YOU SHOULD HAVE LONG BEEN MARRIED

Dear Aquila and Priscilla, you should have long been married. The reason you’re not is your unwillingness to labour to make anyone suit your taste. You’re looking for a finished soup.

If I allow you to waste some extra years looking for a finished soup, you will come back with only one conclusion: a finished soup is very scarce to find, if it exists at all.

You want a woman/man who is physically flawless. No spot or pimples. There is a specific height that you’ve adopted as the standard. Anyone shorter than that is too short. S/he must have a specific complexion and must come from a specific tribe and church denomination. (By the way, the longer the checklist, the narrower your chances of finding a suitable prospect.)

S/he must be born again, spirit-filled and tongue talking. S/he must also have very godly character. Besides, he must be financially loaded. You can’t marry someone that can’t afford to spoil you in some of the top resorts in your city. Besides that, his spoken-English must be flawless. I can go on and on running through your check-list.

As you grow older, what you’ll realise however is that most of the people you meet are never all you wanted. Finally you’ve met the flawless shape you were looking for only to discover that there is no character; so you dropped it. Sometimes you meet someone with Character but there is no shape; you dropped it too. This one has both shape and character but the leg is not straight and the English is bad; you dropped it too.

You’re picking and dropping in quick succession with a carefree attitude because you feel you still have a lot of time. By the time you get to a certain age, you’ll begin to face reality. That reality is that what you’re looking for is too idealistic. You may have to create the person that possesses such combination of qualities yourself.

If you put yourself on that same standard you’ve set, you will likely come short. But you know we human beings: it is always easy for us to place a high demand on others while we excuse our own selves. Such unfairness!!! When your eyes clear and age overtakes you, you may now settle for something that is far lesser than several you arrogantly insulted and rejected in your prime. This letter is to help you to avoid such a tragedy.

The wisdom I want to borrow you before you die in the Singles market is that the moment you find 60% of what you’re looking for in a person, that person is a “workable” candidate for marriage. Pick it up and go and work in the remaining 40% yourself. No one will do the work for you. It’s your burden.

The problem is that you’re lazy. You enjoy eating other people’s labour; but to lift a finger yourself is so difficult for you. Even the 60%, don’t you realise that some people laboured to put it there? Why should it be so difficult to build on what they have done and harvest for yourself an enviable life partner?

You have to know what the fundamentals are. The person must be truly born again (and if they are not, yet meet all the other conditions, I told you what you can do last week which may work!!!). The person must be purposeful – motivated about life and success. Your purpose must be agreeable. You must find the person at least to an extent physically attractive TO YOU. If s/he is not attractive because of things that you can easily work on, then they still meet the condition.

“Oh, he has an imperfect dentition!” Hope you know that can easily be fixed for less than two hundred thousand naira with some health insurance plans and in less than two years? So you’ll throw away a life asset because of something two hundred thousand naira can fix?

“She has a K-leg!” I hope you know that can also be perfectly corrected medically? “She is too short.” Interestingly, there is now a science called “limb-lenthening” through which the length of a leg can be increased. “Her face is full of pimples.” With some skin care products of less than forty thousand naira, that problem will be completely sorted.

“His English is bad.” Why not get him A-Z English by Dele Ashade or Brighter Grammar and begin to teach him gradually or get him a teacher? You’ll be shocked about the level of improvement that can be achieved in a short while.

“How can I a masters holder marry an NCE holder?” But he possesses all other great qualities you’re looking for. That’s very easy. Is he ready to go back to school? Draw the plan and ensure you’re part of the financiers. In less than six years, he’ll be a Masters holder.

This is how to literally create from the raw material God gave to you what you really want; instead of rejecting God’s gift and becoming stranded later in life.

And there are some imperfections that just a change of style of dresses will easily sort out. While some, what is needed is for you to receive the grace to change your mindset towards them after which you’ll be able to accept and embrace them.

Before you dismiss a good prospect on the basis of one imperfection or the other, you need to ask yourself, “is this imperfection fundamental or it’s something that can easily be fixed? “Is it something we can work on or sort out over a fairly short period of time? “

If you turn this one down also, do you know the next one coming – whether it will even be worse than this? Why not be thankful to God for this precious one he has brought your way and roll up your sleeves to perfect it?

You’re not supposed to be pissed off by the imperfections of others. The reason you have such a proud attitude is that you’ve forgotten that you are also not flawless. Or are you flawless? Whoever will marry you will also have to put up with some things about you which he would have wished are better and more beautiful.

So with such a mindset that you’re also not flawless, it will help you to be humble in appraising other people and to be more accommodating of their imperfections. My worry is that most of these issues are even issues that can easily be corrected if you’re ready for labour.

I hope that you’ll finally embrace a humble spirit that is equally prepared to labour to enter into God’s rest. That courageous heart that will not waste time envying what others have but will focus on what God has given him to make it the envy of all. Or else, in ten years time, when you’ll have been 38, you may still be there looking for who to marry. At that time, “anyone available, regardless!”

“There remaineth therefore a rest to the people of God. Let us LABOUR therefore to enter into that rest, lest any man fall after the same example of unbelief.”

Hebrews 4:9‭, ‬11 KJV (Speaking originally about the rest of salvation/eternal life but applicable for wisdom in this context also.)

LET US LABOUR TO ENTER INTO REST!!!

Your brother,

Peniela Eniayo, Akintujoye.

©Peniela Eniayo, Akintujoye| hello@lovestraighttalks.com

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