Your disagreement is noted and repected Lambslove. However in my experience most singles in churches I have been in tend to get resentful of the fact that they are single. And even if you are called into a singles ministry as you interpret it to be, I dont think that it is a sin to marry or even out of the will of God. God gave us the desire for sexual intercourse because it insures the continued propagation of our species. Sex has many benefits - its a very powerful stress reliever (scientifically proven) and also people who have regular, wholesome sexual relationships have been shown to be both physically and emotionally healthier than their non-active counterparts. On a more practical side if you are "called" into a singles ministry then your genetic branch of the family tree ends. There is no more of you to go around. Personally I think that it would be more of a blessing to raise up a few children in the admonition of the Lord to continue on in the good work that he started in you. ANd yes christians do get divorced and their lives get messed up. But I have known people who were never saved that lived quite happily and faithfully with their spouses. Its a circular arguement. Personally I would like to see some hard statistical data on the matter as you and I arguing back and forth proves nothing one way or the other - other than we both have different opinions. That would bury the hatchet for good.
I dont see whats so hard to follow about it lambslove. Yes all good things do come from God. But David screwed up with Bathsheba and he was punished for it considerably, but God used this union to create a genetic line that would eventually give birth to our Lord and savior Jesus Christ. Moses screwed up and killed an Egyptian gaurd - frocing him to flee Egypt, but God brought him back to save the Hebrews anyway. Both examples did lead to holiness because all good things "work for the good of those who love him". God has a plan for our lives, he also gave us a free will. Humans including you I have had times that we were acting according to the will of God and other times we are not. Sometimes there are gray areas where the will of God is not always apparent. These gray areas could be settles once and for all except that theology seems to keep reinventing itself with each new generation. God gives us everything including life. God gives me a job, but does that mean I should wait until the employers come to me? I believe that if you decide that you need to marry for whatever reason be it companionship, sexual pleasure etc.. and ask God to guide you then God will respect your decision especially if you demonstrate a desire to do it according to the holy method of marriage he outlines in his Word. He'll work the situation out for the best whatever the case.
It's true that God can take things and make them good, but it's also true that it's better to seek the best things and accept them from His hand.
God does have a plan for our lives, and that plan includes whether or not we should get married. Too often, Christians buckle under peer pressure and get into marriages that are not only not God's best will for them, but they are just plan BAD. Go to heartlight.com and read the prayer requests; most of them are from men and women who got into bad marriages solely because they wanted to be married, and not because they sought God's best will. The depth of their misery will astound you. Women who knowingly married drunks and child abusers because they were tired of being single. Men who married prostitutes because they thought they could rescue them. Elderly men and women who have lived in pain all their lives because they married for lust and not for love. Middle aged people who have had affairs because their mate isn't who they thought they married. Young women who married too young to the first guy who came along so they wouldn't have to experience loneliness. There are worse things that being single.
Being single is no more painful a lifestyle than the misery of any of those married folks. In fact, by staying single, you are open to the right mate when God brings him/her along to you. And in the meantime, you are available to do work for God that most marrieds can't do.
Singleness isn't a curse, it's a blessing for as long as it lasts.
Singleness isn't a curse, it's a blessing for as long as it lasts.
Therein, I believe, lies the key to resolving a piece of your argument with XW. Like XW I think very few are actually called to the kind of singlehood Paul referred to. What remains is glorifying God with the circumstances you're given.
Maybe it would have been best if you had wedded someone, but now things are different. Not really worse, not better, just different. So how are you going to glorify God given what you're doing? It doesn't imply this "gift" of singleness which I think is rare, but an opportunity to do well in a tough spot and in a harsh world. That opportunity, though, does imply a blessing. So I agree with you there. It also implies something transitory. Like you said, "for as long as it lasts". What Clytie said (and for the life of me can't remember the exact content of what we discussed... sorry ) responds quite well to that idea: "Basically isnt that it? Do all you can NOW".
Let me be a little selfish and pull this back to my original question. What might "all I can" specifically mean for us vs married people. Again, this might be a transitory thing for many of us, but I still maintain that the exercise is useful.
