Since we live by the Spirit, let us keep in step with the Spirit. (Galatians 5:25)
Deciding who you will marry is one of the most important decisions you will ever make. In a kingdom courtship, the primary reason for marriage should be the conviction that a particular match is God’s choice for you—not just a good choice, but God’s choice.
Most of the time, you won’t have the luxury of choosing between people or circumstances that are totally bad or totally good. Nearly all your choices will appear good in some way, but only one will be part of God’s perfect plan —His best for you. The chief enemy you fight in choosing God’s best will be your own strong inclination to make a good choice instead of a God choice.
Before you can determine whom to marry, you must first answer an preliminary question: Does God want you to marry anyone, ever? Or is His plan for you to remain single? Scripture teaches that marriage, like salvation, is an unmerited gift from God (Genesis 2:18). When God wanted Adam to have a wife, He brought her to him. Their marriage was a gift from God. But Scripture also tells us that singleness is God’s gift as well.
“I wish that all men were as I am. but each man has his own gift from God,“ said the apostle Paul in 1 Corinthians 7:7. He wished all men were single like he was and free from the stresses of married life so they could devote themselves to God’s work. “But each man has his own gift from God.” In other words, God will either give to a person the gift of being married or the gift of being single.
People who are perpetually lonely as singles are usually the same people who are worried about what isn’t happening to them instead of what they should be doing to minister to others. Their focus is inward, not upward. In 1 Corinthians 7, we’re told to acknowledge singleness as good, allow it for our spiritual growth and use it for God.
C. S. Lewis was single most of his life. He taught at Oxford and Cambridge Universities and used his free time as a single to write some of the best Christian literature available in the world today. As he grew older and was nearing retirement age, he met and married a woman he came to love intensely in their 3 short years together. What would the world have missed if Lewis had married earlier someone whom God had not chosen?
It happens. Singles become consumed with the idea of how wonderful life would be if they just had a marriage partner, and then they make concessions and compromises that lead to marriage out of God’s timing and out of God’s will. To feel accepted by another person and avoid the stigma of being single, they enter into unhealthy relationships and compromise values they once held dear.
The more consumed you become with the idea of marriage and/or sex, the more easily you can slip into a pattern of fantasizing. It might start as innocently as fantasizing about being with another person, perhaps someone at work or church. Then you might progress to fantasizing about the children you’d have together or where you would live. If they continue unchecked, your thoughts could become a full-blown X-rated video that stays stuck on replay in your mind until it replays in your life. The powerful feelings that accompany such thoughts can lead people into marriages God never ordained and intimate relationships He never approved.
The Bible declares that as a man “thinketh in heart, so is he” (Proverbs 23:7, KJV). What a strange thought! How can you think with your heart? We normally associate thought with the brain and feelings with the heart. The phrase “to think in the heart” refers to thoughtful reflection. Many ideas are briefly entertained by the mind without ever penetrating the heart. But those ideas that do grasp us in our innermost parts are the ideas that shape our lives. When our thoughts are corrupted, our lives follow suit. We are what we think.
If God gives you the gift of singleness, He may use that quality in a special way that wouldn’t be available to you as a married person—for a season or a lifetime. God’s sovereign will is always meant for your good and His glory. If and when God decides you can best serve Him as a team member with a life partner, you won’t need to change Sunday school classes, search the singles ads, or join a dating service He will work out the circumstances. “He who finds a wife finds what is good and receives favor from the LORD” (Proverbs 18:22). This favor of the Lord is what God extends to His children in arranging the circumstances for them to meet their life partners.
It also helps to remember that there are a great many circumstances worse than not being married. One of them is being married to someone who doesn’t share your love and desire for God—someone whose commitment divides your commitment.
The life of Hudson Taylor is a powerful lesson in the value of God’s wisdom regarding marriage. Taylor was an English missionary who died in 1910 after spending more than 50 years as a missionary in China. When he went there in 1854, nearly 380 million people in the country’s vast interior had never seen a Westerner nor heard the name of Christ. With a heart for God, Taylor penetrated deep into Chinese culture. He dressed like the Chinese, learned their language, and lived among them. By the end of his life, 205 preaching stations, 849 missionaries, and 125,000 Chinese Christians were a testimony to a life surrendered to God.
Hudson Taylor wielded a spiritual influence far beyond China. Even today, the ripple effect of his ministry is a part of our lives as Chinese Christians number in the hundreds of thousands world-wide. Taylor was single when he left England, but he eventually married another missionary in China. A small sentence in one history book has always intrigued me: “In England, Taylor had left behind his unfinished medical studies and the girl he had hoped to marry. She had refused to come with him.” What would the world have missed if Taylor had stayed home to marry someone God hadn’t chosen?
