Relationship status: Single and Dam Proud

Hey....

It was gonna be sooner rather than later when I dedicated an entire blog to relationships. I am going to be honest I do feel very Sex and the City right now.

Firstly, I believe a disclaimer is due because I am no real advocate of relationships. I am not in one nor am I close to being in one. However, I don't believe that gives me a disadvantage when talking about them; if anything I may be more objective.

When looking at both Christian and secular relationships there are moments of great comparasion but also one of great distance. I think so often Christian dismiss non-Christian's relationships not to be as "special" as Christian ones. That Christians have a better understanding on how to "do" relationships. The obvious missing element is God. No points for discovering that. However, one thing I admire in non-Christian relationships is the non-pressure attitude. With the majority of non-Christian relationships it very much like 'I like you and you like me' then there is a casual seeing each other stage and finally the stage just seeing where it is going. The final stage is my favourite because there is no pressure.

Before you continue to read. I understand there is no point being in a relationship unless you see a future and of course I am not suggesting you ditch the Christian values in your relationship. I am merely disputing the pressure.

I went to Luton to see a friend's film a few weeks ago, because I was seeing the late showing I had some time to kill so I decided to eat in Nando's. I don't particularly like Nando's at the best of the times and the scene which I am about to explain has confirmed by hatred towards the chicken restaurant. I was of course on my own and had a few disagreements in my head about eating there by myself but my stomach beat my head so I went in. Once in there the waiterman said how many? With a cheeky grin I said 'just me' he replied 'Just you? Are you sure?' I nervously laughed but then thought 'oh no I was joking I was waiting for my boyfriend of five years to come in a pay for my chicken then we can both skipped together hand in hand towards to sunset'. Obviously, I didn't say this to the man as he walked me to my seat. Ah ha! The seat I was shunned right in the corner of the restaurant completley out of "normal" people's view. As I was seating myself he then attempted to comfort me by saying 'its ok I am on my break in five if you want some company'. I didn't know whether to laugh hysterically or weep and ensured him it was fine and I was perfectly happy on my own. Being single in Nando's is like having leprosy. You are shunned to the corner and when you go to refill your single pepsi you get a sad/odd look from the smug couple who are out because they simple couldn't be bothered to cook.

Nando's was my Christians world in terms of anti-singleness pressure. If you're single and fancy chicken cook it at home! I beg you! For the love of everything good don't do Nando's on your own. Sadly, when I worked at Pizza Hut I was one of them people feeling sorry for the supposed lonely singletons, who had come in for a quick meat feast and a sneaky bottle of wine. Why is being single a bad thing?! Once we head towards our early twenties why is this sudden pressure that we are in search of our husbands/wives?
If I told my non-Christians friends that I they are to search for their husbands/wives they simple answer would be "Woah! Chill out! I am only 20". Why as Christians do we have this attitude. I mean my friend refers (in jest!) to Soul Survivor as wife provider. It just pokes at the fun that we head to any Christian event with the attitude that we are going to find our husbands. I am gonna hold up my hands and say that I have had this attitude. I do believe it is wrong to think this.

Paul chats so openly in 1 Corinthians 7 about the joys of being married but also the joys of being single. Paul was single. Paul didn't answer to anyone except God.
1 Corinthians 7 32 "I would like you to be free from concern. An unmarried man is concerned about the Lord's affairs—how he can please the Lord"
When we are single the only people that we are to please is God. The only person we are responsible for is ourselves so let us use that and remember that our sole purpose is to serve God. When we are in a relationship/marriage whatever then we serve God together but for now we are 'free from concern'. We don't have commitments to others all we have is our commitment to ourselves and God. Let us honour them. So next time I feel this pressure that it is wrong to be single and I shouldn't hate myself that I have yet to discover the perfect man; I should however rejoice that God is going to use me when I am single.
We need to remember this
1 Corinthians 17 " each one should retain the place in life that the Lord assigned to him and to which God has called him"
Let us retain our positions as singletons and so next time we walk into Nandos and the waiter says 'just you? Are you sure?' we can turn and say 'Yes I am sure' with great confidence and pride.

Til next time. x

My new adventure...

Hey!

