I'm always on the lookout for sermons on the topic of "Singleness". I like to listen to sermons on all sorts of topics (esp. Missions, Grace, The Gospel, and the tough topics of the Bible), but sermons geared specifically towards Singles are of a personal interest to me.
While browsing around on the website of FBC Smyrna where my former youth minister now preaches, I saw a sermon recording titled "Singles", so I was interested to hear what their head pastor had to say (you can listen to it here and be patient for it to load). I must say that I was a little disappointed to hear the usual sermon addressing 1 Corinthians 7. By "the usual sermon" I mean that it talks about the following topics:
- It is better to marry than to burn with passion.
- Some people have "the gift of singleness" and others don't, therefore those that don't have the gift should get married to deal with sexual temptation.
- Even though it's not in 1 Cor. 7, Gen. 2:18 "It is not good for man to be alone." always gets mentioned.
The argument to get married if you're struggling with sexual temptation sounds good, but a lot of us are trying that. "Just get married" sounds easy, but it's not. In my opinion, this causes us young singles to spend all of our time and energy trying to find a spouse. Then you reach an age where you give up on marriage and resign yourself to a life of uselessness in the church and society. The topic of how to live while single NEVER gets addressed. Well, that's a little exaggerated; I've heard it talked about exactly TWICE (hereafter mentioned as the Two Sermons).
Another argument that bugs me is the idea of a gift of singleness. One of the Two Sermons talked about how if you're single, you have the gift of singleness. Marriage is a gift from God, and Singleness is a gift from God. I'll address the Genesis 2 verse here as well. This sermon I was listening to from FBC Smyrna talked about how God is pro-marriage because he arranged the first marriage. Yes, I agree that God created marriage, but he created Adam SINGLE! We are all born single.
A lot of the frustrations that I have with my church and other churches has to do with the wrong focus. God is not pro-family (see Jesus in Luke 14:26). God is not pro-marriage (see Jesus in Matthew 22:29-30). God is pro-God! According to the Two Sermons, we are to live a life of service to God and a life that glorifies God whether we are married or single. Now, I admit that marriage can help with this, but it's not NECESSARY. The thing that I wish would be mentioned more in other sermons is that Singles can be MORE useful to the church than married people because we have more time to give and we can more whole-heartedly focus on our ministry. We should exploit this instead of being ashamed of our failed attempts to be married, and I wish that we would be encouraged more to do so.
Now, I don't know if one is better than the other (single or married), but I like how one of the Two Sermons says that marriage is a picture of Jesus' relationship with the church, and singleness is a picture of how we will each individually be in heaven (again, see Matthew 22:29-30).
Here are links to listen to the Two Sermons
Nathan Trice - "A Word to Singles" (You'll have to give an email address in order to download the sermon, so make sure you give your Junk Mail email address if you have one since they send out weekly newsletters. I can email it to you if you really want to listen to it)
Paul Matthies - "Singleminded Part 1" and "Singelminded Part 2"
Okay, it's actually three, but I could the 2-part sermon as one.
Please listen to these sermons and post your comments about them and anything else to do with singleness or marriage or anything else you feel burdened to share.
Doctory Moments
13 years ago
6 comments:
The "struggling with sexual temptation" argument never really held water with me... that's like saying, "I'm being tempted by nicotine, so I'll just go smoke."
That aside, it's still a bad reason to get married.
As for your argument about single vs. married, I think it's just a matter of the Lord's plan and blooming where God has planted you.
For some, it may be to get married at a young age. For others it may be getting married a ways down the road or not at all.
Who's to say that one is more useful to God than another? Or more important? Should that even matter to us?
Our goal should be to glorify God in every facet of our life, no matter what stage we're in.
Another reason to get married - See Catholic Priests
While I agree that one shouldn't get get married in an effort to avoid sexual sin; if a person waits until they are perfect they will never get married. Similar situation is if you wait until you have no temptations before trying to serve the Lord. Won't happen.
So is a married person's ministry to their family less important than a single person's ministry to others? Remember, without marriage, you wouldn't be here and if I remember correctly, God uses marriage quite a bit to describe the relationship between Himself and the Church.
