Singleness and the Idol of Family

There's a beautiful push in the Church to take the focus off of individualized self actualization and redirect it to families.

This is a big deal. A lot of parents in our self-exulting postmodern society replace their kids with themselves in terms of priority. Many churches are calling men to be engaged fathers, loving husbands, and servant leaders as sacrificial, Godly heads. Simultaneously, they're convicting women to complete and complement the way the Holy Spirit does with sacrificial, loving submission. Encouraging families to serve together, read the Word together, grow in love and sacrifice together. I SUPER dig that business.

However...what can be a beautiful revival of the place of the family in the Church is, I've noticed, being bent toward to an idolization of family and marriage.

Caveat--this is NOT true of every church, every individual, and every family. These are just things I have noticed after being part of the Church as a married person AND now as a single person.

HEAR THIS FIRST: I love marriage. I highly respect it. God made it for a host of beautiful reasons, my favorite 2 being how it gives us humanoids a tangible demonstration of 1) Christ's love for the Church and 2) the great love/submission/glory of the Trinity. Frankly, I'd love to have it again someday.

THAT BEING SAID, THOUGH. The way the Church talks about marriage is often done in a way that makes it seem like one is somehow incomplete, less sanctified, less stable, or less...awesome... without marriage. This, frankly, is unbiblical and completely misses what Paul says about our lives as Christians--single OR married.

Tim Keller (loooove him) writes in his chapter on singleness in his book The Meaning of Marriage, and talks about how the Church in the West has lost sight of the goodness of singleness. He quotes Paige Benton Brown as she picks apart the various ways that Christian churches try to "explain" singleness (this made me cringe as I've DEFINITELY said some of these...ha):

"As soon as you're satisfied with God alone, he'll bring someone special into your life."

...as though God's blessings are ever earned by our contentment.

"You're too picky."

...as though God is frustrated by our fickle whims and needs broader parameters in which to work.

"As a single you can commit yourself wholeheartedly to the Lord's work."

...as though God requires emotional martyrs to do his work, of which marriage must be no part.

"Before you can marry someone wonderful, the Lord has to make you someone wonderful."

...as though God grants marriage as a second blessing to the satisfactorily sanctified.


Why are we all super awkward when we talk about singleness?
I think it's because we've missed the God's purpose for the Church. If we understood that, this stuff would be way easier. And more affirming, for that matter.

I think what we need is a little understanding from both sides, perhaps. This list is by no means comprehensive, and a lot of points overlap between singles and marrieds. I've categorized them in a way that makes sense to me.

HOW SINGLES ARE RIDICULOUS:

1. Playing the victim.

People say stupid things about your singleness. They give you unsolicited advice. They give you shallow suggestions and make condescending remarks. I've heard quite a few. I've also said quite a few.
Get. Over. It. Everyone does this to everyone in every circumstance.
The question isn't "why do people say stupid stuff?" The question is "how do I respond?"

Truth: Believe it or not, your single situation isn't harder or more pitiable than anyone else's. You do not have a corner on suffering. Everybody suffers, everybody has a story.
When you say something completely idiotic to someone, you hope they respond with grace, yes?
You should do the same.
In order to respond with grace, though, you must have a right understanding of suffering.
Consider it joy when you face trials so that you'll persevere. Perseverance must finish its work so that you may be complete, not lacking anything. (James 1:1)

Completion = contentment. When we are complete in Christ, we can't HELP but respond to pithy statements from others about our singleness with grace.

2. Not participating in your Church family.
God gives us everything we need to get through this life. Whether we're single temporarily or indefinitely, our discontentment often comes from loneliness and entitlement.
The great news is, though, we're 1) not alone and 2) deserve nothing but have been given everything.
God accomplishes this through His Spirit and His Word, but especially His people.

Truth: You're called to be known by your spiritual family. You have every imaginable role to play in it--sibling, child, parent, mentor, mentee, disciple, friend, babysitter, teacher, student...
It's not just a beautiful place that God gave us singles to find family in, though. It's a Biblical mandate to be involved in, which I wrote about previously here.
To be bitter about not having a family while neglecting the roles you're called to play in the spiritual family God's made you for (and made for you) is, well, backwards.