Hope you're all ok! I have been working the last couple of weeks so been pretty busy so apologise its been a while!!!

My new adventure is that I am writing a book so basically I am gonna post a bit of it on here just to see what you guys think...The snippet is the beginning of one the chapters. Its a long working progress. Hope you enjoy it and any opinions would be good!

Much Love!!

Hollin

God is calling are you listening?

The phone has been ringing none stop all day and Sarah simply just did not want to answer it. She was sick of people asking what happened to her dream job. For the last three years she had worked for the right qualifications, spent countless hours revising and turned down many opportunities to have fun times with her friends. Finally in the autumn this all paid off as she landed her dream job, she didn’t expect it and was thankful for her blessing. Sadly three months into her job the company went through difficult financial times and had to make Sarah redundant. She was left broken, believing she was a failure and confused about what to do next. After falling asleep one evening she dreamt of a thousand phones ringing and she was unable to answer any of them. She caught the glimpse of a golden phone tucked away in the corner and could not stop staring as she never seen something so striking. She felt drawn to it as she slowly walked towards it the distinctive ringing she came to understand was her name being called. For the first time in ages it had not being about her failure but she felt needed and personally called. She picked up the phone and answered “Here I am”. She woke up changed.

God is calling all of us and like Moses we need to be ready and willing to listen. We sometimes face our failures and we feel that there is no purpose to carry on, Sarah definitely felt like this. Yet like Sarah God is calling us personally and it can become almost impossible not to respond. At the time of Moses the Israelites were under great oppression by the Egyptians so they knew very well what difficult times were like. God called Moses and his response was ‘Here I am’ if God calls us are we giving this response? Are we willing to listen?

Do any of these phrases sound remotely familiar to you?

“I’ve been trying to get through to you all day”

“Your phone is rubbish! Its always off!”

“Are you even listening?”

This is the story of my life?! I am so bad at listening, I know it is a terrible thing to say but if I am not interested then I will not listen. Even if I am listening it is unlikely that my brain has stored it! I was accused, quite fairly, that I had selective hearing. If I am not interested then I am unlikely to listen then switch off to relive an episode of Friends in my head. There are countless times on the phone to friends where they would be chatting away then ask my opinion and I would either have to think quickly or shamefully admit that I wasn’t listening. When I did confess to not listening the consequences were pretty dire and awkward. Thankfully it didn’t ruin any friendships but one friend did have to sit me down and explain how frustrating they found it. Just for the record, although I have not perfected the art of listening I like to believe I have improved!

However, one thing I do pride myself on is being quick to answer my name! For some reason if my name is being mentioned my ears prick up and I am straight there asking why I am being spoken about. Sadly, I don’t believe this is a unique attribute because most people are quick to their names! One of the first things I noticed when reading Exodus 3 was Moses’ answer to God’s calling.

“God called to him from within the bush “Moses! Moses” and Moses said “here I am”’ (Exodus 3:4)

Let’s be honest when we are called replying with “Here I am” is an unlikely response. The answer is one that you would expect in the army, don’t you think? Imagine yourself in the army and you’re waiting to be called, which could be at any given moment if we were to respond “Alright Already, I am coming!!!” I am pretty sure there would be countless hours of toilet cleaning with our own personal toothbrushes. At this point I believe it is necessary to point out that I have never been in the army so this is pretty much speculation. So you’re sleeping in your army bunk and its four in the morning when suddenly the bells ring and you have someone calling you to get up, it is likely that your response is one of readiness and devotion. In the army you are trained to be disciplined and always ready to respond. They’ll expect nothing less, and if there was you would be punished or chucked out, simply as! Well thankfully God won’t punish or throw us out of his grace but I do believe he expects the same reaction. This wanted response is one of readiness when saying “here I am” Moses was ready to do God’s will. In all honesty I find this quite awe inspiring, don’t you? If we were to learn anything from Moses it would be his readiness to obey. From these three simple words we can take great example and can challenge our responses to God.

Proverbs puts it beautifully when it states:

“Blessed is the man who listens to me, awake and ready for me in the morning, alert and responsive as I start my days work”- (Proverbs 8:34 The Message)

When being called by God we need to be awake (obviously!) and ready. My question is are you ready?