How do you get yourself a good woman, or a good man? Today’s questions are very practical and important. If you’re single and you desire to be married, the person that you do marry has got to be one of the most important decisions of your life.
Marriage is not something that you’ll want to enter into without a lot of forethought and some counsel when so many marriages wind up in divorce. Think about it. All those people start off with the best intentions, believing that they were going to enjoy the rest of their lives together. But they were blindsided by something they didn’t anticipate. Those who are single and who would like to get married need to proceed with caution.
The Best Way to Attract the Right Person
Now, how do you find yourself a good person, a good woman or a good man, who would make a great lifelong partner? Well, that’s a great question. And I think that I’d like to first say that rather than looking for the right person, I would suggest being the right person. Because if you want to attract somebody who’s a great potential spouse, the best bait that you could put out there to attract that kind of person is being a great person yourself.
You should ask yourself, how are you doing in your other relationships? We all have relationships. If you don’t have any relationships with other people on any level and you’re like a hermit, well, maybe you should postpone thinking about getting married if you’re not getting along too well with other people.
All the relationships that you have prior to marriage could be considered as training ground for the ultimate relationship of having a husband or having a wife or being a husband or being wife.
You’re not getting along with your college roommate, and you’re at each other’s throats? Well, see what you can learn and see what you can do to fix and repair and make that relationship work.
Preparing for the Challenge of Marriage
I can assure you, as a person who’s been married for 38 years, as a former pastor who’s counseled all kinds of people who are having trouble in their marriage, that every marriage is challenged. Because when you put two people together and one’s a male and one’s a female, oh my goodness, there are going to be some times of stretching, some times of potential conflict, and some times of potential growth as people.
In fact, I just feel like marriage is almost one of those divine conspiracies by the Lord to help us to grow spiritually. Anytime someone says “I do” in holy matrimony, it’s almost like God is up in heaven rubbing His hands together saying, “Now, it’s going to get good! Because I’m going to bring out Christ in these people because they’re going to have to deny themselves. They’re going to have to grow up spiritually. Then I’m going to give them kids, and that’s going to really add to the mix, and we’ll work on their patience and everything else. They’ll learn all kinds of things about each other, and they’ll learn things about Me.”
Marriage is just a wonderful lifetime experience that has a lot of blessings, but it doesn’t mean that the road doesn’t get bumpy at times.
Developing Your Character
To find the right person, start by working on being the right person and making yourself attractive in every way that you can. Of course, most importantly would be your character that you have.
I’m speaking to Christians now who want to find a godly spouse. You need to be what you hope your spouse will be and work on your own relationship with the Lord and your own character so that you’ll attract someone of similar godliness and character.
Then once you feel like you’re mature enough and ready enough because of your success in other relationships.
Seeking and Finding
Scripture says, “He who finds a wife finds a good thing and obtains favor from the Lord” (Proverbs 18:22). And Jesus said, “Seek, and you shall find” (Matthew 7:7).
I would encourage you to, yes, pray, to ask the Lord, but also to put some legs on those prayers, as I heard an old Pentecostal preacher say once.
Seek, and you shall find. He that finds a wife finds a good thing. That implies that you have to get out there and look.
You’ve got to put your periscope up and utilize the means to go and be where the fish are biting. Pardon my expression, but you’re not going to find a good wife in a dark and dirty place! You need to look in the right places, and you need to go where there is more likelihood that there’s going to be good women and good men. Naturally, good women and good men aren’t found in bad places, so look in good places.
Taking Advantage of Modern Technology
One of the wonderful things about modern technology are these matchmaking sites where you can put in all these things about yourself and what you’re looking for, and they try to match you up with people of some degree of compatibility. It gives you a low-risk way to weed through a lot of people that otherwise aren’t worth your time to find those gems.
I have seen lots of people who have used that technology, those websites. It costs a little bit of money, but it pays off. For example, I know some people who, in their questionnaire, when they’re filling out the web forms, they’re asked a question. “What’s the one thing that you cannot possibly live without?” Those folks put in there, “I don’t want you to match me with anybody who doesn’t put Jesus in that line right there.”
Well, that just weeds out all kinds of people right off the bat. “I’m looking for a solid follower of Jesus Christ,” and you can weed them out a lot quicker that way than by going to church and dating people and finally getting around to asking them those important questions.
Closing Advice
Then once you think you found that special person, get counsel and read some of those books that are out there on things to talk about before you get married. It’s a lot easier to break up before you get married than after you get married. In fact, you just don’t want that to happen at all, because it’s harmful and hurtful on a lot of levels, and it’s sin.
This is a Little Lesson. Hope I helped you. Thanks so much! God bless.
