Finding A Christian Man

It’s Not About You

March 3, 2025

Spiritual Preparation for Marriage Lessons

Galatians 5:19-21(NLT)
“19 When you follow the desires of your sinful nature, the results are very clear: sexual immorality, impurity, lustful pleasures, 20 idolatry, sorcery, hostility, quarreling, jealousy, outbursts of anger, selfish ambition, dissension, division, 21 envy, drunkenness, wild parties, and other sins like these. Let me tell you again, as I have before, that anyone living that sort of life will not inherit the Kingdom of God.”

The grace that God has given us is too amazing for words. Through the sacrifice and resurrection of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, God has saved us, and He has empowered us through His Holy Spirit so we can live successfully within the earth. For years too many to count, He has been patient with our sinful indulgences and behavior, and although He is as patient and merciful as He ever was, something within this earthly realm has changed. The consequences of our actions are more severe, and we no longer have the time we once had to get things right with God.

For many of us, the desire to get married is still first and foremost in our hearts, but the path seems more challenging to find. This shouldn’t be surprising to us. 2Corinthians 4:4(NLT) says, “Satan, who is the god of this world, has blinded the minds of those who don’t believe. They are unable to see the glorious light of the Good News. They don’t understand this message about the glory of Christ, who is the exact likeness of God.” Our Heavenly Father has provided a wealth of knowledge about how satan operates in this verse. First, He tells us that satan is the god of this world. When we study God’s Word more closely, we will see that satan was given this position by us. Our sin put him there, because there’s a whole lot of sinning going on in the world, and sin transfers what God meant for us to satan.

One of the chief functions of darkness is to blind so that light cannot be seen. This is another piece of wisdom that 2Corinthians 4:4 conveys. If we do not believe in faith, we can be blinded from the treasures that faith reveals. Sadly, this is the condition of many people, more specifically, those that desire to be married.

We understand that the activity of evil in the earth has accelerated, perhaps more in our time than any other. The lives of many people are totally consumed by what is happening in the world, and they dedicate even less than an hour a week on the things of God. This is what blinds them. It’s what keeps their eyes from landing on the very thing that would lead them down the path of what they’re desiring.

Our Heavenly Father has given us free-will. We can do whatever we choose, but there is a consequence for every action. If actions are aligned with the Will of God, the consequence will be a reward. If actions are aligned with darkness, the consequence will be more darkness. The wrong actions, behaviors, confessions, and thoughts will corrupt our lives and cause everything to work against us. God commands us to steer clear of these things. 1Thessalonians 5:5(NLT) declares, “For you are all children of the light and of the day; we don’t belong to darkness and night.” We are children of God’s light, and it is our responsibility to keep our eyes focused on Him so we can see what He is doing in our lives.

Many of us are too focused on ourselves to be focused on God, and that’s a huge problem. It’s not about you. This is the simple truth. It is always and forever about Jesus Christ and how you live in, with, by, and through him. Colossians 3:3(NLT) tells us, “For you died to this life, and your real life is hidden with Christ in God.” When you gave your life to Christ, your life became hidden with him in God. The reality of this is that when anyone sees you, they shouldn’t see the old you, they should see Christ.

1Corinthians 6:12-13(NLT) says, “I am allowed to do anything”–but not everything is good for you. And even though “I am allowed to do anything,” I must not become a slave to anything. 13 You say, “Food was made for the stomach, and the stomach for food.” (This is true, though someday God will do away with both of them.) But you can’t say that our bodies were made for sexual immorality. They were made for the Lord, and the Lord cares about our bodies.” There is no joy to be had in sinfulness. There is only pain, and that isn’t what our Heavenly Father wants for us. He tells us in Galatians 5:22-23 that the fruit of the Holy Spirit are love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. When we walk in the Spirit, he will produce these in us, and our lives will be pleasing to God.

We must make up our minds that we will not be blinded by the enemy and separated from the blessings we desire most. The wrong choices and decisions can set us back, but the right choices and decision can set us up for all that our Heavenly Father has in store. In these last days, it is more important than ever to say “Yes” to God. We can’t simply say that we believe all things are possible through Him, we must show God that we are growing in faith by being humble to His voice and directions, because this is His Will. Don’t be like those that have been on this Christian journey for years but have believed so little in His power. Focus your energy on God through the Lord Jesus Christ, not on what you want, because it’s not about you. It’s about what God wants for your life. Miraculous things will happen when you surrender to that truth.■

Scripture quotations marked (NLT) are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Wheaton, Illinois 60189. All rights reserved.

English Standard Version (ESV)
The Holy Bible, English Standard Version. ESV® Text Edition: 2016. Copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers.

“It’s Not About You”, written for findchristianman.wordpress.com. Copyright©2025. All rights reserved. All done to the glory of God through Jesus Christ, our Lord.

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More Precious Than Jewels

February 24, 2025

Spiritual Preparation for Marriage Lessons

Proverbs 19:14(ESV)
“House and wealth are inherited from fathers, but a prudent wife is from the Lord.”

In Old Testament times, wealth and possessions went from father to son. A daughter was not allowed to inherit her father’s wealth, so she did not receive an inheritance, only a dowry that she could bring into her new marriage. An inheritance meant a great deal to sons and gave them confidence that they could begin their own families with some degree of stable footing. Leaving an inheritance was the best that a biological father could do, but receiving it is no guarantee for a fulfilling and happy life with a wife. Proverbs 19:14 tells us that only God can give a man a wise, understanding, and sensible wife. For women, this is information we can’t afford to miss.

