She has a good job, some savings and a pre-approval letter from the bank that has been sitting in a drawer for two years. Every time she gets close to making an offer on a house, a small voice asks: What if you meet someone next year? Wouldn’t it be better to choose a home together? So she waits. She renews the lease on the apartment. She tells herself the timing is not right.
Many single Christian women, and quite a few men, will recognise the pattern. Some hold off on buying a home. Others hold off on furnishing properly, planting a garden, or hosting people, as if real life begins at the wedding. Beneath it all is a sincere question: Is marriage part of God’s plan for me, and if so, should I be keeping everything else on hold until it arrives?
Praying honestly
It is right to pray for a spouse. Jesus encouraged bold, believing prayer: “Therefore I say to you, whatever things you ask when you pray, believe that you receive them, and you will have them” (Mark 11:24, NKJV). That verse sits in a passage about faith and forgiveness, and it invites us to bring our deepest hopes to God without embarrassment.
But praying with faith is not the same as freezing your life. The women and men of Scripture who waited on God’s promises did not sit still while they waited. Abraham pitched tents, dug wells and raised flocks. Ruth gleaned in the fields. Faith and ordinary diligence walked together.
The secret Paul learned
Writing from prison, Paul said something remarkable about his circumstances:
“Not that I speak in regard to need, for I have learned in whatever state I am, to be content.” (Philippians 4:11, NKJV)
Paul says he learned contentment. It did not come naturally. It was practised, in hunger and in plenty, in company and alone. Contentment does not mean pretending you have no desires. It means refusing to let the thing you do not yet have steal the good of what you do have.
For a single person, that might mean admitting honestly: “I would love to be married, and I am not yet.” And then adding: “And this season is still a real season of my life, given by God, worth living fully.”
A home is not a consolation prize
Some people worry that buying a home alone feels like giving up, or like announcing to the world that they have stopped hoping. It need not mean either. A home is a place to steward, to rest and to welcome others. Those are good things at any stage of life.
Think of what a home can be for a single believer:
- A place of hospitality, where friends, nieces and nephews, church members and neighbours are fed and encouraged.
- A stable base that frees you from rising rents and the uncertainty of landlords.
- An asset that can be sold, rented or shared if and when your circumstances change, including if you marry.
- A space arranged for your own life and calling now, not for an imagined life later.
None of this is a reason to rush into a purchase you cannot afford, or to ignore wise counsel about location, cost and timing. It is simply a reminder that waiting for marriage is not, by itself, a sound reason to postpone every other decision.
When the loneliness is real
It would be dishonest to pretend that singleness is always easy. There are evenings when the house is too quiet. There are family gatherings where the questions sting. There are moments, perhaps turning the key in your own front door, when you wish someone else was there to share it. God is not offended by those feelings. The Psalms are full of them.
What helps many single believers is not a perfect theology of singleness but a full life: close friendships, a church where they are known, meaningful work, people to serve. A home can support that life. The table can be set for four even when only one lives there.
Carried, not abandoned
Many Christians treasure the old poem about footprints in the sand, in which the dreamer notices only one set of prints during the hardest seasons of life and asks where the Lord was. The answer is that those were the times He carried them. Whatever you make of the poem, the idea behind it is deeply biblical. God does not step away in the waiting seasons. He is closer than we know.
So pray for a spouse, if that is your desire. Pray boldly. And while you pray, live. Plant the garden. Paint the walls the colour you like. Sign for the house if the numbers and the counsel line up. Whatever God’s plan holds, you will not have wasted the season you were given.
For reflection
- Is there anything in your life you have put on hold “until I’m married”? Is that still wise, or is it fear?
- What would contentment look like for you this month, without giving up on your hopes?
A short prayer: Lord, You know the desires of my heart. I bring them to You honestly. Teach me to be content in this season, to use what You have given me well, and to trust that You are carrying me even when the path feels lonely. Amen.
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