By Tatianah Green
If you watch the ABC show Scandal or not, view this clip from episode 18 of this season. It’s a conversation between President Fitzgerald Grant and his wife, Mellie, who knows about his affairs and he knows about her dirty laundry as well.
What blew me in this whole clip was that in
Mellie’s fragile state, she says that pretending in your marriage is what’s
real. Pretending to love one another for all the years that you vowed to be
together, in public behind the smiles, etc. Whoa,
I thought, who says stuff like this?
Mellie is a character on TV, but that statement comes from a place of hurt,
rejection and lack of real love to say that pretending is what’s real. And so
many real families and couples fake the funk to get through.
Relationships take hard work, and as believers we have this
fine line of crossing when we meet someone new. The line teeters between “This
is the one for me, they are perfect” to “I’m being delusional and going to make
this work because I may not get anything else better than who I’m with now.”
That’s a scary thought process to have but it’s real. Have you ever dated
someone and thought you were settling? Have you ever thought that there was
someone better out there for you, the “perfect” person for you? Were you ever
caught up in a relationship in which you were pretending to get through, to
have someone to hold you, to say that you weren’t single or alone? Christians
go through that too.
Mellie says that everyone pretends in marriage. I have to
disagree. I believe that she and Fitz got married on reasons that didn’t
include genuine love or God, it was a business/political deal. We say that
about the celebrity couples who quickly get together and then break up a second
later. Where is the genuine love and integrity? We have to remember where those
qualities come from-God- and get back to basics.
"For I have told you often before, and I say it again with tears in my eyes, that there are many whose conduct shows they are really enemies of the cross of Christ. They are headed for destruction. Their god is their appetite, they brag about shameful things, and they think only about this life here on earth. But we are citizens of heaven, where the Lord Jesus Christ lives. And we are eagerly waiting for him to return as our Savior." -Philippians 3:18-20 NLT
With God, there is no pretending, His love is real and He is forgiving of the ugliness we show and think we are. We have to practice that relationship that God has with us with each other, for Jesus tells us to love each other as He has loved us (John 13:34-35). This means no pretending, no hiding or lying, no settling for less just to get by, that’s not the God we serve and that’s not how He intended for us to spend our days on earth. You are deserving of love and happiness in a relationship and a marriage if you desire, but you gotta be real with yourself, your mate, your God, and stop pretending.
Singles, we can’t pretend to not feel certain emotions in
our singleness. It’s okay to feel lonely sometimes, we are emotional creatures
and need to be uplifted by the Holy Spirit and good counsel to get us out of
those pits we dig ourselves into. You can always get a pep talk from God, just
open up to Him. Say it out loud, get into prayer mode, or however you express
yourself to the Lord. Pull down the defense mechanisms that portray you as
tough and bad all by yourself when you really want true companionship and
unsure of when and how it will manifest. This kind of pretending is not real,
it’s also not going to help you get what you desire out of life any sooner.
That’s what some of my male friends mention to me when they
see women approach them in an ungraceful and aggressive manner, aka “thirsty.”
No women of God should be thinking like a worldly man, trying to date like a stereotypical worldly
man does: dating numbers of women, hook ups, and numbing your true emotions.
That’s how people get hurt-by pretending the real feelings are not there. Stop the
madness and keep calm; God has the right person for you, are you getting in the
way of that? This goes for the brothers as well.
What I'm getting to in all of this is TV or no TV, pretending to be something you're not, including in relationships, will eat you alive and hurt another person. Don't stay because it's convenient, don't fake it til you make it, face reality and be free from the lies and the pressure.
What I'm getting to in all of this is TV or no TV, pretending to be something you're not, including in relationships, will eat you alive and hurt another person. Don't stay because it's convenient, don't fake it til you make it, face reality and be free from the lies and the pressure.