God is the One that causes the paths of two individuals to cross. He is the One who knows exactly what it will take to bless our lives. Although many of us think we know everything about who the right person is for us, we do not. In Jeremiah 17:10(NLT), Heavenly Father tells us, “But I, the LORD, search all hearts and examine secret motives. I give all people their due rewards, according to what their actions deserve.” When the disciples were praying about a replacement for Judas, Acts 1:24(NLT) says, “Then they all prayed, “O Lord, you know every heart. Show us which of these men you have chosen.” They understood that they could not make a decision with their own sense knowledge. They surrendered to God’s Will and needed to hear from Him because He, and He alone, knows the secret motives of every heart. We would do well to remember this so that we will seek God only when it comes to marrying the right one for our lives.

A prudent wife

A prudent wife is going to know what to do when the man or the children are ill. She’s perceptive, so she knows and recognizes signs when someone isn’t feeling well and needs medical attention. A prudent wife is not selfish because she knows that selfishness and bitterness ruin relationships. Giving and pouring into her family is always on her mind, and she always puts God first. A prudent wife prays all the time, and she recognizes that a persistent and quality prayer life keeps her relationship with God tight, and therefore, keeps her life blessed and in balance. She walks by the Spirit, and never gets ahead of his counsel. This is what makes her special.

A prudent woman understands that in order to be a prudent wife, she must divorce her single life and not try to hang on to her single days. This is a challenge for many modern women. We’re in love with our closet space, and never thought of making room for two as a sign that our faith and actions are working together. We never thought of learning to cook as a way of showing God we’re willing to make sacrifices for the good of our future marital union, so that if hubby can’t cook, at least we can make a banging omelet. As a prudent woman seeking marriage, you can’t just pray about what you desire, you’ve got to be thinking about what your husband might desire as well. Your life has to prove you’re confident that God will deliver on His promises. Your faith, actions, and confessions must all be on the same page.

An excellent wife
Proverbs 31:10(ESV) says, “An excellent wife who can find? She is far more precious than jewels.” At one time, the self esteem of a lot of women tanked because of baked-in societal norms of inequities and mistreatment. To compensate, there’s now an over exaggeration of a woman’s value and worth in some arenas. Society pushes for selfish indulgences, and there’s all this talk about queenship. A woman cannot make herself a queen, and this is something we would do well to learn very quickly. Only God can give us a crown, and He does not do that lightly.

We can’t have an over exaggerated sense of self-worth, because that will lead us to arrogance, and arrogance will kill any blessing that we’re hoping to receive. Many of us expect the man to automatically assume we’re a queen and treat us that way, when there’s not enough of the love of Christ in our hearts to make us royalty. It’s God who assigns worth and judges us faithful according to the standard He alone has set. An excellent wife knows this.

Many of us haven’t prayed to God to teach us to be an excellent wife. We’ve not prayed to be accelerated in spiritual preparation so that we can marry soon. We haven’t developed the maturity to hear what the Lord is saying, fix what He says to fix and hone what He says to hone, so that we’re ready to be presented with the man He sends. An excellent wife has delighted in being prepared by God through His Word and the Holy Spirit. She has her eyes open spiritually, and this makes her priceless.

Sometimes we make decisions and choices without being patient to hear from God. We still have more work to do to be the prudent and excellent wife that God wants us to be. The problem is that many of us don’t think so. We’re not interested in hearing what God says on the matter, so ultimately, we self-sabotage. We can avoid this. We don’t have to mess things up for ourselves when it comes to our significant relationship with the one God will send. He would not tell us to be prudent and excellent if it were not possible. Remember, you’re not trying to be a prudent and excellent wife for every man, only for the one that is right for you. Pray on that. Pray that the Lord continues to polish you so that you’re seen as the most precious jewel in the eyes of your beloved. Pray that you will be a prudent and excellent wife that comes from the Lord.

Scripture quotations marked (NLT) are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Wheaton, Illinois 60189. All rights reserved.

English Standard Version (ESV)
The Holy Bible, English Standard Version. ESV® Text Edition: 2016. Copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers.

“More Precious Than Jewels”, written for findchristianman.wordpress.com. Copyright©2025. All rights reserved. All done to the glory of God through Jesus Christ, our Lord.

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Let Your Love for God Be Genuine

February 17, 2025

Your Relationship with God

After reminiscing one day about a past relationship with one of my sisters in Christ, she phoned me with a question. “Kim, you said something the other day that I don’t quite understand. You said that I should never give a man that I’m dating husband privileges.” She told me that this was the way she had always approached relationships, and it is what she’s seen from other women as well. We’re living in a completely different day and time. Choosing the wrong man can literally destroy your life because the wrong man is sent to put a wedge between you and our relationship with Heavenly Father. So, I conveyed to her the wisdom of Ephesians 5:25(NKJV), “Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself for her.” Only a man sent by God can love a woman that way, so if God hasn’t given us the greenlight that the man we’re dealing with is the one that He sent, we need to press the pause button.

Keep your heart

Proverbs 4:23(NKJV) tells us to, “Keep your heart with all diligence, for out of it spring the issues of life.” Whether we know it or not, our hearts belong to God. In truth, all that we are belongs to Him. In Proverbs 4:23, He is teaching us to be good stewards of our hearts, because our hearts determine the issues of life. Our Heavenly Father is not going to throw out all the bad stuff in our hearts, He tells us to do this. He’s given us free-will to make our own choices and decisions, and the very best thing we can do for ourselves is to do some housekeeping when it comes to our own hearts.

We are the keepers of our own hearts. God warns us to steward them well. This means we must do our due diligence in making sure our hearts are filled with God’s love, because that is what’s most important to Him. A heart that pleases God is one where our love for Him is above our love for all others and everything else. He deserves this place of honor and much more because He is our Creator, and He gave His only begotten Son to rescue us from sin and darkness.

