Many single men and women hoping to get married believe that when they get to meet and marry the person God has set aside for them, their lives will be complete and the gaps in their hearts will be filled.

My dear single friends, I know you're hoping to have that love of a lifetime, thinking that it's what will complete you, making you feel happy and content. While marriage does make us happy and content, it cannot complete our lives. Let me explain.

Historically wrong

History tells us that when men and women marry each other, they find happiness in each other but the problems don't end there. We've heard and read stories of broken families, divorced couples, and estranged spouses. What happened to them? Didn't they say "I do" at the altar? Didn't they go through a romantic courtship period? Didn't they promise "till death do us part"?

From history we see that a wife doesn't complete a husband, and a husband doesn't complete a wife. There's only one person who can complete you and me, and that's not your spouse or mine. It's God.

Made complete

Friends, the truth is that when we try to look for a lifetime partner to complete us, we will end up incomplete just the same. All humans are imperfect, and there's no perfect person – all have fallen short of the glory of God (Romans 3:23).

When we try to make up for our perceived inadequacies and imperfections by looking for someone perfect to complete us, we will find ourselves longing. We find ourselves latching on to the person we marry, thinking that he or she will be the one to satisfy every need, every longing, every hope unmet, and every dream unrealized.

And when we do that, we end up taking more than giving. We end up not loving the person we marry; we end up marrying them for what we can benefit.

Friends, that's not right. We marry because we love. We marry because we want to give ourselves to the person we marry. We marry because we want to care for, nourish, and cherish the very person we believe God created to be our partner, companion, and friend for a lifetime.

Simply put, my dear friend, you do not seek a spouse who will complete you. You seek a spouse who will walk with you as you seek God, who alone completes both of you.

God Completes

Friends, I encourage you to find yourself in the Lord God. He alone completes us. He satisfies every longing and every need. He fulfills the greatest and deepest desires of our hearts as we delight in Him. And as we live for Him, we find ourselves happy and content with our lives, married or not.

God is our ultimate joy. God is the one who sustains our marriages. God is the one who makes us truly happy for more than just a lifetime. God completes us.

"I say to the Lord, "You are my Lord; I have no good apart from you."" (Psalm 16:2)