by stacey venema
Last week I shared what singles are hearing when their community tells them that “marriage is hard.” I explained that singles are hearing that “marriage is scary,” “marriage and kids are too much work,” and “you need to be content in your singleness, you don’t know how good you have it.” Many of us have good intentions when trying to encourage those that are single but it can be really easy to hurt someone instead of building them up. As a community we want to help build each other up, whether married or unmarried. I have some amazing friends who are married that do a great job at caring for me and it makes me feel so loved. The best way for us to know how to care for each other is to listen to each other’s heart and to take steps from there. So, from my heart, I am writing 3 ways that we can all encourage single people.
1. Listen to their pain without judgment.
There are days where I deeply desire a spouse and children and on those days I just need someone to listen. I need someone to validate the way I feel and recognize that, whether or not “I should” feel that way, I do feel that way. In those moments I need the encouragement that God sees me and He knows my pain. I will admit that there have been times when I have shared my pain with my community and the conversation that followed made me feel worse. But don’t we all do this quite often? In many situations instead of listening and validating someone’s pain we feel the need to fix it immediately and pull out whatever band aid we think will help. That band aid might be a story about ourselves, a piece of advice that worked for us, saying we will pray for them or even minimizing the other person’s pain because we don’t understand it. We want to somehow fix it quickly because if we don’t we will be forced to sit in our community’s pain and we might feel their pain. Feeling other’s pain is not what we always want to do but it’s what we need to do. Whether married or single we need to enter into our community’s pain, listen to them and then sit in it with them. By doing this we are able to validate our community and walk through the difficult pieces with them. Having someone with you and encouraging you will give you more strength than walking alone.
2. Pray for them.
Once we have listened to each other’s pain it is good to not just stay in the pain but rather move to prayer. Pain needs to be experienced and truly dealt with. Pain that is glossed over will surface at another time. However, dwelling on pain is not healthy either. Prayer is taking action after the pain and refusing to allow those in our communities to remain victims. We need to remind them that there is hope and they are a child of God. We can do this through prayer. We need to be intentional with prayer because if we just say “I’ll pray for you” and we don’t actually do it we are just using prayer as a band aid. Let’s take the time to actually pray for each other in person. Prayer can bring a community together. I know that prayer is always the go-to-solution but that is because it is the most powerful solution. God moves and our hearts change when we pray. When we take the time to pray over each other in person we validate each other and we are able to invite the Holy Spirit into that moment to do the healing. We also are seeking God for answers that we don’t have in our community. Our situations may not change but God can show us the plans He has for where we are at and pour out His peace over us. Let’s allow our communities to vulnerably share with us and then pray together.
3. Tell me something good.
Once we have listened to each other’s pain and prayed for each other we need to turn our focus in a positive direction. We need to share with each other the good things that are happening in our lives. I want to clarify here because I am not talking about bragging. I’m not talking about sharing a million photos on social media about how wonderful life is. I am talking about sharing our real lives. It is encouraging to me when I hear about the things that God is doing in my community’s lives and my attitude changes when I share with my community about the good things God is doing in my life. Speaking of what God has done is a form of thankfulness. Studies have shown that practicing thankfulness can improve physical health, mental health, immune systems, strengthen relationships and even improve sleep. Aside from the health benefits, God has also commanded us to be thankful in all circumstances. When we are thankful for what we have been given it makes it easier for us to encourage others. There are single people in our communities that need encouragement. Many single people in our communities will eventually get married. While they are still unmarried it is an opportune time to share with them ways to do marriage well. If you are already married please share your advice on what you have learned about marriage. Compliment the single people in your community on their strengths. Since they do not have a significant other they may not have someone caring for them in that way.
We will still have difficulties in life whether single or married. But one thing that we can do is to change our outlook on marriage and that could change the outcome of many marriages. If we all believed that the Lord was going to be there, giving us strength, no matter what difficulties we face in life then our mindset towards marriage could change. We would see society change as divorces decreased and communities strengthened. It’s not only single people that need to be reminded that marriage is a good gift. Our entire world needs that reminder. Next time you talk to someone who is struggling with singleness, please listen to their pain, pray for them and then tell them something good about marriage. These simple things could change the world.
Remember to check out Stacey’s blog at https://staceyannvenema.wordpress.com/
the rambling missionary 