God tested Taylor when He made him choose between God’s will and his own desires. The day came in Taylor’s life when he had to decide if it was important to be in God’s will or be married—the God choice over the good choice.
God still tests us today. We can’t assume that the woman Taylor left behind was ugly, irritable, or contentious. He was a man of character who probably kept the company of godly woman. Many people may have thought it was a good match, and perhaps the couple could have had a good marriage. But every good choice isn’t God’s choice.
If God gives you the gift of singleness, He may use that quality in a special way that wouldn’t be available to you as a married person—for a season or a life time.
God’s favor wasn’t lost on Hudson Taylor. In China, he eventually met and fell in love with 22-year-old Maria Dyer, the much-admired daughter of prestigious missionary parents. They had an uncommonly happy marriage because they shared a deep passion to evangelize China even at great personal sacrifice.
Seven years before his marriage to Maria and after his breakup with his fiancé, Taylor made a God choice that was painful and agonizing at the time. “What can I do?” he wrote to his sister. “I know I love her. To go to China without her would make the world a blank.” Instead of the “blank” life Taylor feared—the life we all fear—God brought purpose to his pain and honored his sacrifice. Even though it may have felt like a long wait, God was in the waiting. And so it is with us.
When we decide on our own that we’re compatible or totally in love with another person and therefore refuse to seek or wait for God’s instruction, He will allow us to choose the good—His permissive will. But we will miss the best—His perfect will. The problem is that things don’t work right when we’re in only the permissive will of God (1 Corinthians 6:12).
In his popular workbook, Experiencing God, Henry Blackaby suggests we “find out where God is working and join Him there.” We, on the other hand, are more likely to say, “God, here’s the person I want to marry. Will You bless us?” The difference is the approach. One approach puts God at the center while the other puts ourselves at the center. When we make choices independent of God and then ask for His blessing, we’re asking God to approve an idea that originated with us, not Him.
Throughout Scripture, God always takes the initiative. He sets the agenda. “We adjust our lives to God so He can do through us what He wants to do,” says Blackaby. “God is not our servant to make adjustments to our plans. We re His servants and we adjust our lives to what He is about to do.”
Once again we’re back to the difference between a good idea and a God idea. How many times have we heard people say, “If God gave me a brain, He must expect me to use it”? Even though God gave us the ability to reason and make choices, what did He say about our thoughts compared to His?
“For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways,” declares the LORD. “As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.” (Isaiah 55:8-9)
God’s knowledge and wisdom are far greater than ours. He can see the entire landscape while we concentrate on a single valley. We would be foolish to try to fit God into our mold and conform Him to our plans. Yes, He did give us a brain, and we should be smart enough to know that God’s even smarter.
Once again, what’s the difference between a good idea and a God idea? A good idea will work some of the time; a God idea will work all the time. Scripture warns us not to lean on our own understanding but to trust God wholeheartedly (Proverbs 3:5). When we’re not willing to submit to God’s leadership and authority in our lives, God will let us follow our own devices. In following them, we will never experience what God is waiting and wanting to do in us and through us.
Christians must realize that it’s more important to be certain that a marriage is God’s will than to judge our suitability for marriage by love, attraction, or compatibility. Our situations change and we grow through the years. We cannot predict future compatibility on our own. When we accept compatibility as a primary basis of marriage, we can be led into cultural traps such as living together before marriage to make sure we are compatible. Only God knows the end from the beginning. He is the one who creates love, not man.
It was Ruth’s mother-in-law, Naomi, who made the choice of a husband for her (Ruth 3). It wasn’t love at first sight, getting to know each other, or even a passionate kiss that brought Boaz and Ruth together. Romance wasn’t the issue, although the story later became beautifully romantic as Ruth and Boaz developed an unselfish love and deep respect for each other. The issue was obedience, a “rightness” about the relationship. God was working in the situation, and He was using Naomi’s kindness and moral integrity to guide Ruth. As a result, Ruth later became the great-grandmother of King David and direct ancestor of Jesus.
Does the story of Boaz and Ruth interrupt your romantic vision of passionate love? Would you like the story more if the two had been lovers who glimpsed each other across the wheat field and became passionately attracted? It happens to some people in some situations, but the qualities that are attractive in the beginning may prove difficult to live with in the long run. The man who falls in love with a woman’s attentiveness may find it is the very quality that drives him crazy when he can’t get enough space. The woman who falls in love with a man’s drive to succeed may find that quality irritating and destructive when he spends more time at work than at home.
