I am a shy christian woman almost in my thirties who had to deal with OCD almost her whole life and still struggling with finding a job. Lately I'm thinking about marriage and stuff. I never had a boyfriend before. I have discussed with some people what to do about my situation, because it seems quite hopeless. I don't go to my youth fellowship because I can't mingle with the people. I've tried online christian dating, but there were no matching candidates. I've asked some people if they knew someone, but with no result.
Now there is a guy who I have known since little, but is still a vague acquaintance, that I have interest in, because he is also shy, has a gentle personality and a good job. But the problem is, he's not a christian. The weird thing is, my mother, who is a devoted christian her whole life, thinks he's a good match for me, because of his good qualities. She says I have to contact him. I don't know what to do.
Here is also some background information about my christian life:
I do go to church each sunday and pray to God to give me a partner. But sometimes I have the feeling I have to change my life as a christian first. I have this feeling or consciousness that I'm not a very devoted christian, but a passive christian. I know you have to search God's kingdom first and then He will give you everything you wishes. I feel like I am too attracted to the worldly things in life like movies and internet, and sometimes forget about God. I do pray and read the bible each day, but sometimes more as a obligation. I do believe in God though and I'm even baptized, but I don't feel I bear fruit as a christian. I don't know precisely whether this affects the fact that I'm still very shy, dealing with OCD, being jobless and having no boyfriend. But if it is, what am I supposed to do to bear some fruit as an christian? I'm too shy to participate in church activities. Should I pray more than 2 times a day or donate more money to church even though I'm jobless? Should I put some free times aside to have more time with God? What is the meaning of bearing fruit anyway?
I can think of two good passages that talk about fruit. One is the fruit of the Spirit passage in Galatians. Love, joy, peace, etc. Having a godly character is one way of bearing fruit. Paul also wrote in Romans 1, 'that I might have some fruit among you, even as among other Gentiles.' Winning other people to Christ is fruit. I also believe positively impacting people for Christ, for example, discipling someone who then bears fruit is also bearing fruit. That's my opinion, anyway.
As far as the husband thing goes, have you tried an intense period of seeking the Lord with prayer and fasting? You can't earn God's grace, but fasting may be able to help you be humble and focused on the Lord. Think of your hunger as hunger for God. An easier way of fasting than no food for 40 days is you could just eat at night and fast during daylight hours. Seek God and pray.
I wouldn't pursue a relationship with an unbeliever. Does the man you are interested in have any Christian background at all. IMO, if someone wants to set you up, as the lady, it makes more sense to get other people to suggest it to him and let him take at least some initiative, at least in saying yes and asking them to set you up with him. That way, you won't be chasing him around. If he's not a believer, there are plenty of people on this site who can tell you the problems of marrying an unbeliever or someone with very different religious beliefs.
As far as online dating goes, there sure is a lot of it beyond just one site. If there were no matches, what do they match by, values? personality type? I met my wife before Internet dating took off, so I don't know about all that. I helped a friend who didn't know computers well get set up on Christian mingle and there was like one or two people in the system that matched with him, but there have to be a lot more people than that out there on other sites.
I used to live overseas in my wife's country, and there, marrying with a foreigner, a westerner at least, is a high status thing to do, and some women there like Caucasian men anyway. My wife would talk to single women who would ask her how to marry a white man. She didn't really know many single white men in our social circles. (Ironically, now, in the US a few single men looking for women from her country, and we don't know many single women from there these days who are looking.) One of the women came to our house for some kind of Bible study type event we were hosting and she told us she was looking for a husband. She looked much younger, but she was 40, and she was an attractive lady, but no one had proposed and she didn't have any prospects.
I mentioned that I'd heard a lot of people were meeting online these days. I think it was 8% or 18% of newly married couples at the time, I'd heard. I even knew a couple who'd met that way. So she shows up at our house at another similar even we held at New Years a year later, and she was engaged to a man from Virginia that she'd met and e-dated through a web cam online. He sponsored her to move to the US, and several years later we heard from her, and she was living in Virginia.
The good thing about online dating on the right site is you can find men who are really looking for a wife and there is none of this thinking about each other as potential romantic partners and never doing anything about it. People see each other's profiles and if they are interested, they start talking. I don't know how it words with passwords, but you can use 'site:' followed by a portion of the website name on a google search engine to look for key phrases like 'love Jesus', 'serve God together', 'I don't believe in sex before marriage' or whatever key phrases you'd like to search through for a spouse.
Ultimately, though, you need to depend on God to help you find someone. When I was single, it seemed like it was taking forever to find that special person. I started praying for the Lord to hurry it up and bring me that person. I'd been praying for years, but after praying more intensely about it, after a few months, I met her. It had seemed like for years like something that just wasn't happening. But God answered my prayer like He did for many others. When you look for a spouse, put God's kingdom first. Look at the duties of a wife to a husband and ask yourself, can I do that with this person? Can I be a helpmeet for this person? When you ask those questions about an unbeliever, hopefully you'll see there are problems with putting God's kingdom first if you do that.
In some countries, you go to church and ask the pastor, and he'll try to set you up with someone to marry. If you wouldn't mind marrying a Korean man, you could get to know a Korean pastor and see if there is someone they'd want to match you up with. When Koreans get to the stage where they are asking to get set up, though, they move fast. If their churches are like over here where there can be more single women than men, it might not be as easy for women to do that as men.
I hear some people have gotten married through the Singles pages of this website. You can also search for all kinds of details from past posts, so you could find a lot about someone's beliefs if they'd posted a lot on here, things you might not find out from someone on a date.
If you don't mind marrying someone a little older, I know some single fellows around here who are looking.
