How to Identify Your Lifetime Love

The Father has given us our own will and volition. He has endowed us with the power of choice. He does not micro-manage the minute details of our lives. He is Lord, yes, but He delights in our willful obedience. The Lord prefers that we make a decision to abide in Him.

The same is true with our love life.

The correct concept of ‘the perfect will of God.’

The Bible do talk about God’s perfect will in Romans 12, but it was not solely for marital relationships.^[1]

Yes, there is such a thing as a ‘specific’ someone that would fit God’s perfect will, but the concept of the ‘specific’ and the ‘perfect’ is much broader than we think. (see next post)

From the opposite gender.

In this day and age, this has to be said.

When God saw that Adam got lonely in that there was no suitable companion for him, the Lord didn’t create an Adam-2. Oh no, He made a woman, not another man.^[2]

The promise of procreation was given to the “male and female.”^[3]

(We shouldn’t be even prolonging this issue…)

A Christian.

Again, the heart can be so confused, that it forgets the basics.

There are many Biblical references as to why we should be turned off concerning unbelievers when it comes to lifelong relationships. The following is one of them:

Do not be yoked together with unbelievers. For what do righteousness and wickedness have in common? Or what fellowship can light have with darkness? What harmony is there between Christ and Belial? What does a believer have in common with an unbeliever? What agreement is there between the temple of God and idols? For we are the temple of the living God. As God has said: "I will live with them and walk among them, and I will be their God, and they will be my people." "Therefore come out from them and be separate, says the Lord. Touch no unclean thing, and I will receive you." ^{(2 Corinthians 6:14-17 NIV)}

Enjoy life with your wife, whom you love, all the days of this meaningless life that God has given you under the sun-- all your meaningless days. For this is your lot in life and in your toilsome labor under the sun. ^{(Ecclesiastes 9:9 NIV)}

We have a direct and plain command to enjoy life with our spouse. Not to enjoy in a year or two, but for life. For the committed, the wisdom is how to make it enjoyable until ‘death do us part.’ But for the single, the question is obvious: Will you be enjoying this for a lifetime? If not, then you have the grace to stop. The marriage vow is the point of no return.

The Wisdom of True Courtship

Since dating is all about knowing the other person very well before doing the “I DOs,” then ending the courtship as friends would have also been a successful story. Young people should know how to ‘Agree to Disagree’ as early as possible. ^[4]

If the other person has different dreams and plans that are awfully opposite to that of yours, then there is no reason in continuing. Remember, it’s for life. It’s unnatural to pursue pain.

Emotional lovers of God do not compartmentalize their life. No compromise. All feelings are subject under God’s love. Christians have no eros towards the same gender, and they don’t fall for people who haven’t experienced First Love.

Up next: More on Powerful Choices.

^Verses:

^{[1] (Romans 12:2 NIV) Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is--his good, pleasing and perfect will.}

^{[2] (Genesis 2:20 NIV) So the man gave names to all the livestock, the birds of the air and all the beasts of the field. But for Adam no suitable helper was found.}

^{(Genesis 2:22 NIV) Then the LORD God made a woman from the rib he had taken out of the man, and he brought her to the man.}

^{[3] (Genesis 1:27-28 NIV) So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them. {28} God blessed them and said to them, "Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air and over every living creature that moves on the ground."}

^{[4] (Amos 3:3 NIV) Do two walk together unless they have agreed to do so?}