In 1Samuel 16:7(NLT), God said to His prophet, Samuel, “Don’t judge by his appearance or height, for I have rejected him. The LORD doesn’t see things the way you see them. People judge by outward appearance, but the LORD looks at the heart.” No human being can know what is in another’s heart, but God knows all our hearts. He knows who and what we value most because He can investigate our hearts and see this. He also knows that our actions will follow what we value. We get up every morning and go to work because we value the paycheck and believe it improves the quality of our lives. We read and study God’s Word because we value the knowledge it gives us. We pray to God because we value God’s love and power and believe in His willingness to help us. Everything we do in life reflects what we value in our hearts, and to please God and keep them according to His standard, we must make sure our hearts are filled with His love.

The treasure in your heart

Jesus Christ said in Matthew 6:20-21(NLT), “20 Store your treasures in heaven, where moths and rust cannot destroy, and thieves do not break in and steal. 21Wherever your treasure is, there the desires of your heart will also be.” This passage prompts us to examine what we are treasuring in our hearts. Some of us want to have a man so badly that we are willing to do just about anything to keep him. We assume this mindset because we have placed a high value on having a man. So, when God looks at our hearts, that’s what He sees. He sees that we are willing to disobey Him and obey the evil one who tempts us to sin through the man. Jesus Christ said in Matthew 6:19 that if our treasure is laid up in keeping the man through sin, the thief, who is the devil, will break that relationship and steal the joy of it away from us.

2Chronicles 16:9(NLT) says, “The eyes of the LORD search the whole earth in order to strengthen those whose hearts are fully committed to him.” God is looking for hearts that are fully committed to Him. We don’t have to be perfect, but our love for God must be untainted. Some might call you old fashioned for taking a Godly approach, but we should never allow the words of others to hinder us from standing on God’s Word.

The Lord knows our needs and desires. He knows us better than we could ever know ourselves, and He knows when and how to bless us. This includes the blessing of a man that He sends to walk with us through life. Understand that God is looking at your heart. Please be sure your love for Him is genuine, because it’s not enough to say that it is. Your love for Him will be put to the test, and you must have the patience and endurance to always choose to love God with all that you are, and you must love Him more than you love anyone else. When you do, your commitment to Him will be rewarded, and you will love the right man with the same commitment, loyalty, patience and grace that he has for you.■

Scripture quotations marked (NLT) are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Wheaton, Illinois 60189. All rights reserved.

Scripture taken from the New King James Version. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

“Let Your Love for God Be Genuine”, written for findchristianman.wordpress.com. Copyright©2025. All rights reserved. All done to the glory of God through Jesus Christ, our Lord.

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What Happened to the Blessing?

February 10, 2025

Spiritual Preparation for Marriage Lessons

Joel 2:25-26(NLT)
“25 The LORD says, “I will give you back what you lost to the swarming locusts, the hopping locusts, the stripping locusts, and the cutting locusts. It was I who sent this great destroying army against you. 26 Once again you will have all the food you want, and you will praise the LORD your God, who does these miracles for you. Never again will my people be disgraced.”

Whenever I read this verse, the first five words always stop me in my tracks. It reminds me that if God is giving us back what we’ve lost, we had to have lost it first. That’s not a good feeling. Then I read further, and God reassures us that He’s the One who does miracles for us, and He can make it so that we will never again be disgraced. That’s good news indeed! However, we can’t get to the second part if we overlook the first part of this verse. It’s the reality that God will restore what we’ve lost. Many of us are holding this promise in our hearts, as we should be, but as it relates to relationships, we may need to examine it more closely.

Some of us are looking for God to restore something we’ve never had. In this passage in the Book of Joel, God’s people had once enjoyed the bounty of His blessing, but they lost it. We, too, are enjoying God’s bounty, but not so much in the area of relationships with men. We’re praying for restoration, but for some of us, we’ve never experienced the kind of quality relationship with a man that God wants us to have. So, it was never taken from us; therefore, it isn’t something we can get back. This seems relatively obvious, but our thinking around it isn’t always in line with faith and believing. Some of us are asking God, “What happened to the blessing?” When the truth is the relationship that we’re wanting to get back wasn’t the blessing we thought it was. It did more harm than good.

We’ve seen others have wonderful relationships with their spouses, and even though we’ve been in relationships during our lives, we’ve never had a quality loving and lasting one for ourselves. We need to stop and think about that for a moment, because it really is time to leave the past behind.

Exodus 6:9(AMP) sheds a little light on the mindset of some people that have been traumatized by their past, and because of it they refuse to move forward. God told Moses to tell the people that He is the Great I Am, and that He would free them from oppression and rescue them from slavery, but they would not listen to God. This verse says, “Moses told this to the Israelites, but they did not listen to him because of their impatience and despondency, and because of their forced labor.” They were impatient, and instead of believing in the power and goodness of our Heavenly Father, they rebelled in their minds. They saw their oppression bigger than God, and this is an offense to Him.

The reality for many modern Christian women is that oppressive relationships with men is all they’ve ever known. We either chose the wrong man, or we didn’t know enough of God’s Word to walk in wisdom and maintain the relationship with faith, patience, and endurance. We didn’t know then, but we had certainly better make it a priority to know now. God is not in the business of restoring things that we have grown out of. He’s not going to pull old dead and worn out things from our past and bring them into the future. We shouldn’t want that for ourselves either.

God told His prophet, Habakkuk to write down the vision He had given Him. He said in Habakkuk 2:2(NKJV), “Write the vision and make it plain on tablets, that he may run who reads it.” God had given His prophet a vision, and it wasn’t just for the period they were living in during Old Testament times, it was for us as well. God told Habakkuk to write it down so that those of us living today could read it, gain faith from it, and run the race that God has set before us. You must have a vision of what God has in store for you. In other words, you can’t have the memories of your past dancing all over your thoughts and believing, keeping you stuck in the wilderness like the Israelites.

