Well, so far we have spent some time talking about the family unit in this series. We’ve devoted a lot of time to the marriage relationship because it is foundational and we have also spent some time exploring the parent child relationship. I know that there are some of you who don’t quite fit into that “normal” category of the family unit. I want to say thank you for your patience as we have addressed some of these things in this series and I’m also happy to tell you that your day has come! Today, we are going to talk about what it means to be single. This is a series about God being glorified in the homes of His people, and according to statistics, a little less than half of those people are single. Not only is it important for you to know a lot of these things that we have talked about so far, but it is also important for you to have a good understanding of what it means to be single during this season of your life from the Scriptures. For that reason we will spend a couple of weeks talking about singleness and dating.
In my experience, singleness is not typically something that is celebrated here in American church culture. It has a very negative stereotype. Andreas Kostenberger has some very insightful words concerning singles in our culture: “Post-adolescent singles are probably the most overlooked social group in the contemporary Western church. While larger congregations typically do have “college and career” ministries (some of which seem to operate at least in part as church-sponsored dating services), and while the topic of singleness occasionally engenders a brief chapter in a book on marriage and the family (witness the current example), for the most part singles have been marginalized within the modern church. To most Western Christians it appears self-evident that marriage is the normal state. Therefore, when a post-adolescent single is found within the body of Christ, many well-meaning believers view it as their Christian duty to locate a compatible mate for that individual.
Moreover, when someone does remain single well into his or her twenties and thirties, either by choice or by circumstances, many people being to try to diagnose the problem (be it sexual orientation, physical appearance, intellectual ability, social ineptitude, unduly high standards, or other factors) that has trapped the single person in the unnatural and undesirable condition of being unmarried. It is probably no exaggeration to say that the thought that singleness could be an acceptable permanent state has not even occurred to many people in our churches today. What is more, the only call of God that Western Christians fear more than the call to missions is the call to a life of celibacy.
Given the fact that 46 percent of the U.S. population over the age of 15 was single at the beginning of the twenty-first century, the neglect and distortion of the state of singleness by the Western church is anything but justified. Although most will eventually marry, statistics indicate that a growing number will never do so, and many who do will find themselves single once again because of divorce or the death of a spouse. For these reasons, and in light of the fact that many of the heroes of the faith have been single (including Jesus) – not to mention the scriptural teaching that singleness can be a gracious gift of God (Matt. 19:11-12, 1 Cor. 7:7) – the contemporary church stands in urgent need of reappraising its stance on the issue of singleness.”[1] That is exactly what we will seek to do today as we examine a passage that profoundly exalts true contentment with Christ alone and single-minded devotion to Him. From this passage I would like to point out three truths that are important for both married and single people.
1) Both Marriage & Singleness are Gifts from God (7:6-9)
What Paul is simply saying here is that even though He wishes that all people were single like him, not everyone has the same gift that Paul has. Some people receive the gift of singleness and other people the gift of marriage, and not all people get the same gift. So how does one know if they have the gift of singleness or not? Well, if you never get married, that is certainly one way to know, but Paul does give some insight here into part of what this gift looks like. He seems to imply that people who receive the gift of singleness are able overcome sexual temptation through celibacy. In other words, I take how Paul is describing people who need to get married in 7:9 to imply that people who do have this gifting experience great grace in overcoming sexual temptation. On the other hand, people who receive the gift of marriage overcome sexual temptation through physical intimacy with a spouse. Paul calls people who are made for marriage people who have trouble exercising “self control.” (7:9). Paul says in 7:36 that such a person sees that their “passions are strong,” and that marriage “has to be” (they have a sense of moral and physical necessity to get married).
Now one more thing I want to point out about this truth is that even people who are given the gift of marriage experience the gift of singleness for a season. No one can say, “It’s OK for me to commit sexual sin because I don’t have the gift of singleness.” If you are single, you have it at least temporarily and are just waiting on a gift exchange! This means that any single person (teen, young adult, engaged, divorced, widowed) should practice celibacy and model contentment with Christ until God in His sovereignty brings someone along to consider marrying.