Dr. Neil Clark Warren, author of the popular book Finding the Love of Your Life, says your choice of whom to marry is more critical than everything else combined that you’ll ever do to make your marriage succeed. “If you choose wisely,” he says, “your life will be significantly easier and infinitely more satisfying. But if you make a serious mistake, your marriage may fail, causing you and perhaps your children immeasurable pain. Most of the failed marriages I have encountered were in trouble the day they began dating. The two people involved simply chose the wrong person to marry.”
What might seem like a good choice at the time may not be a God choice for a lifetime. If you “lean on your own understanding,” you may someday feel like the person who fell out of the raft into the Colorado River: The more you struggle, the deeper you go.
Just as Ruth was unaware of the larger purpose God had in mind for her life, you can’t see the larger picture of your life. Because of Ruth’s faithful obedience, her life and legacy carried great significance even though she couldn’t see the end result. In a similar way, your faithfulness to God’s leadership will bring a significance to your life that will extend beyond your lifetime. The question is not how to find a mate, but who will find the mate. God will direct you in choosing God’s best.
The above edited article can be found in an expanded form in the great book, “Choosing God’s Best” by Dr Don Raunikar. This book is the result of what he saw as a therapist and experienced as a single person before marrying his wife Kimberly.
The late Dr Raunikar was the director of New Life Clinics in Houston, Texas as well as a psychotherapist who specialized in singles issues. He lead Christian singles seminars nationwide and oversaw Lifehouse, a Christian home for young women experiencing crisis pregnancies.
This book delves into real issues that offers proven, biblical principles for creating godly relationships and a deeply satisfying courtship—rather than just dating—which many will argue is the current system that’s in desperate need of reform. It is straightforward and scriptural and will help you see how your attitude toward today’s relationships will affect your marriage and family in the future.
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(CANADA) "Choosing God’s Best" is the worst book ever for Christian singles. If marriage is what MarriageMissions.com hopes to encourage, they should stop recommending it and take down this article immediately.
Case in point: This is an entirely unbiblical teaching: "The chief enemy you fight in choosing God’s best will be your own strong inclination to make a good choice instead of a God choice". This is also an entirely unbiblical teaching: "Before you can determine whom to marry, you must first answer an preliminary question: Does God want you to marry anyone, ever? Or is His plan for you to remain single?"
The Bible NEVER says anywhere that we must find out from God whether or not He wants us to stay single or get married, and if so, to whom. And there are no examples anywhere in the New Testament where someone sought God’s personal opinion on these questions and got answers. No generation of Christians EVER considered singleness to be a gift, or marriage for that matter.
“I wish that all men were as I am. but each man has his own gift from God, does NOT mean "God will either give to a person the gift of being married or the gift of being single". This was a mistake made by the editors of the Living Bible in the 70’s. The latter part of 1 Corinthians 7:7 (which is conspicuously absent here) reads, some of one kind, some of another. Paul was NOT referring to two specific gifts (like this, singleness and that, marriage) but rather the variety of gifts that we each may be given, and in his case, it was most likely the gift to contain himself sexually, although he doesn’t state this specifically. So in light of the gifts (ie. abilities) that we each have, we are free to CHOOSE marriage or remain unmarried, as Paul goes on to say in verses 8 & 9. Some may be gifted with enablements that might incline one to choose singleness, but that does NOT mean that that Paul considered unwanted circumstantial singleness a gift (btw- suffering is NEVER considered biblically to be a gift, only when it occurs in the context of persecution for the sake of the church).
Unfortunately, this mistranslation has resulted in a generation of Christians who have been taught to believe that since God gives you either marriage or singleness as a equal gifts, you should be equally happy to get either. And that since it’s up to God, you don’t have to take much initiative, and to do so might be sinful. As Raunikar writes:
"If and when God decides you can best serve Him as a team member with a life partner, you won’t need to change Sunday school classes, search the singles ads, or join a dating service. He will work out the circumstances. ‘He who finds a wife finds what is good and receives favor from the LORD’ (Proverbs 18:22). This favor of the Lord is what God extends to His children in arranging the circumstances for them to meet their life partners."
Raunikar has it completely backwards in claiming that God grants you favor in arranging circumstances and then you meet your life partner, when it’s clear that the actual verse reads that you get out there and find a wife (finds what is GOOD) AND THEN the Lord grants you favor!