It’s not relationships with the men of your past that need to be restored. It’s your attitudes, thoughts, and beliefs about who you are in Christ and the blessings that God wants to give you; this is what needs to be upgraded. So often we allow the past to rule over us, but we’re different women today. Get it into your mind and heart that never again will God allow you to be disgraced. Pray that He will enlighten the eyes of your understanding about what is possible for you. Write the vision down and holdfast to it, because God is preparing you for a blessing that you will never lose.■

Scripture quotations marked (NLT) are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Wheaton, Illinois 60189. All rights reserved.

Scripture taken from the New King James Version. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

Amplified Bble (AMP), Copyright © 2015 by The Lockman Foundation, La Habra, CA 90631. All rights reserved.

“What Happened to the Blessing?”, written for findchristianman.wordpress.com. Copyright©2025. All rights reserved. All done to the glory of God through Jesus Christ, our Lord.

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Let Us Continue to Love

February 3, 2025

Your Relationship with God

1John 4:7-10(NLT)
“7 Dear friends, let us continue to love one another, for love comes from God. Anyone who loves is a child of God and knows God. 8 But anyone who does not love does not know God, for God is love. 9 God showed how much he loved us by sending his one and only Son into the world so that we might have eternal life through him. 10 This is real love—not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as a sacrifice to take away our sins.”

Real love comes from God, and we know we have it in our hearts when we love others not based on how we feel about them, but how God feels about them. Our Heavenly Father wants us to go into our significant relationships with the truth of His overwhelming love for everyone already firmly anchored in our hearts. God demonstrated His great love for us when He sent His only begotten Son, Jesus Christ, to offer himself as a sacrifice for our sins. If God made decisions based on how we feel about Him, Jesus Christ would never have come, because most people do not love Heavenly Father the way He deserves. Even when we are at our worse and do not love Him, He still loves us unconditionally. He expects His children to remember this with every breath we take, so that His perfect love works in us and helps us to truly love others.

Dishonor

1Corinthians 13:5(NLT) says that love “does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs.” Many of us have known about or witnessed in relationships where the couple doesn’t honor one another. They do not regard each other in the highest esteem. Instead, at times they speak to one another with belittling and profane terms and have a bad attitude towards the other person when things don’t go their way. You may have had a relationship like this yourself. It’s not fun. It a signal that the two people in the relationship do not value each other or themselves in a Godly way.

You matter, all day, every day. You matter not because you say so, but because God says so, and showed you this by giving Jesus Christ as a sacrifice for your sins. You matter to Him, and that is all that counts. In order for you to walk in faith, you must believe what God says about you. If you do, you will not invest in a relationship with someone that dishonors you by constantly putting you down rather than lifting you up. You shouldn’t want to be treated this way, and you most definitely should never treat anyone else that way. Love elevates, and that’s how you know it’s real.

Selfish Agenda

1Corinthians 13:5 tells us that love is not self-seeking. Real love does not have an agenda of selfishness. God’s purpose for marriage is that two people serve one another in a way that promotes loyalty, preserves unity, and stretches capacity. Marriage is going to stretch a person beyond the level of their perceived capability. If you miss this, you are in for a rollercoaster ride you won’t like. There are instances in a relationship where both individuals are giving equal levels of effort, time, and resources, but there are also times when there are varying levels of giving. There may be areas in the relationship where one partner is devoting 70 percent and the other 30 percent, and we need to be prepared for that.

The thing to know is that when God has put two individuals together, Jesus Christ is the head of their union, and it is their responsibility to keep him there. Even during times when it appears that one partner is not all in, prayer is the answer, not bitterness or resentment. Playing the blame game or being sour and in our feelings because we didn’t get from our partner what we expected isn’t the way love behaves. God is our sufficiency, so we shouldn’t make a habit of expecting another individual to complete us, because no human being can do that. Real love does not allow expectations or personal agendas to hinder the other person’s peace and contentment. You must stretch your faith in God that He will take care of you as you serve your spouse and always do what is in their best interest according to the Will of God.

Reciprocity

Reciprocity is a practice of mutual exchange for mutual benefit. This is the emotional and spiritual goal that most have as they consider marriage. It’s responding to one another in a rewarding way. We didn’t set the precedent for this, God did. Jesus Christ said in Luke 6:38(NIV), “Give, and you will receive. Your gift will return to you in full–pressed down, shaken together to make room for more, running over, and poured into your lap. The amount you give will determine the amount you get back.” When we pour into the person that God has sent for us, they will pour into us. This isn’t something that we need to push or shove along. God takes care of this and its where our faith must be.

The issue arises when we’re not with the person God has ordained for our lives. When this is the case, we might find ourselves giving and giving without receiving anything of significance in return. Real love always, always, always seeks God first, and real love allows HIM to direct our paths. This means that we don’t invest in men that God didn’t send because they are not yet equipped with the level of gratitude or the capacity to respond to us. Even if he’s a maybe, many of us will still make an ample investment and give too much of ourselves without a greenlight from Heavenly Father. We’ll see the rewards of our giving at some point down the road, but that man will not engage in reciprocity of our investment. He is the receiver of it but lacks what is needed to reciprocate.

Whatever the case may be, we can never allow what our partners do, and how they respond to us, to stop us from continuing to love with the heart of Jesus Christ. For those relationships that ended, we must handle things and walk away with God’s love in our hearts for that person. We must carry no trace of that relationship’s fallout into the next one. We must also understand that even in relationships with the man that God has sent, there will be disappointments and unfulfilled expectations. There will be dry spots, mountains to climb, and bumps along the way. In all these, we have got to trust the power of God’s love, because it is real love, and real love never fails or gives up. Be committed to let God’s love lead you every step of the way in your desire for marital partnership. Anchor yourself in His love, so that wherever He leads on the path of His blessings, you have the humility and wisdom to follow. ■

Scripture quotations marked (NLT) are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Wheaton, Illinois 60189. All rights reserved.

THE HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®, NIV® Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by Permission of Biblica, Inc.® All rights reserved worldwide.