I don't think the human race would last too long without marriage.
"As for your argument about single vs. married, I think it's just a matter of the Lord's plan and blooming where God has planted you."
I agree, but the unknown of if you're going to get married at some point or not can drive some Singles crazy. They concentrate on trying to find someone or trying to figure out if they're supposed to stay single, instead of just serving God, the church, and others where they are.
"Who's to say that one is more useful to God than another? Or more important? Should that even matter to us?"
I think that Singles are more useful to the church than married people (there, I said it). They have more time and resources to give as well as more of themselves (energy and heart). Like Paul says in 1 Cor. 7:32-34...
"An unmarried man is concerned about the Lord's affairs—how he can please the Lord. But a married man is concerned about the affairs of this world—how he can please his wife— and his interests are divided. An unmarried woman or virgin is concerned about the Lord's affairs: Her aim is to be devoted to the Lord in both body and spirit. But a married woman is concerned about the affairs of this world—how she can please her husband."
The problem is that in the current church culture, so much focus is placed on the family, that Singles feel out of place and irrelevant. Don't believe me? Take note of the program titles and slogans used on Christian radio programs. I remember Ross King going off on this in one of his journal entries on his website www.rosskingmusic.com about the slogan "Music that's safe for the whole family" for a Christian radio station.
Just curious, given the way we tend to try and rationalize our views so that we feel justified that they are superior to to the other viewpoint, is this your attempt to do that? Surely you've been in a serious relationship before that may have had marriage potential, and I would imagine that your view of singleness was vastly different at that time. So is your viewpoint solely dependent upon the status of your love life, or is an objective opinion developed without any emotional influence?
I appreciate your honesty ("I think singles are more useful to the church than married people."). I think you could probably debate that point successfully, and Paul would agree with you (he favored not getting married).
I think the key phrase to focus on, though, is "more useful to the CHURCH". True, singles probably are (although are you taking into account all the time allotted to thinking of dating, pursuing relationships, dating, courting, etc.?), but what about useful to God?
I don't think you can quantify that. Our relationship with our spouse can be a witness to unbelievers. How we raise our children can be a witness. Our children growing up and serving the Lord... these are all things that serve the Lord, but may or may not directly serve the church.
The bottom line, I think, is that no matter what 'life stage' we are in, we should seek to serve the Lord to our fullest potential, and keep our sights above, and not on the person next to us.
Even if he DOES have an Xbox 360.
-Surge!
"So is your viewpoint solely dependent upon the status of your love life, or is an objective opinion developed without any emotional influence?"
Well, my viewpoint was shaped largely from two main factors: almost getting engaged to a girl that just wanted to get married and hearing the sermons I mentioned in the original post.
I saw in my Ex such a strong desire to get married just for the sake of being married that it made me question why people are to get married in the first place. She went to Baylor where she and other have told me there is HUGE pressure on you (especially young ladies) to either be engaged or married by the time you graduate. I saw some of this at A&M, too. So, when she told me after a month of dating that she wanted to marry me and the pressure she put on me to get married ASAP (and I have to admit that I didn't fight it too hard until it was almost too late to back out), I started to feel like I was her "Mr. Right", I was just her "Mr. Right-Now". And I didn't want that.
I made a determination that I wasn't going to let others pressure me into marriage (or even dating), but I would only pursue a relationship with a young lady as the situation presented itself. "Are you unmarried? Don't SEEK (or look for or whatever) a spouse." But I'm very mindful that it's not a sin to marry or to remain unmarried, I'm just trying to make a case it's OK and right to remain single just like it's OK and right to get married. Both are holy states, and I wish that Singles would see themselves as that (and not outcasts of the church), and I wish that married people would look at Singles as a problem to be fixed.
I remember an illustration from a friends wedding that I think gives a beautiful description of how to approach finding a spouse:
You are running a your life as a race with the goal/prize is the pleasure of God. If while running the race, someone comes up beside you, you can run together encouraging and pushing each other toward the goal/prize. You can run the race either way, because ultimately it's about God and not us. And also, how much control does anyone have over finding their spouse? It's all God and in His good timing. (listen to about minute 44-46 of the Nathan Trice sermon).
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