You Complete Me…Bologna!
When I first heard that line during the movie, like everyone else, I thought how sweet. As it became an overused phrase bandied about by immature and shallow individuals I started to really think about it. It’s Bologna! Looking for another human being to complete us idolizes a relationship and tries to fill a void only God can fill. Only God can complete us.
Expecting another person to fill an emptiness in your life is an unrealistic expectation. It places a burden on the other person to hold a position that is not humanly possible to maintain. Being a complete person is about having God in your life, not your boyfriend/girlfriend/spouse to make you feel whole and validated.
In addition this idea that we need another person to complete us is a slap in the face to all Single Christians! In 1 Corinthians Pauls talks a lot about marriage and the good therein, but he also says:
1 Corinthians 7:32-33 But I would have you without carefulness. He that is unmarried careth for the things that belong to the Lord, how he may please the Lord: But he that is married careth for the things that are of the world, how he may please his wife.
Paul himself was obviously not an incomplete person because he lacked a woman in his life. Neither is any other person who remains single through life, or after a divorce, an incomplete person.
But, what about being one flesh isn’t that completing each other?
Genesis 2:23-24 And Adam said, This is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh: she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man. Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh.
My husband and I are one flesh. We compliment each other and are flip sides of the same coin Together we make a whole that is more than the individual, but we don’t complete the other.
- We honor each other.
- We respect each other.
- We support each other.
- We encourage each other.
- We stand by each other.
- We give ourselves to the other with our whole heart, love in action, and body.
- We each become a complete individual through our relationship with God.
Only by being two complete and whole individuals looking to God, and not another human being, to fulfill us and give us validation in our lives can we enter into a healthy marriage relationship. As a human being we might let each other down, but God never will. Only God can truely complete us, not another person.
Don’t be a Jerry McGuire! Seek God, not another person to fulfill you. Don’t try to make your boyfriend/girlfriend/spouse Jesus in your life. Let Jesus fill the hole inside of you and fill each other with the overspill from your relationship with Him.