“Let Us Continue to Love”, written for findchristianman.wordpress.com. Copyright©2025. All rights reserved. All done to the glory of God through Jesus Christ, our Lord.

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The Very Best for Our Lives

January 27, 2025

Your Relationship with God

1Kings 3:7-9 (NLT) “7 Now, O Lord my God, you have made me king instead of my father, David, but I am like a little child who doesn’t know his way around. 8 And here I am in the midst of your own chosen people, a nation so great and numerous they cannot be counted! 9 Give me an understanding heart so that I can govern your people well and know the difference between right and wrong. For who by himself is able to govern this great people of yours?”

When Solomon became the king of Israel, he understood the gravity and weight of his responsibility. He knew that the people of Israel would look to him for guidance and leadership as their king, so, what did he do? He turned to God and prayed for discernment and wisdom to govern that great nation. Heavenly Father gave us free-will to make choices on our own, this means that we have the independence to choose which direction our life will go in. Solomon made a wise decision to ask God, who is intelligent beyond intelligence, to lead him in the right direction. While dating and marriage are not the same as ruling a kingdom, they still require the same mindset that Solomon had, which is to lean on God for answers and direction so that we don’t make a terrible mistake.

In 1Kings 3:7-9, Solomon humbled himself before our Heavenly Father, and this is required of all of us. Proverbs 22:4(NLT) tells us, “True humility and fear of the LORD lead to riches, honor, and long life.” A humbled heart is the first business we must complete before we attempt any endeavor in life. Like Solomon, we must understand that God is the Leader, and we are the followers. No matter our age or level of maturity, we are still children who do not know their way around. God created us to be children that continually and always lean on their Father. 2Corinthians 3:5(NIV) schools us on this matter and tells us, “Not that we are competent in ourselves to claim anything for ourselves, but our competence comes from God.” Our Heavenly Father is our Source and sufficiency, and He is the supplier of all the blessings we possess and desire.

All of us want what is best for our lives, but on our own, we don’t know what that is. The only thing we know for sure is that God supplies our needs, and we should lean on Him, especially when it comes to the right person to walk with us through life. God has a plan for the entire universe, and it is extraordinary. Our lives fit into that plan, and God reminds us in Jeremiah 29:11 that He has a good plan for us as well, and His plan will give us hope and a pleasing future. We should know that the wrong person can interrupt God’s plan for us. The wrong person can steal our peace and contentment and cause us to stumble and lose momentum on this Christian journey. We can prevent this and we should.

This is one of the lessons that our past relationships teach us. We should have learned that the choice to do things on our own is not a workable strategy. It leads us down a troublesome path. Jesus Christ commands us in Matthew 6:33(NIV), “But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.” Blessings are added to us when we seek God first, and they are subtracted from us when we seek any other thing first, because when we seek people, relationships, and other things first, we open the door for the thief to rob us.

Another very important lesson that we learn from our past relationships with the wrong person is that settling for less doesn’t work. As women of God, we deserve a man that will love us according to the level that we are capable of loving him. Settling for less than this sends the wrong message about us and about our capacity. If we are still in the posture of settling even today and haven’t elevated our minds, hearts, and faith, we’re setting ourselves up for more heartache.

God commands us in Ephesians 4:23 to be renewed in the spirit of our minds. What does this mean? To be renewed in the spirit of our minds is to change the way we think. So, if we’re in the mindset of settling, that has to change. Our vision of what we can have and what our loving Heavenly Father wants to give us must be elevated. This means we need to study His Word and confess His promises so that what we say and confess is perfectly in sync with what He says. This is when we will see the power of God manifested in our lives.

Every step we take to renew our minds and elevate our faith will be rewarded. Many of us want to live our lives exactly the way we see fit. We’re stuck in our habit patterns and refuse to accept that we can’t keep doing the same things and expect different results. God will not reward our refusal to spiritually grow and to stretch our vision to what is possible for us. We’re limiting God’s love from flowing from our hearts when we refuse to see ourselves as God sees us. He sees the best in us, and He wants to bless us with the very best. So, don’t think that God is making you wait for marriage. When we commit to deepen our relationship with Him and be humble to release the habits that are keeping us from growing in Christ, things will change. We’ll realize that we needed to be more motivated in the power of God’s love so that our minds and hearts would equal the blessing He had in store for our lives.■

Scripture quotations marked (NLT) are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Wheaton, Illinois 60189. All rights reserved.

THE HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®, NIV® Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by Permission of Biblica, Inc.® All rights reserved worldwide.

“The Very Best for Our Lives”, written for findchristianman.wordpress.com. Copyright©2025. All rights reserved. All done to the glory of God through Jesus Christ, our Lord.

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Marriage Is Something Special

January 20, 2025

Spiritual Preparation for Marriage Lessons

James 4:3(NLT)
“And even when you ask, you don’t get it because your motives are all wrong – you want only what will give you pleasure.”

When Jesus came to the coasts of Caesarea Philippi in northern Israel, something dramatic happened. It was during the first six months of his third year of ministry and close to the end of his time on earth. The disciples had heard and listened to his teachings and witnessed the miracles he had performed. Matthew 16:13(NLT) tells us that Jesus Christ posed a question to the disciples. He asked, “Who do people say that the Son of Man is?” Some of them responded that many had said he was John the Baptist, Elijah, Jeremiah or one of the other prophets, but Simon Peter answered in Matthew 16:16(NLT), “You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.” This is known as “Peter’s Confession at Caesarea” and it is so profound because Peter received this revelation of Christ directly from the Holy Spirit. It was indeed the right answer, because Jesus Christ is always and forever the right answer, and we are required to know this in the deepest part of our hearts.

