Our Purpose and calling as Women

The more I cry out to the Lord, longing to be closer to Him, the more He shows me why I need to be close to Him. Marriage is a calling to pour oneself out with no expectations as an act of worship. We women were created to be helpers, we are a gift to our husbands and we need to have our Lord’s perspective and continue to renew our minds that we may be able to see clearly what our purpose and calling is.
As a woman, I sometimes long to be cherished honored and loved but that should not be the basis for praying/begging the Lord for a husband. Instead we should think about our Lord and rejoice in the fact that He is the perfect lover and offers all the things we long for as women and the wonderful news is that He freely offers it to us. There is nothing that we could have done to earn it, His love to us is a free gift! Let us focus on the lover of our souls and seek a deeper intimacy with Him as we long for companionship. Let us renew our minds and get lost in our romance with the Lord. I once read in a book “if we become a necessity to anyone we are out of God’s will.” That made me ponder… It went on further and said, “we ought to be the bridegroom’s friend first. We cannot continue to increase and watch Him decrease, we ought to be magnets that draw others to Him not to ourselves and away from Him.” Immediately I thought about being married and the desires that come with that like being number one, the one he cannot live without and etc.. and it hit me hard! Those desires aren’t Godly. If the Lord does call us to marry, we ought to be helpers to our mates by drawing them to Christ and not ourselves. The call of marriage is a call to daily surrender and self-denial. I have to give my husband back to the Lord every morning. To be consumed with him or have him be consumed with me is idolatry! We need to be running to our God together and seeking to glorify Him in all that we do. A mate is a gift and a blessing how sad would it be to forget our first love and seek to find fulfillment in one another. No man can fulfill/satisfy our longings like Christ. Everything this world has to offer will leave you empty, only what the Lord offers is eternal everything else is temporary, it does not last. Unless we are satisfied with Christ, we will be chasing after fulfillment in places where it cannot be found and we’ll only be left bitter. We must decrease and HE must increase. Marriage is a calling to pour out oneself for the glory of God. To live in a state of Continuous self-denial, putting our mates first to Honor the Lord no matter what.
My beautiful now married sister in Christ Ashley Strickland or her now husband Jeremiah once shared  something with me that I didn't even think about! they said "Marriage does have an expectation, one of love and dedication. Just as Christ does desire and expect his bride the church to love him back, in marriage there is an expectation of a reciprocation of love and service."
This picture gets more and more beautiful everyday! How beautiful and perfect! Our God is good! but yes marriage a beautiful calling indeed!