It is astounding that he would encourage this kind of magical thinking, which inevitably discourages Christians from becoming active agents in their search for a mate. Especially amid our current epidemic of protracted singleness and declining birthrates! Young Christian women, who currently outnumber their single male counterparts two to one, cannot afford to waste their most fertile years on this kind of hyper-spiritualized nonsense.
It’s one thing to believe in the sovereignty of God and to take everything to the Lord in prayer as the old hymn goes. But it’s quite another when you presume to get an unmistakable answer or clear path in response to every question you ask him, particularly when it comes to mate-finding, which is the most human decision you will ever make. Truth be told, Christians get married the same way as everyone else: a mix of "man (or woman) with a mission" and "how’d that happen?!".
Dr. Raunikar died a couple of years ago, leaving behind a family that most likely depends to some extent on the royalties from his book, but not at the expense of those who might read it and come away confused, disheartened, and misled. As much as he is to be admired for his lifetime of humanitarian works, this doomed experiment for Christian singles isn’t one of them. It should be tossed into a time capsule with the rest of the "gift of singleness" genre for future generations who will be relieved that their grandparents paid no attention to it.
PS. Fortunately, teachings to Christian singles are currently under reform. Better, newer books include "Getting Serious about Getting Married: Rethinking the Gift of Singleness" by Debbie Maken; Get Married: What Women Can Do to Help it Happen, by Candice Watters; The Freedom to Marry, by Ellen Varughese. For more teachings that are pro-marriage and anti-GoS, see giftofsingleness.blogspot.com and Boundless.com (sponsored by Focus on the Family, Watters is a contributor)
(USA) Man. Thank you, Jennifer. You’re definitely right. There are some things about this that are certainly off the mark. For instance… I recall that marriage started out as being "arranged" by the parents. It was the parents’ decision, oftentimes based primarily on politics, not on … "compatibility."
In dating and marriage, each "X" does not have its own "Y." If that were the case, then we would all be doomed, because somebody’s "Y" is with the wrong "X" and the right "X" would be left to choose a wrong "Y" for himself.
The author was right in saying that one should be content in what God gives them, but that’s about the only positive remark I have on this book.
(UNITED STATES) Hello everybody, I have been visiting this site for a couple of months now and I find it very uplifting and inspirational. I applaud every last visitor of this site who is dedicated to Christ and your relationships. I was preparing myself for marriage and I found a lot of helpful information on here before I was hit with the worst news of my life!!
I have been in a relationship for 6 years now, I have been engaged for 2 months and I have a 4 year old daughter. I acknowledge Christ and I know that I have not lived my life according to his will but everyday I am making efforts to strengthen my relationship with Christ.
My world began to tumble down about 2 months ago. I learned that my ex fiancé was cheating. I immediately forgave him and then began reading together and studying God’s word and we even attended 2 sessions of pre-martial counseling. We focused on each other and what has gone wrong between us. I was devastated but I put my faith in God in I really believed that this was my future husband and we could get pass this.
On my weak days, I continued to pray and I asked God to give me a clear sign whether my ex fiancé was the man God made for me; in about 1 week God give me my sign.
I continued to question my ex fiancé’s actions and I learned that he had not ended this relationship with the other young lady and he also had been dating another young woman for two years and she just had a 2 month old baby. He also had a few female friends that he talked to on the phone occasionally.
I was crushed….I haven’t even gotten over the first ordeal and then I was hit with this. He denies being the father of this child and a paternity test will take place soon, but as much as I am hurting I still feel like he needs me and my strength to get through this. He doesn’t deserve me and God has really strengthened me throughout this process. But I still have a lot of love for this man and I was really looking forward to day when we would become a family. I am seeking advice because my mind is fed up and tells me NO!! but my heart just wants to be there for him and tries to save us. What good is it to pray for something from God and then when he shows you something you ignore it?
I’m so confused…. my ex fiancé seems like he is really focusing on God to bring him through this situation. He has apologized to me and expressed deep remorse and sorrow. I’m just lost right now and I don’t know what to do please give me some advice and please keep me in your prayers.
(MALAWI) If you are not married yet, let go before it is too late. I was married for 15 years. The signs that I was in a wrong relationship were there, but I went ahead. Right now I am struggling alone with 3 children just because I thought things were going to get better, but things got worse as the years went by. A person who regards you would never want to hurt you over and over again – for what? When God gives you a thing, it’s always genuine and its permanent.
May God minister to you so that you are able to see in what situation you are in. Ask God to give you courage to move on. You don’t know what God has in store for you…..I urge you to move on; don’t look back. I feel it in my spirit, once again move on! God bless you.