So what are you doing now? What more can you do for the kingdom? I'll throw a few examples out to show what I was trying to get people to think about:
- You have a good amount of disposable income. Where do you dispose of it? People need to play, but mighn't the difference in cost between a frisbee-golf set and a handheld video game player be put to better work at World Vision's latest drinking water for African children campaign? Likewise you love books, but maybe could wait for the paperback edition of Harry Potter (assuming you don't think it's of the devil) for the same reason?
- You are a competent accountant (with the fortune of not working for former Arthur Anderson). You have bits of vacation time collected to do something a little different. Are you aware that a number of missions organizations are almost screaming for temporary tax workers? Would there be enough time to help organize things at a national branch of an organization in, say, Ecuador or Niger? Are they desperate enough that a tiny little ember in your brain starts wondering whether this might be something more permanent?
- You are a legal assistant with a fair amount of time yourself, but not the wherwithal to do anything abroad. You have the boldness to talk back to your supervising attorney when he deserves it. What would happen if you took many of the other singles adrift in your church and negotiated with the church leadership to create an evangelical corp with the time and energy to make a fresh impact in your community, showing people what real living is all about?
- You live in a rural area and know that the local farming community was hurt last year because of a poor crop. Now a bumper crop is coming up but with such depressed prices it won't be much better this year. None of the farmers are talking to each other (even those in your church are too independent), but you have their trust. What would happen if you organized a support group amongst the willing and a prayer group to further support them in a very tough place?
- Likewise you live in a city that is pushing 8% unemployment. Once again, you have the time and energy to organize intra-church networking with some of the member employers to help --even with temp work-- in the mean time. Could spread even further beyond the church and become an outreach?
Just a few to get things going and start massaging brains. Oh, and regarding whether one ought to wait for a call from God: You already have it.
It doesn't imply this "gift" of singleness which I think is rare
Where in the world did this idea of there being a "gift" of singleness come from? There is no such spiritual gift. And if you think that it is rare that Christians die without having been married, then you need to look around you more. Oodles of Christian men and women live their whole lives without being married.
I stand by my statement. If it is God's plan for you to be married, he will provide you a spouse. If He doesn't, you don't get married. Getting married for the sake of being married is the gateway for a whole lifetime of unhappiness.
Singleness isn't a curse, it's a blessing for as long as it lasts. It's not God who curses singleness--it's people who curse it.
Where in the world did this idea of there being a "gift" of singleness come from? There is no such spiritual gift. And if you think that it is rare that Christians die without having been married, then you need to look around you more. Oodles of Christian men and women live their whole lives without being married.
I stand by my statement. If it is God's plan for you to be married, he will provide you a spouse. If He doesn't, you don't get married. Getting married for the sake of being married is the gateway for a whole lifetime of unhappiness.
Singleness isn't a curse, it's a blessing for as long as it lasts. It's not God who curses singleness--it's people who curse it.
sigh. Thank you for picking my nits. I needed them removed.
Anyhow the idea of the gift was already mentioned by DonnyB and referenced by XW:
"Paul considered being single a gift, and we all have different gifts, but notice he was speaking "off the cuff" and not by commandment when he wished we were single:
"But I speak this by permission, and not of commandment." I Corinthians 7:6
That's the origin of the idea. I think it does exist in somewhat rare cases for people who never even considered the possibility of being wed. Could it be that this same gift applies *in the same way* to those who have considered being wed and have not? Maybe.
And it has nothing to do with the point of my post. My point was that our human perspective is incapable of knowing the full content of our lives. We might or might not die without marrying. The lack of that certainty that those few *with* the specific gift (or calling if you prefer), makes it transitory.
Either way, I'm tired of hashing this out over and over again. I was hoping vainly to generate a response specifically on how individuals might live in the context that they're in and to build on that.
I stand by my statement. If it is God's plan for you to be married, he will provide you a spouse. If He doesn't, you don't get married. Getting married for the sake of being married is the gateway for a whole lifetime of unhappiness.
