Not the Single Issue

Ok, so I've been thinking about whether to write about this subject for a least a week now. And I'm pretty sure I wrote this post mentally on Sunday as I gazed wistfully out of a train window at Salzburg's craggy grey mountains and fertile green plains... a beautiful blue sky, impressive cloud formations and the odd scrap mental heap. The subject of my deliberations being, for want of a better word, single-ness.

It is one of those things that has ostensibly nothing to with my decision to apply for my role at TWR, do support raising or anything else. Yet (if I were writing in German there'd be a 'doch' here) it  has more to do with  my thoughts and attitudes as I start this journey than I'd like to admit. Firstly, if you thought that only non-Christians (or even just other Christians) had strange or sometimes absurd ideas about what it means to work with a missions organisation then it would useful to quote the following missionary appointee who shall remain anonymous: "If I apply for this position, in which I guess I'm technically becoming a missionary, no-one's ever gonna ask me out on a date again, right?"

This is not the only area where I have some stubbornly-held yet rather erroneous beliefs, which God is working on but it's one of the more obvious ones. I've realised that I believe in an all-powerful, all-present God who created this universe, and yet I'm not quite convinced he's able to put the right partner there for me at some point on the journey. Writing that sentence helps me realise how ridiculous that notion is. And yet it has some serious sticking power. 

God's also continuing to work away at some convictions, which ruled past relationships of mine. It took me a long while to realise that a true sense of self-worth can come from no human relationship, romantic or otherwise. Only God can give me that security of being fully accepted. I still need to be reminded of that, whether I am tempted to try and shift that foundation to one based on a relationship, success in my work or anything else. These things, and a desire to attain such things in life, aren't bad, they just make a lousy foundation for my self-esteem, which I've learnt by falling through the cracks a few times. I will certainly do this a few more times in this life, which is why it is also good to have a gracious God. 

OK, so I'm now pretty sure this is not the post I was writing on Sunday. And it doesn't actually have that much to do with being single or otherwise. Maybe I'll have to write that one another time. I hope therefore, it is an encouraging one, regardless of which box you fall into.