2) Both Marriage & Singleness are Divine Assignments to bring Glory to God In (7:17-31)
Paul says in 7:17, “Only let each person lead the life that the Lord has assigned to him, and to which God has called him. This is my rule in all the churches.” He will go on to repeat that instruction in 7:20, 7:24, and 7:26. The first thing to notice about this instruction from Paul is that God gives every believer a divine assignment. All Christians have been given a divine assignment in life. For some it is circumcision (being a Jew), for some uncircumcision (being a Gentile), for some it is slavery, for some it is being free. For some it is marriage and for some it is some form of singleness (being single, engaged, divorced, widowed). Sometimes the assignment gets modified. The bottom line though is that each of these assignments are a sovereign calling from God (7:20,24) in which we should seek to bring glory to God. The idea is that we are to bloom where we are planted and that these assignments are the pots in which we are planted.
Now just in case you are wondering about this, saying that God has a divine, sovereign assignment for every believer doesn’t mean that God approves of things like slavery, divorce, etc. And it also doesn’t mean that God is responsible for the evil choices that individuals make as part of that assignment. Genesis 50:20 is helpful here where Joseph tells his brothers that what they had intended for evil, God had intended for good. There you see Joseph being given a divine assignment (betrayal, slavery, imprisonment) in which there were many circumstances that God did not approve of and is not responsible for, yet intended for good. Joseph’s part was to bring God glory in that divine assignment. I think that Paul is saying something very similar here, that all of us find ourselves on different assignments in life in which God in His wisdom saw fit to bring about for our good and His glory and that we are to bloom in those places that we are planted. That means that married people should seek to bring God glory in their marriage (husbands modeling Christ-like love & servant leadership; wives modeling helpful submission). That means that single people should seek to bring God glory in their singleness (modeling contentment with Christ; preparing yourself for marriage).
The next thing that we see here is that every believer should seek to bring glory to God in his or her assignment with a sense of urgency. Why do I say urgency? Paul says here that there is a “present distress” (7:26) that we’re living in and that it should flavor our attitudes towards marriage and singleness and he goes on to say things like, “Don’t seek a spouse if you don’t have one. Let those who have spouses live as though they had none. Let those who deal with the world live as though they had no dealings with it.” What does he mean? He doesn’t mean that anyone who is single should not seek marriage and He doesn’t mean that a husband should not act like a godly husband to his wife, but I think he does mean that people shouldn’t make things like marriage the major pursuit of their life. Why? He says it is because we live in this “present distress.” What is the “present distress”? It is defined in the passage here. Combine 7:29 and 7:31 and what you get is that Paul is talking about an “appointed time” that is coming very shortly where the “present form of this world” is going to pass away. We are living in the last days, and we should live with urgency in light of that reality and not be weighed down by “worldly troubles” (7:28). The time we have is short and we have a job to do in taking the gospel to the nations. Human marriage, as much of a gift as it is, is only a temporary reality. It is not eternal (Matthew 22:23-30).
This idea of living with urgency in light of the world’s soon end and Christ’s soon return is a major theme in the New Testament. Romans 13:11-14: “Besides this you know the time, that the hour has come for you to wake from sleep. For salvation is nearer to us now than when we first believed. The night is far gone; the day is at hand. So then let us cast off the works of darkness and put on the armor of light. Let us walk properly as in the daytime, not in orgies and drunkenness, not in sexual immorality and sensuality, not in quarreling and jealousy. But put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh, to gratify its desires.” 1 John 2:15-17: “Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world – the desires of the flesh and the desires of the eyes and pride in possessions – is not from the Father but is from the world. And the world is passing away along with its desires, but whoever does the will of God abides forever.” These passages are telling us to wake up from the slumber that this world has rocked us into and to start living in light of eternity. At the end of the day, human marriage is a temporary thing that belongs to the present form of this world that is going to pass away. If you are single, this should give you a whole new perspective on life. If you are married, I think that living in light of eternity will only enrich your marriage because it keeps your marriage from being the end game and makes how you can bring glory to God in your marriage with the time that you have the end game. This reality doesn’t degrade marriage; it infuses it with purpose!
