Sustaining Hope on the Way to the Altar

I had always wanted to marry and trusted that it would naturally happen.

After all, marriage is a normal part of life, right?     

While I did meet and marry my husband at the age of 42, it was notwithstanding a constant and brutal struggle to maintain a healthy dose of hope that God could and would fulfill my desire for a spouse. I had to keep up the good fight of faith even when my circumstances and feelings were saying something completely different. 

Hope is defined by the Merriam-Webster dictionary as a “desire accompanied by expectation of or belief in fulfillment.” The Bible also tells us in Proverbs 13:12 that “Hope deferred makes the heart sick but a wish fulfilled is a tree of life” (NABRE).

During my single years, especially in my thirties, I was very disheartened—at times, despairing—over the lack of a marital relationship. I would often tell God that if He would just bring a spouse into my life, thus fulfilling my hope and desires, I would not feel so terrible!

Looking back, I now believe that God had a greater desire for me to marry than I had for myself.

After much contemplation, I have more insight into my own wounds and misconceptions about God’s character. I realize that due to these, I tended to believe He was withholding a spouse from me, and this affected different areas of my life while I was single. This notion also fueled my lack of faith in His provision and would directly impact my ability to hope. And we know that “to have faith is to be sure of the things hoped for, to be certain of the things we cannot see” (Hebrews 11:1, Today’s English Version, Second Edition). 

The struggle to maintain hope and believe that God could bring about a marriage for me was a cross in and of itself. But it was this same cross that set me free of my exceedingly small view of God and showed me that God was truly the God of miracles and the God of hope. “For nothing will be impossible for God” (Luke 1:37, NABRE). 

One day, the wisdom of the "Little Flower" helped me see things in a different light.

It was during one of my tough single seasons that I happened to be reading The Story of a Soul by St. Thérèse of Lisieux. As you may know, Thérèse very much desired to enter the Carmelite order at the age of 15. She believed she had a calling to the religious life. Thérèse was not able to secure the necessary permission due to her young age. She even tried, unsuccessfully, to acquire the permission of the Pope during a pilgrimage to Rome. 

I began to see a similarity between myself and St. Thérèse in that we were both doing everything we could to answer the call of our vocation but to no avail. In The Story of a Soul, she recalls, “I was very much distressed, but since I had done everything I possibly could to respond to God’s call….” I found a renewed strength in Thérèse’s response to her failed endeavor with Pope Leo XIII: “I had lost all confidence in mankind and was depending only on God….” 

Thérèse resigned herself to complete trust that God would make it happen and, as a result, she entered the convent at the age of 15 as she recounts in her manuscripts: “But He whose Heart is ever watchful taught me that He works miracles even for those whose faith is like a tiny mustard seed, to make it grow…” (The Story of a Soul).

I knew that my trust was meager at best. However, St. Thérèse gave me hope.

If God could work a miracle for her regarding her vocation, there was a good chance He could work a miracle for me regarding mine. And God did just that. With just a scant seed of faith and a rosary in my hands, I boldly beseeched God for a helpmate. And He answered me.

I can now say with St. Paul, “May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that you may abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit” (Romans 15:13, NABRE). Hopeful are the forlorn, for they shall see God perform miracles!       

Do you struggle with hope regarding your desire to marry? Can you bring this struggle to God and openly and honestly talk with Him about it? I encourage you to read Proverbs 13:12 and Romans 15:13.

Have you felt discouraged or distraught over marriage being delayed? Do you see the God of all hope as capable of providing a spouse? How about restoring your hope after a set-back? Why or why not?