29 and Fine/The Heart

A week ago I turned 29 and when the clock struck midnight I cried... I cried because I'm not who I planned to be. I then realized I'm who God wants me to be, I've spent the past couple years on a journey of dying daily and seeking him. At 24 I chose celibacy, purity and I stopped running from God. I was tired of dead end relationships, self fulfillment and heart break so I closed the door on dating completely. The hardest part of that was that I was secretly in love with someone who wasn't in love with me so I literally had to remove myself, my heart and feel the pain of letting go. Do you know the pain of literally feeling your heart break? The pain of literally letting go of everything you know, love and want? I can't lie... It left me bitter for a while, it made me hard and it almost made me not want to love again. 

Lately I've been reevaluating my life, I've been searching my heart and healing old wounds that I told myself had been healed but really had not been dealt with. I've been rekindling old friendships that weren't neccessarily harmful just not beneficial to my growth during the process of my life change. Five years ago I was a mess (still a mess without Jesus) and I couldn't even see past pride, insecurity and years of emotional pain but I knew that I wanted to be whole. I decided in my heart that I wouldn't date just to date, that I wouldn't entertain meaningless relationships or even court a man who didn't have a heart for God. Five years later I'm still holding on to that, yes I'm single and have heard numerous times that my standards are too "high" but are they really? Settling for a man who doesn't understand my lifestyle or my love for Jesus just seems foreign to me and I can't bring myself to just give up hope of meeting a man who is committed to serving the lord with his heart. I've had admirers, brief suitors over the past few years who got ghost when I explained that I'm celibate and don't plan on giving up anything until marriage. It use to bother me that they disappeared or stopped talking to me altogether when I explained this and I just convinced myself that I'd be alone forever. 29, single with no prospects causes people to worry apparently... I had to shut off the clock in my heart and block out the voices of people who questioned my lifestyle. Yeah, a lot of my friends are married with kids but a lot are in the same place as me. I've watched many settle after years of holding on, I've watched the enemy plant seeds of discontentment and destroy beautiful people which only causes me to seek Christ more. 

I find myself constantly saying that I do NOT want a "churched" man meaning one who loves church, church events but has zero relationship with Jesus. If he can't pray, lead and cover then we honestly have nothing in common. I'm in a place where religious activity annoys me, religious, cliche banter makes me twitch and I just want people to be REAL! Be honest about how life sucks at times and your only hope is in Christ! Be real about how you've had periods of time where this job or that job didn't work out so you literally had to depend on God to pay your bills, put food on your table or get your from point A to point B! Be honest about how your faith has been shaken because you haven't had steady work in a year and a half, you're single with no prospects and close to 30... Let's just be real. I've always hated phony, cliche responses on life, love and especially how to handle heartbreak. Yes I pray, yes I love God and at the same time yes my faith is tested because I'm human. Super Christians usually fall super hard so my goal is to always admit my wrongs, my short comings and errors. I am Ciara Danelle, I'm 29 and still grappling with life and its issues... I don't know what tomorrow holds, heck I don't know what I'm eating for lunch and I had a plan for my life but it wasn't God's so I'm literally out here "winging" it day by day. I know that he loves me and I know that daily I must cling to him and "Matthew 6." I refuse to settle for anything less than what he has for me!   “Therefore I say unto you, Be not anxious for your life, what ye shall eat, or what ye shall drink; nor yet for your body, what ye shall put on. Is not the life more than the food, and the body than the raiment? Behold the birds of the heaven, that they sow not, neither do they reap, nor gather into barns; and your heavenly Father feedeth them. Are not ye of much more value than they? And which of you by being anxious can add one cubit unto the measure of his life? And why are ye anxious concerning raiment? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they toil not, neither do they spin:”

Matthew 6:25-28 ASV