please lead me to the rock: a letter on singleness
Dear elder, relative, friend.
You know I love you and value you, but you need to know.
That oftentimes your words have driven me to despair, making me feel completely alone.
Your job is to push me to God in all circumstances.
Yet your words (perhaps unknowingly) often drip with pressure toward the ways of this world.
Please lead me to the rock.
The sole job of a parent is to model and teach a child how to fall in love with the Lord.
Yet it seems thousands of Christian parents have fallen into the same, sinful system of the world.
Common phrases little-by-little tearing down truth and God-led dreams,
“You’ll understand when you have kids”
“Just wait until you’re married”
“There are more fish in the sea”
I thought your job was to foster my love with Jesus?
I thought your job was to help me love me?
You ask me over and over if I have my eye on a man.
Yet you never ask me about my romance with Jesus, you never ask me about His plan.
Please lead me to the rock.
Why are you treating singleness as if it's a problem to be solved?
Nothing in the Bible supports this at all.
God tells me to keep my eyes fixed on Him, to trust Him at all times, to fall in love with Him first.
Yet you try to tell me I am in control, that I need to “put myself out there”, resulting in my confusion and hurt.
Please lead me to the rock.
You ask me so many questions.
About my job. My friends. My future.
Yet you never ask me about the one thing that matters, my relationship with the love of my life, my Almighty King and Ruler.
Please lead me to the rock.
Don’t you understand that I’ve already made my most important vow?
I have committed every detail of my life to God and I plan to fully live it out.
I have committed to radical obedience. I have committed myself to His Word!
Yet your worldly words try to veer me off His path, thinking my trust in God is absurd.
Please lead me to the rock.
I so desire for you to live a life of God-love that I want to emulate.
But everywhere I turn I see Christians looking exactly like the world.
Nothing about their lives I want to copy, but instead teach me to turn.
Please lead me to the rock.
I need you to remind me that this world is temporary and what is more real is eternal reality.
I need you to help me remove my culture-stained glasses and remind me to open my eyes to His reality and really see.
I desperately need you to push me to God and acknowledge that I am counting the cost.
I desperately need you to pray over me and lavish me with God-filled words.
I need you to acknowledge what I’ve sacrificed and lost.
Please lead me to the rock.
I become so confused!
So many Christian couples choosing to live together before marriage, disregarding God’s more beautiful plan.
We then lavish their marriages with money and gifts, while my striving for purity remains unacknowledged as I try to stand.
I need you to affirm my modesty.
I need you to affirm my fight!
I need your help in resisting my sinful culture.
I need you to model a God-honoring life lived right!
Please lead me to the rock.
Please know not one of these words is filled with condemnation.
There is unending redemption and grace for me and every one of my sisters and brothers.
What I am pleading is for you to see me.
And to use your words not to encourage me to idolize marriage but to spur me on to idolize only one thing worth idolizing–my God, my King, my ultimate Lover.
Please, I beg of you, lead me to the rock.
“Hear my cry, O God,
listen to my prayer;
from the end of the earth I call to you
when my heart is faint.
Lead me to the rock
that is higher than I,
for you have been my refuge,
a strong tower against the enemy.
Let me dwell in your tent forever!
Let me take refuge under the shelter of your wings!
For you, O God, have heard my vows;
you have given me the heritage of those who fear your name.
Prolong the life of the king;
may his years endure to all generations!
May he be enthroned forever before God;
appoint steadfast love and faithfulness to watch over him!
So will I ever sing praises to your name,
as I perform my vows day after day.”
PSALM 61 (ESV, EMPHASIS ADDED)
