People often tell single gals that once you’re ready, God will send a husband into your life. But, what is “ready”? I struggled with that in my single years, often thinking that maybe the reason God wasn’t giving me a husband for so long was because I wasn’t ready for marriage. Or maybe my husband wasn’t ready. Maybe neither of us was ready, and so we had to wait. 

It wasn’t until I met my now husband, Daniel, that I finally understood: in part, God was indeed preparing my husband and I to be “ready” to marry each other. But, the thing I got wrong is that “ready” is not a destination but a process. 

So, here are four indicators to know if you’re ready (and how to get ready) for marriage as a single woman: 

Are you praying for your future husband?

About three to four years before I met my husband, when I asked God what to pray about for my future husband, the Holy Spirit lead me repeatedly to 1 Timothy 3 where Paul lists the characteristics of a man in ministry. That passage became a cornerstone of my prayers for my future husband. 

Around the same time, God began calling Daniel to get more involved in church and ministry, and about two years before we met, he started to pray for an opportunity to serve in ministry. A few months before we met, God opened the door for Daniel to relocate to a different state due to a sudden job change, and he ended up joining a small church plant in Indiana, which got him involved in youth ministry, and gave him opportunities to preach and lead worship. By the time we met, Daniel was dedicating a lot of his time and talents to ministry in his local church.

Your prayers today shape your future, while preparing you for that future. Ask God what to pray for and once you do, look for His answer in His Word through daily Bible study, in sermons, in the Christian podcasts / articles / social media posts you come across. God may even use people in your life and “random” conversations to guide you. Whatever God reveals to you, pray those things over your future husband, your marriage and your future family.

Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness. For we do not know what to pray for as we ought, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words. And he who searches hearts knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God. -Romans 8:26-27

Are you focusing more on character than searching for a husband?

Many single girls spend a lot of time searching for a husband, but not enough time working on becoming a Godly woman and allowing God to shape a noble character in us.

Looking back, I see how God used my single season to shape my character, tear down my pride, and soften my heart. He used His word to teach me what He values and delights in, put me in lonely wilderness seasons to draw me nearer to Him, and developed in me a Biblically sound understanding of womanhood and marriage. The Lord changed my character completely and now that I’m married, I see the blessing of that in my marriage.

I’m far from who I should be and God is still working on my character, but I truly believe that God knew what character traits and personality to develop in me to be the best complement to the husband He chose for me. 

An excellent wife who can find? She is far more precious than jewels … She opens her mouth with wisdom, and the teaching of kindness is on her tongue. -Proverbs 31:10, 26

Yield your character to God in your single season - He knows how to make you “ready” to become Godly wife material and to shape you into a woman of noble character. Learn to forgive quickly and be the first to forgive. Practice building up others with your words. Develop a lifestyle of serving others with your time and resources. Dedicate time to Bible study, because the word of God is powerful to discern our thoughts and intentions, and transform us to become more like Christ. 

All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be competent, equipped for every good work. -2 Timothy 3:16-17

No one can take God’s reserved portion for you, but only God can prepare you for what He has allotted for you. Trust His provision and focus more on becoming a woman of God than on searching for a man of God. Seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and everything else will be added to you (including a husband, if that’s God’s will for you.

Are you stewarding well what God gave you in this season?

While God was leading my husband into ministry, He was also putting a similar call on my heart. First, through Tirzah Magazine, and then a year and a half before I met my husband, God called me to teen ministry in my local church.

That’s actually how my husband and I first connected. He responded to one of my posts on Instagram that he was leading his youth group through the topic I wrote about and we started talking back and forth about youth and teen ministry in Slavic churches. Ministry is what brought us together and now that we’re married, God keeps giving us more opportunities to serve together in our local church. That would have been much more difficult to do if neither of us had not already been in ministry before we got married. 