-Lambslove
Love in Christ. But your original statement implied that if you were called to be single then by seeking out marriage then you are committing an infraction against God, or sinning. The debate actually lies in the realm of detrerminism vs. causeality the same philosophical underpinnings of recent movies such as Terminator 3 or The Matrix. Are we actors with God simply pulling our strings as marionettes? God's laws, under the New Covenent, are not selectively enforced. A sin for a believer is the same as a sin for a nonbeliever. God is no respector of persons. True Nazarites such as Samson were set apart not to cut their hair or touch strong drink, but again that was under the Old Covenant. I have a problem reasoning an act being a sin for one person and not for another. In short if you seek union with a born again believer that loves Christ as you do then according to the Bible you are still pure. But if you are "called" to be single and you seek the same route then you are sinning? Sure there is the part in the bible that talks about certain things (manners of dress etc..) being a sin to one person and not to another but that was based upon requirements that were set by the HUMANS themselves.
We simply fall in to two different lines of thought. You believe in an infallible plan or perfect mold for youir life based upon what God has established. This is probably correct. This was Plato's argument as opposed to His student Artisotle's of nominal invention. And in God's original plan that would work just fine. But we happen to live in a world that is fowled by sin. If God gives you the strength to resist the temptations thrown at you the I applaud you. But you seem to make the inference that the single life is better than that of marriage and for the sake of the ministry that may be in some respectss correct. But for the sake and well being of the individual I reserve questions. There is no data (survey, etc...) to my knowledge supportig one way or the other quality of life of Christian Singles vs. Marrieds. There is however data that suggests that people who have healthy sexual relationships(married, single partner) are more happy, healthy, and emotionally satisfied than their single counterparts. And your observations of the prayer requests on another board are unreliable representations of a population sample to determine trends as wholes. It is the equivalent of going to either a democrat or a repubican political forum and then trying to make a determination about a public policy such as the economy or abortion. The results on each board are going to be skewed by biases. Neither of the three is a reliable scientific sample. Your forum observations also seem to be representative of Christians who have "unequally yoked" themselves with the unsaved. Going about anything in an unplanned, halfhazzard manner wether it be relationships or business will ultimately end in disaster if you remove chance luck. Yes there are problems with relationships today but that is also the result of the dynamic processes of our culture at this point in history that have torn apart familial institutions accross the board. As well too often I have found that many people who are claiming to be called into the single lifestyle (and I'm not stereotyping because as weve discussed there are some) do so as to pass the buck for their personal failings in relationships.
There is no data (survey, etc...) to my knowledge supportig one way or the other quality of life of Christian Singles vs. Marrieds. There is however data that suggests that people who have healthy sexual relationships(married, single partner) are more happy, healthy, and emotionally satisfied than their single counterparts.
Just one small point. Be careful in the demand for data where questions of rightness and faith are involved. It might not be inappropriate here, but matters of faith can and do defy empirical data gathering. After all, it has to do with what really is rather than what humans observe.
Bedwyr
ps- I had the same reaction when I heard Michael Newdow (US plaintiff involved in a pledge-of-allegiance dispute and atheist) make the same demand for data support the existence of God.
But your original statement implied that if you were called to be single then by seeking out marriage then you are committing an infraction against God, or sinning.
I implied no such thing. I said that if you are meant to get married, God will provide you with a mate. If He doesn't then His plan might just be for you to stay single. Taking a mate just because you want one isn't a good reason to get married. Every Christian needs to prayerfully be open to the idea that they might be better off single, that God's best will might be for them to be single, and that what seems like a desperate situation here (singleness) won't matter a mite in eternity.
It is an infraction against God to take what He hasn't given you, yes, just like it's wrong to take the Lexis He hasn't given you, the money He hasn't given you, the children He hasn't given you, in the same way it is wrong to take a spouse selfishly just because you want one, without regard to compatibility, maturity or any other factor that should go into choosing a mate. In that sense, it is covetting.
) responds quite well to that idea: "Basically isnt that it? Do all you can NOW".
Linear Mode