Peter was sometimes very impetuous and got ahead of himself by acting without considering consequences, but in the record of Matthew 16, he received an amazing revelation from heaven. The Holy Spirit downloaded a truth that cut through all the doubt, bypassed his thoughts and feelings, and came through with razor sharp precision. Lightbulbs went off in Peter, and Jesus Christ told him in Matthew 16:17(NLT), “You are blessed, Simon son of John, because my Father in heaven has revealed this to you. You did not learn this from any human being.” Peter was not a perfect man, but he received this revelation because his heart was in the right place. Many of us that are seeking and praying to God for marriage should take note.

There can be no doubt that marriage is something special. It is an integral part of God’s plan for the earth, and it is God’s provision for humanity. We know how special it is because marriage is a deep desire for many of us. Some born-again believers have been waiting for the blessing of marriage for quite some time. And because they’ve been waiting a while, some are secretly thinking that God doesn’t want them to get married, but this isn’t true.

They have been waiting on God, but in truth God has already ordained their marriage to the person He will send. He did this long before either of them was even born. So, God is waiting on us to wake up. Some of the very single people that are praying for marriage have never had a razor-sharp revelation of the reality of Jesus Christ. We’re praying for the husband to come into our lives, but we haven’t prayed as diligently as we should for the love of Jesus Christ to flood our hearts.

Jesus Christ told the disciples in Matthew 16:24-27(NLT), “24 “If any of you wants to be my follower, you must turn from your selfish ways, take up your cross, and follow me. 25 If you try to hang on to your life, you will lose it. But if you give up your life for my sake, you will save it. 26 And what do you benefit if you gain the whole world but lose your own soul? Is anything worth more than your soul? 27 For the Son of Man will come with his angels in the glory of his Father and will judge all people according to their deeds.”

We must have a heart that seeks God first, because it’s the only way to have the kind of relationship that honors the greatness of all that God is. Hebrews 11:6(NLT) tells us, “And it is impossible to please God without faith. Anyone who wants to come to him must believe that God exists and that he rewards those who sincerely seek him.” It’s not about having faith in marriage or having faith in the right husband. It’s about having faith in God. It’s knowing Him intimately and understanding that He is the Giver of good and perfect gifts. Jesus Christ said in Matthew 7:11(NLT), “If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask him!” God knows how and when to bless, and this is a truth on which we must anchor our believing in every way.

We cannot think that our believing to receive a certain blessing will outpace or out-perform our faith in God’s unconditional and unlimited love. That will not work. So, if we are believing God for a husband, but we’re not truly connecting with God’s love through our faith, we’re always going to be running behind. For many of us, this is the issue that continues to block us. God is not number one in our hearts, and our actions reveal that. Although we have a tremendous amount of love and enthusiasm for the husband we’ve never met, we don’t feel that way about the love Jesus Christ gives us. Why is that? Well one of the reasons is because we’re not actively and fervently praying for a revelation of the love of Christ.

Yes, marriage is something special, but nothing is more special than doing what Jesus Christ commands in Matthew 6:33, which is to seek God and His righteousness first in all that we do. Single women worry that they won’t ever get married, that God won’t bless them with someone to walk with through life. This worry is doubt. It means that we lack confidence in God’s love, and we need to change that. Like the Apostle Peter, we need a revelation of the love of Christ that blankets our entire being. We need to know from the depth of our hearts how special we are to Heavenly Father. Jesus shows us this in Matthew 6:26 (NLT) when He said, “Look at the birds. They don’t plant or harvest or store food in barns, for your Heavenly Father feeds them. And aren’t you far more valuable to him than they are?” We know from this verse that the answer to this question is clear to Jesus Christ. Pray that it will be clear to you as well.■

Scripture quotations marked (NLT) are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Wheaton, Illinois 60189. All rights reserved.

“Marriage Is Something Special”, written for findchristianman.wordpress.com. Copyright©2025. All rights reserved. All done to the glory of God through Jesus Christ, our Lord.

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Loving Wisely

January 13, 2025

Relationship advice

John 15:9(NLT)
“As the Father loved Me, I also have loved you; abide in My love.”

In Colossians 3:14(ESV), our Heavenly Father tells us, “And above all these put on love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony.” This is an amazingly important verse, especially when it comes to significant relationships. Through the Apostle Paul, God informs us that His love is the glue that binds everything, including our relationships, together. Only His love can do that. God also tells us in Colossians 3:12-13 to put on compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience, and to forgive each other as He has forgiven us. These are all important, but He tells us that what is most important is that we put His love in our hearts. God’s love is forgiving, kind, patient, righteous, and enduring. He means for us to put that kind of love in our hearts because that’s His kind of love, and it’s a powerful force of victory for all who put Him first and follow the example of Christ.

As women who walk in God’s wisdom, we must know that feelings of love can be quite different from the actions of God’s love. Not making this distinction can be extremely costly. God’s love is real and true. It’s unconditional and limitless, and He demonstrates through His actions and Word that real and true love is a commitment. It isn’t based on feelings, because feelings come and go. We fall out of love as easily and quickly as we fall in love. Sadly, many romantic significant relationships begin without considering this. We go into them using feelings of attraction and affection as the springboard. Without hearing from God at all, many of us proceed to treat these relationships like marriages.

Feelings of love are wonderful, and God created us with the capacity to express them, but He never intended feelings of love to cause us to sin or place our commitment to another human being above our commitment to Him. 1John 4:16(ESV) tells us, “So we have come to know and to believe the love that God has for us. God is love, and whoever abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him.” The love that is written about in this verse isn’t referring to romantic love. It’s pointing to God’s love, which is the kind of love that lasts.

When we accepted Jesus Christ as our personal Lord and Savior, we transferred lordship from ourselves over to him. Before we did that and accepted the salvation that he offers, many of us had heartbreak and pain in our lives. Our marriages and significant relationships fell apart, and some of us were left abandoned and emotionally exhausted. We were left with pain and heartbreak because either we, the man we loved, or the both of us, had not learned to love through Jesus Christ. The love of Christ never fails, but the love of a person who doesn’t love Christ will fail us repeatedly.

