dating.

This seems like the general topic that everyone from my GCC friends to non-church friends to home friends to my parents want to talk about this summer. It's not that boys are bad or that I'm a strong female and want to live this life alone, but I just want this to be God's work. Within the past year and a half God has transformed my plans completely - turning a Jonah like resistant heart to one that just wants to follow His path brokenly and with full abandon and this is how I've come to my thoughts on this topic.


Quoting John Piper in his book on Ruth...because I am not eloquent...
"Here we have a picture of God's ideal woman...Faith in God that sees beyond present bitter setbacks. Freedom from the securities and comforts of the world. Courage to venture into the unknown and the strange. Radical commitment in the relationships appointed by God....This is the woman of Proverbs 31:25 who looks into the future with confidence in God and laughs at the coming troubles: "Strength and dignity are her clothing, and she laughs at the time to come." Ruth is one of "the holy women who hoped in God...[and did] not fear anything that is frightening" (1 Peter 3:5-6). It is a beautiful thing to watch a woman like this serve Christ with courage….Whatever else the great women of faith doubted, they never doubted that God governed every part of their lives and that nothing could stay his hand...Nothing--from toothpdicks to tyrants--is ultimately self-determining. Everything serves (willingly or not) the "purpose of him who works all things according to the counsel of his will" (Eph. 1:11). God is the all-encompassing, all-pervading, all-governing reality." --John Piper, A Sweet and Bitter Providence, p. 35, 44


This is the woman I want to be.  Not that I will become this by the time I find that person and not that I will be ready for this relationship because I have become this, but this is my focus. 


When I think about my parents and think about how much I look up to them for who they are in Christ, I often think "I want to marry someone who loves God and trusts in his paths the way my dad does" and I think "I want to be the surrendering but confident and caring woman my mom is". But the kink in this is that my parents have had the past 26 years together becoming the people they are becoming. They grew as they ran after the same goal- to fully worship our Lord. 


So the conclusion is I just want to run after God with an open mind that He has already set my paths. If and when He chooses dating will be part of that path. But for now, instead of such focus on these significant others why not focus on the only significant One.