Life Application.

When you’re a single, Christian, 25-year-old woman whose closest peers are mostly married and/or pregnant, you—whether you admit it or not—often wonder why it is you’re still single. What’s wrong with you or (if you want to put a spiritual spin on it) what God still needs to teach you before you get married.

So, since I meet all the qualifications of the aforementioned person—very single, Christian, 25-year-old woman whose closest peers are mostly married and/or pregnant—and since I’m in the “admit it” party, I’ll tell you, I think I realized something the other day that could be one of those big lessons God wants to teach me pre-marriage.

I think maybe one of the reasons God has not yet chosen to marry me off is that I’m far too selfish, especially with my time.

In short, I give the people who mean the most to me, leftover me. They get me at the end of my day. They get me rushing through. Yawning. Changing and dashing out. When I’ve already hit my limit with social time. They really get the leftovers, but they’re the ones who mean the most. I’ll block out time to spend with other people, or for appointments, and these important ones will get lost in the rush. My parents. My few good friends. The kids. They really get the shaft.

And here I am, telling people one of the things I learned in Sudan was that relationships take work, that you have to make sacrifices for them. But I haven’t applied that to life back home quiet yet, it seems.

And so I’m being selfish, not sacrificing enough and sometimes I’m even being selfish by trying to be something to everyone.

And you can’t do that with a husband. Or a family. You can’t shaft your spouse and, oh gracious, my heart hurts when I think about doing that with the kids. (It was hard enough when I realized I was doing it to my little friends.)

So, I guess this must be a current lesson I need to learn (… again). I’d like to say “the” lesson I need to learn, but I have a feeling God still has a lot of work to do on me.