As each has received a gift, use it to serve one another, as good stewards of God's varied grace. -1 Peter 4:10

There are things God has earmarked for you to do in your single season that will prepare you for your future marriage. Maybe it looks like God opening the door for you to move to a new place or take a certain job. Maybe it is a skill or experience you need to have.

Most of all, if you want a Godly marriage and you’re praying for a God-fearing husband, the Lord is going to take that seriously and prepare you for a marriage that glorifies God first and foremost. While God does that behind the scenes, our role is to walk in obedience to what God is asking of us in this season and to steward wisely the time and resources given to us today. 

One who is faithful in a very little is also faithful in much, and one who is dishonest in a very little is also dishonest in much. -Luke 16:10

Because here is what God is calling you to fill your single season with. 

Do you trust God’s timing?

If I had met my husband in college, I probably wouldn’t have been interested. He wasn’t “my type” - a quiet, steady, hard-working farmer who wears cowboy boots and plaid shirts with jeans (back then, I was more into the tall, dark, and handsome guy who wears a fitted suit and is a very obvious outgoing leader). I was also a budding feminist with big career ambitions, no interest in any type of ministry, independent, set in my ways and beliefs, and so full of pride. That young woman was in no way ready for a Godly marriage, let alone to be a helper to a man in ministry. 

It took years of God working on both my husband and I separately to prepare us for the marriage and mission He had planned for us together. And when the timing was right and God deemed us “ready” for the next season, God made our paths cross so that we could go forward and serve Him together as a team. 

A few days after we met, Daniel shared the vision he had for his life and I’ve never met someone whose calling and vision aligned so much with mine. As I told my brother: "I'd follow this guy anywhere to help him achieve what God has called him to do, and it would be easy because it's what God has been preparing me for and already having me do with my life." As cliche as it is, it's like finding someone walking on a parallel path to you, at the same pace, to the same destination, and it's easy for your paths to merge because it's two sides of the same thing.

When it comes to love, we want to make things happen in our own time and effort, which is why Song of Solomon repeats this warning often to women: “Promise me, O women of Jerusalem, not to awaken love until the time is right” (Song of Solomon 8:4).

There is an appointed time for your love story. In Ezekiel 16:8, when God speaks to Jerusalem as His beloved, He speaks of seasons and one of the life transitions is the season for marriage: 

And when I passed by again, I saw that you were old enough for love. So I wrapped my cloak around you to cover your nakedness and declared my marriage vows. I made a covenant with you, says the Sovereign LORD, and you became mine. 

In Genesis 18:14, God tells Abraham and Sarah that He will come at the appointed time and give them a son. And in Luke 1:20, an angel told Zechariah that God’s promise of a son for the couple would come true at their appointed time. 

For still the vision awaits its appointed time; it hastens to the end—it will not lie. If it seems slow, wait for it; it will surely come; it will not delay. -Habakkuk 2:3

For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven (Ecc. 3:1). The Lord is the one who changes times and seasons (Daniel 2:21), and it is not up to us to know times or seasons that the Father has fixed by his own authority (Acts 1:7).  The potter who holds you in His hands and is shaping you into a woman after His heart knows when the time is right for you to marry. He has appointed a time for you, a time when He deems you to be ready, so trust Him with your love story and yield yourself to the Potter’s hands.

If you enjoyed this article, I just published a four-week devotional Bible study for waiting seasons and single gals!

The study is also available in the Tirzah Shop as an e-book & digital download.

And if you’re not sure if this book is for you or want to read chapter one while you wait for your copy to arrive in the mail, I’d love to share the introduction and chapter one with you below!

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Yelena Sheremeta works as a tax attorney, and is the founder of Tirzah Magazine. She has a passion for pointing young women to Christ, and enjoys reading, writing, traveling, and spending time with her family. On her website (YelenaSheremeta.com), she seeks to equip Christian women to navigate modern issues from a Biblical perspective and writes about theology, current events, work, and other issues facing young women today. Yelena lives in Indiana with her husband, Daniel.