Faith, Life, and Lessons

I had a phase of my life where I convinced myself that I would never get married or have children, that I wasn’t even meant to do that. I didn’t attach emotion to the declaration; it was almost the opposite. I took a starkly rational and utilitarian view of my life and decided that the time and emotional energy necessary to foster a family was simply too much, and my time was best used in other places. My ultimate goal was, and really still is, to glorify God by serving others in love, and I believed that I would be more “efficient” at this goal if I didn’t worry myself with the very taxing business of finding a mate and raising kids. The underlying assumption was that domestic affairs were always at odds with my ultimate purpose; they were indulgences in fleshly desires that should be avoided if they could (I was reading a lot of Paul, if you know what I’m sayin’).  Over the course of about two years, I spoke with mentors and friends about my proposed singleton lifestyle and began to