God calls on us to abide in Him, and whoever abides in real and true love abides in God. His Spirit, the Holy Spirit, is in us, and our bodies are the Spirit’s temple. Heavenly Father commands us to let our lives be governed by His Spirit so that we walk in His love continually. Jesus Christ said in John 16:13(NLT), “When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all truth. He will not speak on his own but will tell you what he has heard. He will tell you about the future.” The Holy Spirit that dwells within us guides us into God’s truth. The Spirit would never guide us into situations that cause us pain or cause us to sin. Pain and sin are not the truth, they are lies and tricks of the devil.

We have allowed society to convince us that in order to keep a man, we must let him enjoy all the benefits of marriage without the commitment. This will always lead to disappointment. Boyfriends are not husbands, and we can be with them a long time before this realization hits home. It isn’t love when we loan our bodies and hearts out to men that have no intention of committing to us in marriage. We allow them way too many privileges. They make themselves at home in our lives, but they don’t make us at home in theirs.

The Holy Spirit will guide us into the truth, including the truth of God’s provision. If we’re not patiently enduring and trusting God to reveal the right man to us, but instead we’re jumping all in without His greenlight, we’re setting ourselves up for problems. We need to pause and examine our actions and attitudes about God’s holiness and about how we’re viewing the purpose of significant relationships. Many of us are praying to God to send us the right man, but we are still very willing to treat the next man with the same open-door policy we’ve had with men in our past.

God wants to see us blessed, that’s why He sent His one and only begotten Son, Jesus Christ, to sacrifice his life for our sins. Through Christ, God has given us a new nature, so we can’t expect Him to overlook it when we choose to hold on to a consciousness of sin. Our Heavenly Father is not punishing us. It’s the mindset of accommodating sin that continues to block our blessing. We must open our eyes and walk in God’s wisdom, especially when it comes to significant relationships. Jesus Christ said in John 14:15(NLT), “If you love me, obey my commandments.” Understand that your commitment to love wisely is a commitment to love like Christ. To love like Christ is to be obedient to God’s Word. This is what leads us to marriage. If you doubt it, simply ask the Lord to guide you to the truth, and then be willing to accept and follow it.■

English Standard Version (ESV)
The Holy Bible, English Standard Version. ESV® Text Edition: 2016. Copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers.

Scripture quotations marked (NLT) are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Wheaton, Illinois 60189. All rights reserved.

“Love Wisely”, written for findchristianman.wordpress.com. Copyright©2025. All rights reserved. All done to the glory of God through Jesus Christ, our Lord.

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Let Your Love for God Be Genuine

January 6, 2025

Devotions

After reminiscing one day about a past relationship with one of my sisters in Christ, she phoned me with a question. “Kim, you said something the other day that I don’t quite understand. You said that I should never give a man that I’m dating husband privileges.” She told me that this was the way she had always approached relationships, and it is what she’s seen from other women as well. We’re living in a completely different day and time. Choosing the wrong man can literally destroy your life because the wrong man is sent to put a wedge between you and our relationship with Heavenly Father. So, I conveyed to her the wisdom of Ephesians 5:25(NKJV), “Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself for her.” Only a man sent by God can love a woman that way, so if God hasn’t given us the greenlight that the man we’re dealing with is the one that He sent, we need to press the pause button.

Keep your heart

Proverbs 4:23(NKJV) tells us to, “Keep your heart with all diligence, for out of it spring the issues of life.” Whether we know it or not, our hearts belong to God. In truth, all that we are belongs to Him. In Proverbs 4:23, He is teaching us to be good stewards of our hearts, because our hearts determine the issues of life. Our Heavenly Father is not going to throw out all the bad stuff in our hearts, He tells us to do this. He’s given us free-will to make our own choices and decisions, and the very best thing we can do for ourselves is to do some housekeeping when it comes to our own hearts.

We are the keepers of our own hearts. God warns us to steward them well. This means we must do our due diligence in making sure our hearts are filled with God’s love, because that is what’s most important to Him. A heart that pleases God is one where our love for Him is above our love for all others and everything else. He deserves this place of honor and much more because He is our Creator, and He gave His only begotten Son to rescue us from sin and darkness.

In 1Samuel 16:7(NLT), God said to His prophet, Samuel, “Don’t judge by his appearance or height, for I have rejected him. The LORD doesn’t see things the way you see them. People judge by outward appearance, but the LORD looks at the heart.” No human being can know what is in another’s heart, but God knows all our hearts. He knows who and what we value most because He can investigate our hearts and see this. He also knows that our actions will follow what we value. We get up every morning and go to work because we value the paycheck and believe it improves the quality of our lives. We read and study God’s Word because we value the knowledge it gives us. We pray to God because we value God’s love and power and believe in His willingness to help us. Everything we do in life reflects what we value in our hearts, and to please God and keep them according to His standard, we must make sure our hearts are filled with His love.

The treasure in your heart

Jesus Christ said in Matthew 6:20-21(NLT), “20 Store your treasures in heaven, where moths and rust cannot destroy, and thieves do not break in and steal. 21Wherever your treasure is, there the desires of your heart will also be.” This passage prompts us to examine what we are treasuring in our hearts. Some of us want to have a man so badly that we are willing to do just about anything to keep him. We assume this mindset because we have placed a high value on having a man. So, when God looks at our hearts, that’s what He sees. He sees that we are willing to disobey Him and obey the evil one who tempts us to sin through the man. Jesus Christ said in Matthew 6:19 that if our treasure is laid up in keeping the man through sin, the thief, who is the devil, will break that relationship and steal the joy of it away from us.

