How Starving for Love Led Me to You | Ep. 1

I love being a disciple of Jesus Christ. I do not always love being single. I love God, I serve people, I try to be grateful. But there is this quiet, relentless hunger in me for love, real love, and sometimes it feels like it’s going to eat me alive. That hunger is what brought me here. To this, to you. Welcome to the very first episode of Single to the Glory.

Hello, I’m Aleah, your host, storyteller, big sister, and hopefully friend. I’m so glad you’re here and have decided to join me for this podcast. If I had to pick one word to describe what I’m feeling about this project, I’d have to pick squishy. My heart is super, super squishy. You just have to poke it and it gushes feeling. There’s this tenderness in me about singlehood and the struggles we face. I know so many amazing single women and men who are beset by the question of love and marriage. It is such a hard stumbling block. I think we’re all deeply wrestling with how to live more enriching, connected lives as single members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

That’s why I wanted to do this podcast. It’s my hope that by being together we can really feel more empowered and at peace, and maybe even connect with God in such a way that we can find love. And that is a huge thing to try and do. So I wrestled with where to start, what to say. I finally settled on just sharing a bit of my journey, my desperation to feel loved, and how being single to the glory of God has changed everything for me.

But before we dive into all of that, it’s time for the first ever Aleah’s affirmations. I want you to hear truth spoken over your life and your circumstances. These words are here to set the tone for personal revelation

First, I want you to take a deep breath in. Let’s do it again. In and out.

The Lord knows exactly where you are right now. He understands the hunger in your heart, the longing to be seen, chosen, and cherished. You were created to love and to be loved. Your desire for connection is not too much. He is teaching you how to receive love, how to give love, and how to recognize the kind of love that reflects his own. You can trust him with your hunger. He knows how to satisfy it in ways deeper and more lasting than you can ever imagine.

Take a moment to ponder what came to your heart. Keep these feelings close as we go forward

This is episode one of Single to the Glory.

Late one night, some time ago, I felt so full of desperation I practically clawed at myself. I had kicked all of the clothes on the floor away so I could make space to kneel. My beautiful life was before me. I have a good job with a little bit of money, people to sit around my dinner table and break bread with, and a faith in a God who protects me and provides for me. But it wasn’t enough, and the shame of that brought me low.

I pressed my forehead into the cheap, scratchy carpet and prayed.

“What am I missing?” I asked over and over again. “If you give me what I need, then I have missed what you provide. You know what’s missing, what I’m missing. What do I need to do to stop this pain? What do I really need?”

The answer came immediately, a very clear cry from the depths of my heart. I need love.

I needed a different kind of love than the ones being offered to me. A love that wasn’t always on someone else’s terms. A love that wasn’t only available when it could fit conveniently into a schedule. A love that wasn’t carelessly offered and quickly withdrawn. A love that wasn’t earned by being as pleasant as possible. A love that didn’t go unexpressed because it was just a foregone conclusion. A love that wanted to give as much as it took. I longed for love that would fill my soul, which in that moment felt so cavernous.

I tugged at the swollen gravel itch left behind from my tears. For all the despair I felt, wanting love and not knowing how to find it, there was also peace. I felt like God agreed with me, that he knew I needed love, and he wanted it for me. He reminded me that the love I sought was the stuff of eternity, the purpose of progression, and was embodied fully in his divine nature.

He also very gently helped me to see there were things I still needed to do to invite love, not just romantic love, but eternal love into my life.

Have you ever asked the questions I have? How do I get the love I need? What do I need to do? I talk a lot with my friends about matters of the heart, and no matter the tone or the topic, I feel these questions looming. There’s so much heartache, so much pain. It overwhelms me how much I want you to have the love you want so desperately. I wish there was something I could do, and I guess this podcast is my attempt to meet you where you’re at. From all I’ve seen and heard, it seems to me we all just want to feel like we’re doing something right. Something that is going to get us one step closer to whatever dream we’re longing for.

Now, my steps are pretty slow, but one thing has changed years of these questions into a modicum of clarity. Becoming single to the glory of God.

What does this even mean? I’m glad you asked. It’s a bit intangible the way things of the heart generally are. For me, to be single to the glory of God means to set your heart upon the Lord, allowing him into your life in an intimate way to shape your desires and guide your choices according to his eternal purposes. I’ve done great things, faith-inspiring things in the pursuit of discipleship. I have worshiped God and I have loved God, but I didn’t delight in loving God. I wasn’t embracing my covenant relationship and asking myself, how can I love the Lord better? For me, this is at the heart of being single to his glory.

Think of someone you desperately love. Someone comes to my mind. You can’t help but think of them. What would make them happy, how to serve them, how to make them smile. You don’t just desire to be loved by them. You find joy in loving them. It’s both natural and supernatural. You overcome the selfish inclinations of the natural man to give freely of yourself while simultaneously feeling there is nothing else you were made to do. Do you feel this way about the Lord? I haven’t always.

My eyes have not been singled to his glory. They’ve been wandering around. Let’s just sit for a second and think. What have you been looking at lately in a spiritual sense? Are you looking really hard at yourself to find all the awful flaws? Or maybe it’s others who catch your eye, and you either desire them or detest them to the point you can’t think of anything else.

For me, I think I’ve been looking a bit too hard at the pieces of what I feel are a very broken life. I retread my path until I’m dizzy, picking up little shards and examining them. They cut me, and the longer I look, the more there are. I become obsessed with them. And even when God tries to tell me to put them down, I just keep pushing them in his face. I look down, I look around, I look behind, I look ahead. Even when I look up, I’m not really doing it to behold the Lord. I think to behold God means to intentionally fixate your attention on his character, works, and presence with awe, adoration, and contemplation. I haven’t been doing that. I haven’t been cultivating a heart that longs for God, one that gives as much love to God as I want to receive. I want to receive Him. I’m tired of being distracted. I don’t know why I know what I should do and still don’t do it. But I want him to fill my view until I’m a dumbfounded puddle of joyful jelly.

