praying for the one

So I have been cruising the blogosphere and Andrea Lucado posted a cool blog that got my head thinking. She asked the question, "Is it wrong to pray for my future spouse?" Her answer was essentially yes....Kind of like praying for a BMW. At first a lot of scripture went through my mind like Philippians 4:6 Don't be anxious about anything, but in every situation by prayer and petition present your requests to God.

So I don't think praying is wrong ever about anything, but I do agree with Andrea's premise, although my reasoning might be different. She looked at marriage like a BMW...an awesome bonus to an otherwise glorious life in Christ.

So here is where I differ. I wasn't made to be single. I can say that now that I am married ;), When I was single I was on facebook stalking every girl I was friends with trying to decipher if that person might be "the one." Don't judge you've done it too. You probably just paused stalking long enough to read this.

But here is the deal and my wife will attest to this, I wasn't ready to be married until I prayed for my wife. I put ridiculous standards up for women to meet. The way they looked had to be a certain way. I conformed to the culture on that. The way they treated me had to be a certain way...kind of along the lines of independent Baptist or old school church of Christ. They had to have a certain level of style, they had to have a certain ability to converse about politics or know who Michael Medved is. Their hair had to have a certain look. Look I'm not kidding...and for some of you, you can pick up your jaw at my shallowness or the fact that I just read your mail.

So here is what happened to me. I started really praying that God would bring me a wife. I realized that it wasn't good for me to be alone. I needed a partner. I needed a companion. I needed to have sex. I needed a completion to what God had said in the garden wasn't perfect in a perfect world. I needed a wife. So I asked him.

I really asked him. I used to pray for God to bring me a wife like most guys dream up their favorite sports cars on the corvette website. This much horsepower, these kind of curves, this kind of gas mileage and so on. But this time, I prayed that God would bring me a wife. One for me. Not one that I would order out of a magazine, but a life partner that only God as my perfect Father would know.

So here is what happened. I toned down my view of women. It went from this Weird Science meets Mother Theresa to a woman filled with the Spirit ready to do ministry. God changed my heart.

So I prayed specifically that God would bring me the right one and then it turned out I already knew her. Weird right?

So listen...it's not about praying for the right one, it's about praying to be the right one.