So then he who marries his betrothed does well, and he who refrains from marriage will do even better. -1 Corinthians 7:38
This coming Sunday I will preach from 1 Corinthians 7 on the topic of singleness. I have intentionally placed this message toward the beginning of our series on family matters because I believe it is important to stress early on that the series is not just intended for those who are married. Although that group clearly makes up the majority of adults at LifePoint, we also have many single people who make this church their home (unmarried, those who will be married, and widows/widowers). And here is what I want to stress. Not only are those who remain single part of the body of Christ, but they are those who are promised greater blessings than those who choose marriage and family.
How might I be able to say this and remain on biblical grounds? By reading and applying what Paul teaches us in
1 Corinthians chapter 7. Although Paul makes it abundantly clear that there is absolutely no prohibition against marriage by God, and that marriage is a good gift that is to be enjoyed, he likewise makes clear that singleness is the preferable option (for those who have the gift of celibacy). It is true that the Old Testament lifts up marriage as a desirable station in life. It is also true that the great majority of humans who are in a proper relationship with God live as married persons, or persons who will be married. Finally, it is true that the “cultural mandate”given to all humanity is to “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth.” The cultural mandate is God’s command to exercise dominion over the earth, subdue it, and develop its latent potential (Gen. 1:26-28; cf. Gen 2:15). God calls all humans, as those made in his image, to fill the earth with his glory through creating what we commonly call culture. Some would argue that single people are unable to fulfil this mandate, but I do not believe this is true. Simply put, every human being does not have to propagate offspring in order to participate in and maintain a part in fulfilling this command. If this argument was true without exception for all time, John the Baptist, the apostle Paul, and Jesus himself would have found themselves in disobedience to God.
Singleness is generally considered (at least in our culture) a state of life that is best kept temporary. Some, maybe even many, who are single consider it not only unpleasant but a curse that is to be remedied at virtually any cost. I was single for twenty-three years of my life. However, I was in a serious dating relationship with Dedra for three years prior to our marriage. For me to claim that the overwhelming desire to be married is unhealthy and unbiblical rings hollow to some – that it is easy for me to make such a statement when I did not have to “endure” many years as a single man. There may be some truth in that I suppose, as long as we also agree that Paul (as a single man) and Jesus (as a single man) really have no leg to stand on when they address the issue of marriage, seeing that they never experienced such a relationship. It is not our experience that makes a statement true or false but what God has to say about the matter at hand.“Truth,” Jonathan Edwards said, “is the agreement of our ideas with the ideas of God.” It has very little to do with our experiences. So I say again as a man who has been in a committed relationship with his wife for over thirty-three years of his life; an overwhelming desire to be married is unhealthy and unbiblical. A hope and desire to be married is neither unhealthy nor unbiblical. It is what that desire causes us to do, think, and even demand that distinguishes its relative value.
God consistently calls on his people to radically reorient their lives from a worldview proposed and demanded by the world around us to a biblical worldview. God’s covenant people in the Old Testament advanced his kingdom via obedience to God, the occupation and settlement of the Promised Land, the establishment of families, and the training of their children. In the New Testament, the kingdom of God advances via the spiritual rebirth of those who are in rebellion to God. There is a decided reorientation away from physical families to spiritual families. We now know that marriage (as wonderful a gift as we know it to be) is temporary. It will pass away (or be changed in significant ways) in heaven. Being a part of a physical family is a great blessing, but no guarantee of eternal blessing. Finding life and hope in Jesus Christ and adoption into God’s family is the source of not only temporal blessings but eternal as well. Both single and married persons share this hope equally, and it is a better, more glorious hope.
These are some of the matters we will address on Sunday, Lord willing. I am praying that the Lord will help us to see not only this matter, but each matter we address in this series, in a clearer, more biblical light.
Grace and peace,
Pastor Jym