Dear Priscilla, I took my time to read your narrative. I understand the state you are perfectly. I have also loved people so passionately that didn’t love me in return and I have equally been in the shoe of this your guy severally wherein a lady is eventually forced to come and tell me what she feels. It appears life usually serves everyone of us an equal dose of the two sides just to keep us humble – so we won’t have an exaggerated esteem of ourselves.
It’s normal for him to tell you that he also loves you after you told him what you feel about him. Even if the love he is talking about is the love of Christ, he will still have to speak that way so as to ensure your feelings aren’t hurt.
You guys have been friends. There must be some qualities about you that made him appreciate you as a friend certainly. But I don’t think he is persuaded to take the relationship beyond friendship into something more permanent.
If he is persuaded, he wouldn’t have waited for this long before he would have asked you out. Now that you’ve voiced out, if he had been persuaded about a marital relationship with you, he would have used the opportunity to clearly express his feelings too.
But the response he gave shows that he doesn’t have such a persuasion. At least as of yet. He also may never have it.
From your own narrative, you initiate almost all the conversations with him. If he’s in love with you, it wouldn’t work that way. Where a man’s treasure is, there his heart will always be. And when your heart is always on a woman, you want to talk to her by call or chat or any other means as frequently as possible.
There’s nothing like the guy loves me but he doesn’t usually have time to call me. Not even once in a day. He can go three days without even a call or text or chat. There’s nothing like that. His heart is simply not with you because you’re not yet his treasure.
I know the pain of unreciprocated love because I’ve also had my own fair share of the experience. But sometimes it’s better to face the reality of issues. This brother may love you as a friend and Sister in the Lord, but obviously not as a life partner. No one knows if anything will change about this later on.
But I’ll advice you don’t put your mind. Just turn everything over to God. Cast the burdens on the Lord, for He cares for you.
For the sake of your mental health, it will be necessary that you scale down your communication with him and try to focus on other productive things you’re engaged with.
If he will ever come around to love you the way you love him, it will be under an atmosphere where you’re no longer chasing him. The chase of a woman where it’s no longer coded at the initial stage can put a lot of men off. It may easily devalue her in their estimation. Men prefer that chase after the initial stages – in courtship and marriage.
By your opening up to him about what you feel, at least now he knows you’re open to him if he comes with such an agenda. That’s sufficient. If he wants it, let him act on it by himself. Don’t push it further. Return to your shell and transfer your gaze on the Lord.
Remember the story of Ruth. After she laid beside Boaz and communicated her availability using all the figurative speeches possible, she simply went back home thereafter. She left the rest in God’s hands. She didn’t start coming to see Boaz every night to remind him every day that she was still waiting for him to act.
But Boaz became restless as from that point and couldn’t hold his peace until he finally married her. If this man is your Boaz, he will be restless until he has done the needful even without any further input from your side.
So tone down all your efforts to keep the two of you constantly talking. “Hello” once in a while will be good enough. Let your bigger focus be on God. Just watch and see what He will do for you. He may influence this same brother to come. And it may also not be Him. God may immediately send someone else.
So while you pray from now, don’t say, “Influence Richard to come o Lord.” Tell God, “In truth I currently love Richard and I wish that it is him, but I’m equally aware that you have other uncountable solid brothers in your quiver whose lives and calling I’ll fit into, I’m open to any of them that you will send to me. Do it your own way. Just let only your will to stand.”
As you pray this way, God will show up for you and will lead you in the direction you must follow.
A time may come when even mentioning him in prayer may be too unhealthy for your mind. If that times comes, embrace the reality and open your mind completely to God. Pray about your marital life without putting him in the picture.
In the end, what matters to you is for God to settle you with a man after His own heart, who will love you and whom you will love and be proud of so passionately.
The reason you’re so worried about this brother is because you can not see in the horizon a better prospect coming your way. That’s the challenge of a limited vision.
But it doesn’t take God 24 hours to arrange that where necessary. He did that for some of us in the past.
The moment a better prospect shows up, you’ll almost beat yourself for mourning over the one that was lost considering how your latter house completely surpasses the former.
Let these words encourage your heart. What God has done for others, He will do for you too.
Don’t forget to share the good news with me when it’s ripe.
Your brother,
Peniela E. Akintujoye.
#resettingtheodds
#raisingchristlikecouples
#makingyourmarriageacenterofrevival
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