By: Ijeoma Udife
A few days to my convocation, I was taking a walk in my school compound and I met some friends. They were from a sister fellowship and we shared the same venue. After chatting and congratulating me, one of them made a statement that made me laugh.
He said, “So Ijay, the next thing now is marriage abi?”
I laughed and told him that marriage was the least on my mind and that there were a few things I needed to do before getting married. He was shocked and then began to tell me that the destiny of every woman was marriage and that the life of every unmarried woman was hell.
I looked at him, shook my head and bid him farewell but his statement got me thinking. Does graduating from the university mean that one is ready for marriage? Must university education precede marriage? Does a woman have no other assignment in this world than getting married as soon as possible?
It turns out that society has created a plan for women and that is, you go to school, graduate and then get married. They make it look as if you were brought into the world to get married. I agree that marriage is a beautiful thing and it is an essential part of God’s plan for mankind but I also believe that the quality of your single life will determine how good or bad your marriage is.
Bishop T.D. Jakes and Dr Myles Munroe are strong advocates of maximizing your single life and really discovering who you are before spending the rest of your life with someone else. As I studied more on relationships and marriage and as I looked at the relationships and marriages of the people around me, I realized that there are two essential things that any woman who really wants to have a fruitful life and a beautiful marriage should do:
- Build your relationship with God.This might sound a little cliché but girl, if you are a daughter of God and want to enjoy your life and have a heavenly marriage, you can’t ignore this. Apart from the privilege of being led by God to know who you should get married to, you need to have a strong and unshakeable relationship with your Heavenly Father for so many other reasons.
- Let’s face it, when we get married, we practically give our time to building our homes, being excellent wives to our husbands and outstanding mothers to our children. We really don’t have time for ourselves as much as we used to as single ladies.
Using your time as a single lady to build a solid relationship with God and a good prayer life will keep you strong and ready for the tough times ahead. Marriage is sweet but there’s a lot of battles you would have to win. You don’t expect the enemy to just sit back and watch you have a wonderful marriage, do you? You have to be a warrior in the place of prayer for your husband and your children. Building a strong prayer life is essential to being a victorious wife and mother. You will be able to sense danger and stop the devil right in his tracks before he even makes a move. Marriage is not only about enjoying intimacy with your husband, cooking good meals and having beautiful babies. It takes a strong woman of prayer to sustain and keep her home covered and untouchable for the enemy. When you surround your husband and children with fire from your prayer life, the devil and his minions will be scared to even come close to your family. - Another reason why you should have a strong relationship with God before getting married is that nothing will be able to take HIS place in your life including your husband and children. His position in your heart will be incontestable and sure. As women, getting married means we have to sacrifice so much of our time for our families and if care is not taken, we lose contact with our Heavenly Father. It’s become a lot worse when we never even had a relationship with God in the first place.
- A pastor once told us of an incident that happened with his wife. He was studying and praying when he heard a shout from his wife. It really disrupted him and when he went to see what happened, he realized that his wife had mistakenly broken a plate and that was what caused her to scream. He was so upset and chided her on why she would disrupt his studying just because of a broken plate.
When he went back to continue his study, the Holy Spirit spoke to him and said,
“Go back and apologize to her. You can’t shout at my daughter like that!”
He said he immediately went to her, got down on his knees and apologized to her! He told us that having an intimate relationship with God as a single lady is very important. - Ladies, imagine being so close to God that He defends! That’s the power of relationship!
Building and sustaining a strong relationship with God and a fiery prayer life before getting married will make you a powerful woman indeed. Nothing will take you by surprise and you will always be victorious in whatever battles you face. - 2. Discover yourself and your assignment
- Dr Myles Munroe will always say that the most important relationship is the one you have with yourself. If you are not really sure of who you are, getting into a relationship is not the best thing you can do for yourself. I see a lot of ladies who practically worship the idea of marriage. They just sit at home waiting for a man to marry them. They never take a journey of self – discovery, they never push themselves to do more and be more, they never explore their talents and potentials and then forty or fifty years down the line, they look back and realize that they could have done so much with their single life. They live in regret and plunge into depression.
- Ladies, you need to know who you are. You need to build a healthy relationship with yourself. You need to heal from all the emotional and psychological wounds you may have and develop a good self – esteem before thinking of saying yes to any man. There are ladies who are into terribly abusive relationships and who cling to these men because they feel that they can’t do any better. There are ladies who have destroyed every relationship they have had because of some deep wound that they never took out time to deal with. Heal from all those wounds first so that you don’t end up hurting other people. Heal so that you don’t sabotage a relationship that God has destined for you.
Hurting people hurt people.
The plain truth is that if you never discover who you really are, you will never be able to choose the right man to marry. That’s what spending time alone just to be by yourself does to you. It helps you discover who God is, who you are and what will suit you. It helps you to know what you really want. It helps you discover your divine purpose. When a man meets you, he sees a woman who knows who she is, he sees a woman who is fulfilling her assignment. That way you will never attract men who are not serious. There’s a saying that you attract who you are and that is very true especially when it comes to relationships.- Dr Myles Munroe will always say that marriage is an omelette and an omelette is only as good as the eggs. When the eggs are good, the omelette is wonderful but when the eggs are bad, the omelette is terrible.
Use this time you have as a single woman to build your relationship with God and discover yourself. See yourself as a box of treasures that needs to be discovered and opened. Learn to love yourself and build values and convictions. When you do this, you will be a blessing to yourself and a true gift to your husband and children.
We don’t prepare in marriage, we prepare for marriage - There’s a lot of pressure on us as women to get into the mould that our families and society has placed on us but we have to ignore those expectations and do what is right for us. What we do as single ladies will determine what becomes of our marriage. Marriage can be heaven on earth or a truly hellish experience; it depends on us to choose what we want.
- “Who can find a virtuous woman, for her price is far above rubies…..” – Proverbs 31:10
The Daniellas Foundation 