You should know, if we’re going to be spending this time together, I have a flair for the dramatics. I realize we aren’t necessarily meant to experience such intimacy with God on a constant, never-ending basis. If that was the point, we wouldn’t be here. My point is, I wasn’t pursuing God’s heart. When I did, I was in awe of the way my feelings about God and his son, Jesus Christ, changed. My desire grew to do anything that would bring me closer to them. My power grew so I could push through my weaknesses to seek them. I feel them more, and there have been a few rare moments where it feels like they’re so close. There just needs to be a warm breeze to flutter the veil away.

There is a chance you’re thinking, Aleah, I have done everything I can, and I don’t feel God or his love. I’ve tried and I’ve tried and I’m done. I want you to know that’s okay. I hear you. I sit with you. I have felt what you’re feeling, and I know how debilitating it is. When the darkness is thick and the silence oppressive, I felt blind and unable to see anything of God’s glory. I just want to testify that finding the faith to keep my heart tender and long for God, in spite of those circumstances, has been a ray of light in my life.

I believe pursuing God’s heart can be and perhaps should be, as exciting as that twitter patient of new love, and as rich and fulfilling as old love. There is power in cherishing and cultivating a covenantal relationship with the Lord, and I think sometimes we forget that it is in fact a relationship. I love how Sister Kristen M. Yee described this.

“When we feel his love and reciprocate that love by choosing him each day, the gospel becomes less about checkboxes and more about love and desire. This allows real gospel roots to grow in each of us, bringing us lasting nourishment and joy. This covenantal love helps us to endure when duty or checklists just aren’t enough.” End quote.

How does this work? How can we make our relationships with God more about love and desire? There are three things that have been helpful for me as a place to start.

First, I try to make time not just to feel my feelings, but to examine them, study them, and understand them. I want to bring them to the Lord, feel them with the Lord, learn from them with the Lord. I seek to discern my needs and remain tender and open to what the Lord has to say about them. When we are willing to sit with ourselves, I believe God sits with us. And in such moments we welcome intimacy with the heart of God.

What would it look like for you to sit with your feelings? Maybe you need more time in a busy schedule, or you need to discern how to feel your feels without being overwhelmed. I know sometimes I don’t even know where to begin, but God will be with you through it if you make some time to ponder on what your experiences have been like and what you’re learning.

Second, I try to remember, remember how God has been faithful to me. This will sound weird, but for me, remembering, remembering is different than just plain old remembering. I think I’m actually pretty good at logically being able to say, God did that thing for me, and it was really great. But my heart doesn’t quite get there. There is this fear and pain in me. I ask, what about this time? Where is God right now in this miserable moment I’m in? So when I feel far from God’s love, I draw on his past fidelity to try and get my heart to feel him so I can remain true in my waiting. All things are before the Lord, and his goodness can always be before me as I make the effort to measure how his love has sustained me.

Do any experiences come to your mind where you felt really, really connected to God? I want you to try and recapture that feeling right now. Picture that moment. Where were you? What did you do? What were some of the thoughts that came to your mind? You can use exercises like this to meditate on the love of the Lord. For me, it draws power back into my life, so I have God in the right now moment.

Finally, and I think this has been the most powerful. I ask the Lord to help me love him. I tell him how distracted my heart is, and how much I want that to change. All I had in me was a mustard seed of desire for him, buried deep and in craggy ground. You need to know, he did so much with that prayer. He still is. Most days my heart still beats for other things with such ferocity, it is hard to calm down and just be with him. But where I was blind, I see. I see just how much he is worth, just how precious he is, and I see what my life can be with him at its beating heart.

This next week I want you to ask yourself: what do I need? And how is Jesus Christ the answer? I hope in your scratchy carpet moments of crying out, you can sense how much God honors your heart and wants to become its squishy center.

If any of these principles have touched your heart or you want to learn more, visit singletotheglory.com and download the study guide for this episode. It includes questions and study prompts, resources and even art. I hope it helps you.

Let’s close with prayer.

Father, we come to thee with very tender hearts that are easily distracted and very full.

Father, we want to look for thee, to see thee, to find the ways in which thy hand is over all areas of our lives, including and maybe especially in dating and marriage. Please help us to become single to thy glory, that we can see the tiny ways each and every day that we are provided for, that we are sustained, that we are uplifted.

Father, I think we see so much of what our lives could be that we have these grand visions, these beautiful visions of love for our future, for our eternity. We know that the Savior provides us a way to achieve those things, to make them real. Please, as we draw near unto thee, as we improve our habits, as we soften our hearts with love for thee. May that hope burn bright. May we know the path forward and the path through. May we have guidance so that we can take all we’ve learned from thee and all we’ve been given from thee to build lives that glorify thee, that glorify thy son. We are so grateful for him. We are so grateful for his love.

We ask that we can feel that love and be in that love more and more over the next few weeks. God help us love you more. Show us what we can do to be true to thee and to our covenants. Give us strength, give us energy, give us courage to sacrifice what we need to sacrifice so that our hearts may be fully drawn out towards thee.

I pray for my friends here, that whatever they’re going through, they can know that they are loved and that there is light ready to shine down on them. We offer up this prayer in gratitude, Lord, especially for thy son, and we say these things in his name, even Jesus Christ. Amen.