In today's society, we are inundated with phrases, that we don't often think about. This ends up coming to our demise because those phrases if heard often enough begin to shape how we think, and later how we act.
Phrases like follow your heart, which is in every disney film or I'm waiting for the one. Phrases like these begin to shape our ideas about romance and love. We begin to think if we follow our heart, we will get a happy ending. Lol, I've followed my heart and told a guy I liked him, and it turned out badly. We begin to think there is only one person out there for us. This fills us with anxiety of what if we miss our chance, then we will never be with the one. Yet, what about women whose husbands die and then remarry. Do they have a two? Are you saying there second is less than their first or maybe even their first is less than their second…which you would understand if you've seen Letters to Juliet.
Although I could give full arguments to both of these phrases, the one I feel like is important to talk about is: I'm looking for my other half. Before you think I am a cynic, you can ask any of my friends and they will tell you that I'm probably the most hopeful romantic they know. Yet, I refuse to believe in this phrase because the consequences of this phrase are staggering.
When you say you're looking for your other half, you're implying that you are not yet a complete person, and that when you get married you two together will be a complete person.
There are two consequences of this thought. First, what about the people that never get married? If Paul says it's better that we don't get married if we can resist the temptations, then why would God praise singleness if it made you half of a person? Also, does that mean if I'm single than I'm half a person, oh my gosh, I better find my other half quick because I don't want to be half of a person. I want to be a complete person. These desires could overtake me and leave me discontent with the single life, when God so praises it. Also, Jesus never got married, was he half a person? alright enough said.
The second consequence is that you end up expecting too much of your future spouse. I don't know about you but I hate being underestimated, but sometimes what's even worse is being overestimated. For if you underestimated you could prove them wrong, but when your overestimated if you prove them wrong you show them your not as good as they think you are. Well, if you are expecting a man and women to complete you, those are high expectations that no human could ever meet. They are going to mess up and they may have that one annoying trait that gets on your nerves. Yet, if you really expected them to be your other half, you're either going to get a divorce when your not satisfied with how they complete you, or your going to drive your spouse crazy as they try to live up to your expectations.
The truth is: God is the only one that can complete you. In James, it says that when you go through trials, you learn from it and that makes you mature and complete not lacking anything. We all long to be complete. That's why hollywood has made big bucks on that phrase. Yet, God is the only one that can live up to our high expectations to complete us. He is our other half.
So, therefore I'm a single person, but I'm a whole person. You see how degrading this phrase is? I'm not a half nor do I want to marry a half a person. I want to marry a whole person, not just a half.
I want to marry someone that finds their completion in christ.
Humans are messed up. Two messed up halves don't make a whole. I know math majors just give me a second.
In this case, two wholes can make you holy. Two people who find their completion in Christ can shine a light to the world as they long to look more like Christ and love each other like Christ loves the church.
Two halves can't really make a whole, but two wholes can make you holy.
