Lord. But the married man is anxious about worldly things, how to please his wife, and his interests are divided. And the unmarried or betrothed woman is anxious about the things of the Lord, how to be holy in body and spirit. But the married woman is anxious about worldly things, how to please her husband. I say this for your own benefit, not to lay any restraint upon you, but to promote good order and to secure your undivided devotion to the Lord.” God wants us to celebrate this undistracted devotion to the Lord; we are to drink up this time of singleness and strengthen our relationship with God!

The second and third encouragements to refocusing were from church this past Sunday. Both the morning service and college group Sunday night discussed the book of Colossians and the theme of Christ’s preeminence in our lives. Both pastors emphasized the need to have Christ at the center focus of all that we do and that we cannot and should not let anything distract us. We are to be filled with Christ and to let Him reign supreme in our lives. (Colossians 2:10)

The fourth reminder was, going back to my second paragraph, the chapter Emotional Purity: “God’s Plan for Your Single Years.” The author starts the chapter by quoting the section from 1 Corinthians 7 that I posted above. I just wanted to pull out some quotes from the chapter to share. “’Secure undistracted devotion to the Lord.’ [Singles tend to] live in the here and now, without a thought of the future. This focus on self permeates this life stage and in many people the years of being single become a wasteland of me, myself, and I, with little concern of serving and enjoying God. […] Let’s face it, when you are single…it’s not difficult to become self-focused. Who else do you really have to consider but yourself? If a single person is not involved in reaching out to other people, that lack of accountability or responsibility to others can produce a selfish life-style. […] We ought to rejoice for this time of undistracted fellowship. This undivided attention to the Lord is the point of single life. To use this season in our lives to focus on self does not prepare us for the daily putting aside of self that takes place in marriage. […] When one promotes self before marriage, one will still promote self after. When do you think you are going to learn to be unselfish? […] We should practice becoming unselfish during our single time. […] Learning to become a godly, selfless person during your years as a single will bless your mate in ways you cannot imagine. […] Remember a virtuous woman does her husband good all the days of her life, not just her married days (Prov. 31:12). […] We need to become friends with our singleness. The number one goal during this time is to fix oneself on loving God with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength. When you grow in your love for Him you will desire to conform yourself to Him. You will put aside your own wished and start living for His. Being single will then be easier. It may not come overnight, but with prayer and much reading of His holy and pure Word, you will see that His ways are best for you. This may be on one of the biggest mental battles you will have. It take perseverance and tenacity. You can’t give up. You have to fight the good fight of faith. Repent of thinking that marriage will solve your problems. Learn to fall in love with God. Trust Him for everything. […] God wants you to have joy in your singleness and He wants you to know He’s not going to keep you single a day longer than He plans. He wants us to use our time as singles to serve and enjoy Him and to focus on obeying and trusting Him.”

I know that was a lot to quote, but it was SUCH a good reminder to me and such a blessing. It seems that the point of singlehood is cultivating a relationship with the Lord without distraction and is a time when we can serve Him and others for God’s glory. We are not to spend this time worrying about our futures but to become absorbed in serving God and learning to live for Him and not for ourselves. I really liked the author’s point of asking when we are going to learn to be selfless if we do not learn it while being single. We should always be striving to grow in our relationship and love for the Lord; the best time to do it is when we are not distracted by another person. The patterns we establish now will be the ones that we carry over into marriage…why would we want to carry over the pattern of being selfish and self-serving? We cannot expect our husband/wife to love and serve us if we are not preparing ourselves to love and serve them. I love how she brought up Proverbs 31:12 and how the excellent wife will be living her whole life in such a way as to do her husband good; this process starts from the beginning and continues until the day she dies. This whole process of laying aside one’s own desires and dying to self is a process and a continual battle that must be won. It even goes down to the very small details of how we spend our free time. Are we spending that time on ourselves? Do we sleep, eat, read, watch TV, play video games, etc to make ourselves feel good? (And I’m not saying these are bad things to do but if we are constantly doing them to please ourselves and are not looking to the needs of others, they will become bad things.) Or are we looking for ways to help people? When we are home are we jumping in to help with dishes, chores, daily tasks, errands, etc? Are we spending time in the Word and in prayer? Are we building relationships with God and with people? Are we taking the time to encourage people and speak in to their lives? This whole thing is a process, like the author says; it takes perseverance and tenacity…it is a race we must continue to run and a battle we must continue to fight. We must remember Hebrews 12:1-2, “Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.” We must lay aside the sin of selfishness and look to Jesus to run worthy of our calling.

I praise the Lord that He showed me this truth of how to live and I pray that I would run with endurance and look to the Lord for strength!!