(GHANA) You must be fortunate to have heard and seen these "red flags". I think that God loves you so much to have allowed you see things as these before you make the final decision to marry him. I share with you your situation, more especially where you have a child with him "the one you thought was an ideal for you". But I think that you have these options to make:
1. To say I don’t mind if he decides to marry me and still go ahead hurting my feelings and emotions but to what extent and will you be able to stand? What about if you get a heart attack? What about if he gets AIDS through this his illicit affair, casual, unprotected sex lifestyle (say so because he wouldn’t have had two children with two mothers) perhaps you will also die.
I am a christian and whatever type of sex, whether or not protected, once it is done before marriage, it is sin and beyond that, sex is a covenant expressed between two people. For all you may care to know, he has already entered into what I called a multiple covenant. Now compare what the Bible says about marriage covenant. It is between more than two persons?
You might have been spiritually giant to break all these covenants in order to enjoy that marriage.
2. To say that yes, I did recognize that I have fallen, yet I will not lie down because I have fallen. I will wake up because God is a forgiving God and He will forgive me. Please, the next person you will meet, if that’s the right God’s chosen one for you, will accept you and you child. I suppose that’s your worry that you can’t stop with this person.
My prayer for you is that God will give you the strength to hear His voice and His warnings so as to avoid yourself in agony in near future.
(KENYA) Thanks very much for your discussion. It is wonderful.
(ZIMBABWE) Hie. I’ve been so blessed by these articles and l would like to say that God has to be involved in all you do before you even undertake it. Psalm 127:1 says that” Except the Lord build the house,they labor in vain that build it…” You see, it’s the same with marriage, if God is not in it then it is in vain, it will fail. Kenneth Hagin once in his book Plans, Purposes and Pursuits that “whatever you are doing for God, ask yourself, Is this God’s plan?” You should get God involved in whatever you are doing because for you to succeed in that marriage God has to be a part of it.
It is true that some people choose someone with the physical senses and then expect God to bless it. God will bless it because he loves if you are his child but he can only bless it so far. That means you are now walking in his permissive will and not his good and acceptable will for your life. So when you encounter problems in that marriage you cry and say God, why me? you forget that you are the one who put yourself in that mess in the first place. God wants us to be happy but for us to be happy we have to learn to obey Him so that we can walk in the fullness of His blessings.
The secret to a successful marriage therefore, is walking in line with God’s word, praying and listening to the Holy Spirit and what He tells you to do and then doing it. If God tells you not to marry someone or not to marry at all, it’s because He knows the bigger picture than you would ever know and he knows whats best for you. I think people should learn to be always in prayer and learn to yield to the Spirit if God because He alone has the answers and not lean on our own understanding. God foreknew and has predestined our lives to walk in the ways of His Son but for us to do that we have to allow Him to lead us.
God won’t force us, that’s why we were made with the power of choice. So we have to choose to walk in line with his destiny for our lives whether be it relationships or marriage or even ministry… So get down on your knees and find out for yourself, what his plans are because He will put His approval and blessings on His plans.
(BAHAMAS) I agree totally with Precious. How could a person know what is right of their own? God’s Holy Spirit must give us the gift to discern what God’s will is based on his word and what is not God’s will. I allowed God to lead me in finding a mate and today I have no regrets. God is supposed to be Governor or Lord, a governor or lord plans, organizes and controls. He does it though, through us lining up our will with his will. To think otherwise is to be carnally minded.
(SWAZILAND) I’m a young Swazi man, aged 28. I thank God who just woke me up to read such inspiring an message. I’m blessed. I’m currently in the process of finding who I am to marry. It’s more important to find God’s idea than mine. I pray I will choose right, after I have found such truth.
(BAHAMAS) Good for you Bongiseni. The one way to know God’s will is to read his word. The way to know who we should marry – Test the spirits and see if they are of God. If you date a person long enough, (wisdom) signs will point to danger, or signs will let you know that you are on the right road. Obedience to God’s word causes God to protect us (Ps. 91) and if we are obedient to His word and living holy, even when we are not sure about things, He through His Holy Spirit, will reveal His Perfect Will which is the only will we should be pursuing. God will never allow an obedient child of His to be deceived. He loves us too much. He has the sovereign power to remove stumbling blocks out of our way: stumbling blocks here can refer to the wrong people that the devil makes us believe are the right people. (Deception is the way the devil works.) Have a blessed day in the Lord Jesus Christ!