2Chronicles 16:9(NLT) says, “The eyes of the LORD search the whole earth in order to strengthen those whose hearts are fully committed to him.” God is looking for hearts that are fully committed to Him. We don’t have to be perfect, but our love for God must be untainted. Some might call you old fashioned for taking a Godly approach, but we should never allow the words of others to hinder us from standing on God’s Word.

The Lord knows our needs and desires. He knows us better than we could ever know ourselves, and He knows when and how to bless us. This includes the blessing of a man that He sends to walk with us through life. Understand that God is looking at your heart. Please be sure your love for Him is genuine, because it’s not enough to say that it is. Your love for Him will be put to the test, and you must have the patience and endurance to always choose to love God with all that you are, and you must love Him more than you love anyone else. When you do, your commitment to Him will be rewarded, and you will love the right man with the same commitment, loyalty, patience and grace that he has for you.■

Scripture quotations marked (NLT) are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Wheaton, Illinois 60189. All rights reserved.

“Let Your Love for God Be Genuine”, written for findchristianman.wordpress.com. Copyright©2025. All rights reserved. All done to the glory of God through Jesus Christ, our Lord.

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Lord, Just Send Me the Man

December 30, 2024

Spiritual Preparation for Marriage Lessons, Your Relationship with God

Our Lord was journeying through Samaria when he came upon the woman at the well. Like many other women living during that time, she was there to draw water for her family. Jesus asked her for a drink of water, and she was dumbfounded that he did this. Samaritans notoriously hated Jewish people, and the feeling was quite mutual. The Jews thought that Samaritans were ceremonially unclean, and they wouldn’t be caught speaking to one of them. This is why she was surprised that Jesus, a Jew, would speak to her. Before meeting him at the well, she hadn’t realized that God had a purpose for her life, and that over two thousand years later, people would still be reading about how Jesus Christ transformed her.

Initially, the woman at the well didn’t recognize the Messiah. She didn’t understand that he could give her life ever more. This is an issue with many Christian women today. Our lives do not reflect that we truly recognize exactly who our Lord and Savior is. Some believers have been hearing about the Messiah for years, and even claim to know him, but when God looks at them, their hearts do not reflect that they are excited about Christ at all. Jesus Christ is our glorious King! God has placed him at His right hand and given him everlasting glory. Every knee will one day bow at his name. The woman at the well didn’t know who he was, but those of us living in these modern times have no excuse.

In John 4:10-14(NLT), Jesus said to the woman at the well, “10 If you only knew the gift God has for you and who you are speaking to, you would ask me, and I would give you living water.” 11 “But sir, you don’t have a rope or a bucket,” she said, “and this well is very deep. Where would you get this living water? 12 And besides, do you think you’re greater than our ancestor Jacob, who gave us this well? How can you offer better water than he and his sons and his animals enjoyed?” 13 Jesus replied, “Anyone who drinks this water will soon become thirsty again.14 But those who drink the water I give will never be thirsty again. It becomes a fresh, bubbling spring within them, giving them eternal life.”

The offer of living water that our Savior made was one she had never heard before. No one alive during those times had a mind to fathom giving such a gift and receiving it would be equally fantastical. It was so out-of-the-box that at first, she couldn’t conceive of it. Immediately she supposed that such water was deeper than the water she had fetched every day, and surely no one ill-prepared and without proper tools of rope and bucket could reach it.

When Jesus told her in John 4:26, “I am the Messiah,” everything for her changed. Millions since then have heard this same story. Knowing Christ, making him Lord over our lives, letting his love into our hearts, and believing in God’s resurrection power has transferred us from death to life evermore. The Spirit of Christ is living in us because of the accomplished work of Christ, and because of our Redeemer, we can live a life that is more than abundant. How is it that we can be more excited about the prospect of meeting a man than we are about the reality of Jesus Christ and the salvation he’s offered us?

If we’re honest with ourselves, some of us would have to admit that we’re willing to do way more to get the man and maintain that relationship than we are to maintain our relationship with God through Jesus Christ. The attitude behind this is, “Lord, just send me the man.” Colossians 2:10(NLT) tells us, “So you also are complete through your union with Christ, who is the head over every ruler and authority.” Through Jesus Christ we are complete, lacking nothing! Still, so many of us have convinced ourselves that there is a void in our lives. We should note that the Samaritan woman had in her past five husbands, and yet, when she met Jesus, she was broken, wounded, and sad. We can have a man so fine, so charming, so honorable and sweet, but if the love of Christ is not firmly anchored in our hearts, we will not have a strong foundation, and therefore, our relationships won’t have a strong foundation either.

The Samaritan woman said to Jesus in John 4:15(NLT), “Please, sir, give me this water! Then I’ll never be thirsty again, and I won’t have to come here to get water.” This was a simple truth and she understood it. She understood that living water would cancel thirst. As a single woman, you must examine whether you believe this in your own heart. The living water that Jesus Christ gives to all who desire him will cancel thirst forever more. This should be every single woman’s testimony, today and every day. If you have not allowed Jesus Christ to fill your cup, and you feel there’s a void in your life, that void is not the absence of a husband. You have not allowed your whole heart to be overflowing with the love of Jesus Christ. This is something you can and should change.

Because we are in Christ, we don’t have to continue going back to the well for water. Through him, we are filled to overflowing. This is our reality as God’s daughters, but if our hearts and minds are not lining up with the fullness we have received in Christ, we need to get into God’s Word. Ephesians 3:17 tells us that we must do the things that make Christ at home in our hearts and build our trust in him. When we do this, our roots will grow down into God’s love and keep us strong. We must make this a priority so that our faith in God is where it needs to be, and our desire for marriage doesn’t outweigh our commitment to God through Jesus Christ.■

Scripture quotations marked (NLT) are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Wheaton, Illinois 60189. All rights reserved.

“Lord, Just Send Me the Man”, written for findchristianman.wordpress.com. Copyright©2024. All rights reserved. All done to the glory of God through Jesus Christ, our Lord.

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