Chrysostom
Beloved of All
Your prayer asks that God’s will and ways be done, yet you immediately fill your words with a longing for romance, a declared love, a visit, a united family, and a new life in America. Consider this: to pray for God’s will is not to present Him a list of your own desires and ask Him to shape another’s heart to meet them. It is to be filled with the knowledge of His will in all spiritual wisdom, so that you may walk worthily of the Lord. Are you first seeking that? Or have you already drawn the picture of a future and now ask God merely to color it in?
The passions of the human heart are a deep and dangerous pestilence. When a longing for human affection, even one dressed in hopes of marriage and family, takes the first place in our souls, it becomes a serpent that never ceases to devour us. Its teeth are the teeth of a lion. It demands from us the very service we owe to Christ, so that we laugh at hell and despise the kingdom if only we may work its will. Examine yourself carefully. Do you love this man more than you love the Lord who bought you? Would you obey Christ’s commandments if they required you to let this relationship go? If the answer troubles you, then you have allowed a disordered love to creep in, and you must flee to the only remedy: the precious Blood of Christ received with full assurance, the divine Scriptures heard with attention, and almsgiving added to your hearing. These alone kill the worms within us.
You ask God to stir a spark in this man’s heart toward you, and you desire him to be shaped into a provider, a kind partner, a stepfather to your boys. But true love does not seek its own. Love is proved not by warm feelings or outward declarations, but by keeping the commandments. Hear Christ Himself: “If ye love Me, keep My commandments.” If you truly wish this relationship to bless you, then prove your love to Christ above all. Make your chief desire to love His appearing, to be found blameless and shining when He comes again. Then you will be able to love this man, not as a means to your comfort or security, but for the salvation of both your souls. And you will care far more that he fear God than that he provide a passage to America.
Remember the holy Apostle Paul. He longed with intense love to see the Roman Christians, yet he did not force his way. He submitted his desire entirely to the will of God, and when he was hindered, he gave thanks. He did not love contrary to what seemed good to God. Imitate him. You may pour out your deepest desires before the Lord, but then you must lay them down and trust Him utterly. If He answers quickly, give thanks. If He delays, do not repine. If He closes the door, do not kick against it. To persist in demanding that God shape another’s heart to fit your plans is to love not as Paul loved, but as those who love only their own will.
Therefore, seek first to be filled with spiritual wisdom. Let your prayer shift from, “Make him declare love and bring us together,” to, “Lord, show me how I may walk worthy of Thee, whether in marriage or in singleness. Purify my heart. Let nothing remain in me that is not of Thee.” If this man is to be your husband, God Himself will build the house in His own time and way. But do not attempt to be the architect. And do not measure his worth by his ability to visit soon or to provide earthly goods, but by his fear of the Lord and his sincere faith.
Flee every pestilent affection. Let the glorious Gospel, even if it leads through sufferings, be your true treasure. Then, whatever comes, you will possess a joy that this world cannot give.
May God grant us all to attain the eternal treasure, by the grace and love toward man of our Lord Jesus Christ, to whom with the Father and the Holy Ghost be glory now and forever. Amen.
The passions of the human heart are a deep and dangerous pestilence. When a longing for human affection, even one dressed in hopes of marriage and family, takes the first place in our souls, it becomes a serpent that never ceases to devour us. Its teeth are the teeth of a lion. It demands from us the very service we owe to Christ, so that we laugh at hell and despise the kingdom if only we may work its will. Examine yourself carefully. Do you love this man more than you love the Lord who bought you? Would you obey Christ’s commandments if they required you to let this relationship go? If the answer troubles you, then you have allowed a disordered love to creep in, and you must flee to the only remedy: the precious Blood of Christ received with full assurance, the divine Scriptures heard with attention, and almsgiving added to your hearing. These alone kill the worms within us.
You ask God to stir a spark in this man’s heart toward you, and you desire him to be shaped into a provider, a kind partner, a stepfather to your boys. But true love does not seek its own. Love is proved not by warm feelings or outward declarations, but by keeping the commandments. Hear Christ Himself: “If ye love Me, keep My commandments.” If you truly wish this relationship to bless you, then prove your love to Christ above all. Make your chief desire to love His appearing, to be found blameless and shining when He comes again. Then you will be able to love this man, not as a means to your comfort or security, but for the salvation of both your souls. And you will care far more that he fear God than that he provide a passage to America.
Remember the holy Apostle Paul. He longed with intense love to see the Roman Christians, yet he did not force his way. He submitted his desire entirely to the will of God, and when he was hindered, he gave thanks. He did not love contrary to what seemed good to God. Imitate him. You may pour out your deepest desires before the Lord, but then you must lay them down and trust Him utterly. If He answers quickly, give thanks. If He delays, do not repine. If He closes the door, do not kick against it. To persist in demanding that God shape another’s heart to fit your plans is to love not as Paul loved, but as those who love only their own will.
Therefore, seek first to be filled with spiritual wisdom. Let your prayer shift from, “Make him declare love and bring us together,” to, “Lord, show me how I may walk worthy of Thee, whether in marriage or in singleness. Purify my heart. Let nothing remain in me that is not of Thee.” If this man is to be your husband, God Himself will build the house in His own time and way. But do not attempt to be the architect. And do not measure his worth by his ability to visit soon or to provide earthly goods, but by his fear of the Lord and his sincere faith.
Flee every pestilent affection. Let the glorious Gospel, even if it leads through sufferings, be your true treasure. Then, whatever comes, you will possess a joy that this world cannot give.
May God grant us all to attain the eternal treasure, by the grace and love toward man of our Lord Jesus Christ, to whom with the Father and the Holy Ghost be glory now and forever. Amen.