3) Marriage is Good, But Singleness is Better (7:32-40)
Paul says that someone who remains single “will do even better” (7:38) and will be “happier” (7:40) than someone who gets married. Wow. That would have been a hard pill to swallow as a single guy in college. I remember thinking in college that I would be fine dying a martyr’s death or the Lord coming back very soon, just as long as I could get married to a woman and sleep with her first! I imagine that is what a lot of young, single Christians are thinking but not saying. And if you’re not, you either have the gift of celibacy or are lying!
So why does Paul call singleness better? I think two reasons are abundantly clear in this chapter. First, singleness makes one more advantageous for kingdom ministry. Now it is probably a good time to clarify that Paul is not throwing marriage under the bus in this chapter. Paul’s writings and the rest of the Bible has a higher view of marriage than we could possibly imagine and we should strive for balance here. In 1 Timothy 4:1-5, Paul condemns those who forbid marriage as promoting the teaching of demons.
Having said that, one can easily see practically this truth. Marriage does tie us to a different set of priorities and anxieties, does it not? If God calls a single person to some dangerous part of Africa tomorrow, they can transition into that call much easier than I could. And while there would be questions that would arise, the questions that would arise for me carry far more anxiety than a single person’s would. A single person wonders what moving to that part of the world and risking their lives for the gospel would mean for them; I wonder what it will mean for my wife, my four-year-old son, and my one-year-old daughter. I’m not just risking my life; I’m risking theirs as well. And there are fewer things that would haunt me more than the thought of my wife or my children suffering and being martyred. What’s more, what if I’m the one martyred? I leave a wife widowed and my children without a father. Is the cause of Christ worth that risk? ABSOLUTELY! The point is simply that a single person is much more versatile when it comes to the things of the Lord and how to please Him. They are able to live with an “undivided devotion to the Lord” in a way that married people with a family aren’t. Again, that doesn’t make married people second class Christians. It is just one practical reason that Paul calls singleness better.
The second reason that Paul calls singleness better is that singleness magnifies the all-satisfying sufficiency of Christ. Both marriage and singleness display something. Marriage is meant to display the covenant keeping love between Christ and the church. Singleness, I believe, is meant to display the all-satisfying sufficiency of Christ. It shows the world that Christ is enough; that Christ is better than a spouse, or children, or anything other thing that this world has to offer. Now that is a profound truth! And it is a truth that speaks to much more than being single doesn’t it? The all-satisfying sufficiency of Christ is a reality that all of us are to walk in because if we do not, we will begin to make things like relationships and sex and marriage and spouses and children and possessions into idols. What happens when your spouse dies? What happens when your children are taken away? What happens when you lose your possessions? When we understand the gospel we understand that all of those things are not places that we find our identity; they are gifts of grace that were purchased for us at the cross. When we understand the gospel, we understand that we were made for more than marriage. We were made for God and our greatest need in this life is God Himself. The gospel is the story of how the all-satisfying and all-sufficient God of the universe created us for Himself, to be satisfied with Himself forever. Instead of living with Him in infinite joy, we rebelled against Him and became a dead race of rebels who are sinners by nature and by choice. How does He deal with our rebellion? He humbles Himself and becomes one of us and fulfills all of the righteous demands that are upon us as a member of the human race and then, having committed no sin, suffers every ounce of God’s wrath upon the cross in our place! He dies in our place, for our rebellion and then rose victoriously in order to give us life again. He does all of this so that we can be reconciled to Him. He does this so that we can go from being and wicked and empty people to being eternally satisfied in Him and with Him.
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