Are you ready for the next step?

April is here, and I'm just a few weeks shy of my first wedding anniversary! As my husband and I make plans for a 'second honeymoon' I have been thinking about our first year of marriage a lot, and look forward to sharing with you some of the things I've learned about relationships and marriage. This week, however, I would like to sort of work my way to the actual marriage tips by starting with the question...'I've met the one I think I want to marry, but how do I know he/she is the right one?'

How I knew
You know when you are 'in love' when you see him/her as a flawless person you can't stop thinking about every few minutes, but how do you know if this is just infatuation, or really the person God has for you? Even though I can't answer this question for you, I can try to help guide you in making that decision.
My husband and I spent about 18 of the first 22 months of our relationship (this counts from first meeting via Skype, to marriage) thousands of miles away from each other. Believe it or not, I still caught myself thinking about him all the time, even though I didn't see him or even talk to him every day. I do think that it was God's plan for me to be so far apart so that I could step back and think about the serious questions in a clearer light. For me it wasn't too hard. My husband was in the ministry, which was something that I had prayed for, he was in God's word, and had shown himself to be a godly, spiritual man, we had spent literally hours talking about our views on political, and spiritual topics (when all you have is Skype to rely on, you do a lot of talking!) ect. To top it off, God gave me a peace about it, and on my wedding day, I had no doubts that this was the man God had given me.

How you can know
I have seen countless acquaintances on facebook here lately, of girls who are 'in love' but are sleeping with their boyfriends, and claiming it's God's will for them to be together. After a little while they come back with a shambled relationship, because the 'in love' stage is over and reality has settled in, and those boys are not as great as they first looked like. So when making the big decision to take the next step here are some questions you can ask yourself...

Has my boyfriend/girlfriend and I kept each other from being tempted to sin (to have sex, or other physical touching that you have previously agreed was off limits)
Has he/she encouraged me in my spiritual walk/made me want to grow more spiritually
Have we talked about money/debt, children, family, etc.? (remember, the more you discuss this now, the less you will have to later, and will help reduce future arguments) 
For girls:
Have we discussed how he will lead in our relationship (Ephesians 5:22-24) (for guys, have you made it easy for her to trust your leadership?)
Is he someone I can submit to? Remember, we are commanded to submit, even if we don't like the decisions being made (doesn't mean we can't help with the decision making, but the husband makes the final decisions). Unless the husband is making a decision that is completely against the Bible, we should submit to our husbands. So are you ready to do that?

Here are just a few that I can think of right now. If you think of other questions I've missed, feel free to comment below!  Remember that you can have all the time in the world to physically love on each other after marriage. Talking to your future spouse can make marriage a lot smoother, and helps you feel comfortable talking to that person that you will be with for the rest of your life!