Intimately knowing Jesus as your spouse ushers you into a beautiful (and crazy) family. Jump in.

3. Idolizing marriage.
This really applies to everybody--single and married.
Truth: Indeed, marriage is a beautiful mystery (Eph 5). But no marriage will ever satisfy your need to be delighted in eternally.
This highly individualized society so prizes self fulfillment, and we're conditioned from the time we're young (helloooo, Disney) to believe that all our needs will be met by someone in marriage. Imperfect people can never EVER do that for each other.

As Tim Keller puts it, we totally buy into the illusion that "if we find our one true soul mate, everything wrong with us will be healed; but that makes the lover into God, and no human being can live up to that....After all, what is it that we want when we elevate the love partner to the position of God? We want redemption--nothing less."

Marriage is not about personal fulfillment, someone helping you realize your potential, or someone meeting all your needs and letting you be yourself. It's not about you finding and maintaining your independence. It's a profound gift and another beautiful expression of a benevolent Father's love for His children. It's two notoriously broken people covenanting in a lifelong journey.

Take marriage off the pedestal. Marriage not an end in itself--that would make God a means. He's no means--He's the end.


HOW MARRIED FRIENDS HAVE MADE IT HARDER:

1. Not speaking Truth to us when we're being ridiculous about being single.
Sure, everyone needs the freedom to be frustrated or express discontentment. But as our friends, if you let us run our mouths into an escalation that reveals deep dissatisfaction or hostility, that's a heart attitude that we're supposed to be calling out in each other.
Truth: As our friends, you owe us the truth about our situation: when we abide in God, we enter in the dance of the Trinity. We experience the powerful, overwhelming love of our Father, and we are His bride.
I am His daughter. I am his Creation...and I grow in the love of my divine Spouse. That same Truth speaks to your discontentment in marriage, in parenting, in singleness, in joblessness, in life...and you owe it to us.
Faithful are the wounds of a friend (Prov 27:6)

Discontentment is not exclusive to singles--we just apply it to our singleness. Just like we're supposed to be patient with you when you share your discontent about whatever, be patient with us...but remind us of Truth and the big picture.

2. Not being honest with us about other reasons why we may be single.

Do you have a friend who does something unattractive with her face?
Do you have that guy friend who would love to be married but is really immature?
What about brosef who has a great personality but disgusto hygiene?
Or that girl friend who refuses to go out in anything other than something an 18yo would wear?
What about that girl who has a sweet heart but isn't willing to actually go places where she might interact with guys?
Or maybe that girl who is 28 but has no ambition, or that guy who just plays Xbox all day?
Or she's really smart, but is also kind of easy?

Truth: Just like you marrieds can't see the logs in your own eyes (Matt 7) and have a built-in mirror that you're yoked with for the rest of your life, we singles need that, too.
There may be something super obvious (and likely rather sensitive) that we're overlooking.

Being made aware of these kinds of things will likely make us better people/friends/family members all around, and that can only have a helpful effect on our comprehensive attractiveness.

3. Neglecting the fact that we play a God-ordained, indispensable role in a family already.

That family that we'll have "someday"--we already have one, and it's you.

Truth: I'm part of the family of the Church (Matt 12:50). I disciple people, I am discipled by others. I show love to men and women--both single and married. People of substance sharpen me in painful (and beautiful) ways, and I sharpen others, as well.

Raising kids does not have to mean that they are mine. Followers of Christ are called to be trained in the Word in order to teach others (2 Tim 2:1-2). I'm a nanny--I invest in kids every day. I work in the nursery at church and love on crabby little toddlers who are DYING to show off that they know what the sheep says. I have 4 nieces that I get to babysit and have awesome conversations with.
Are you encouraging us to participate in intergenerational relationships? Are you doing so yourself?

We may have a nuclear family that looks like yours someday, but right now, we're not off the hook for the one Family we're a part of.

4. Not sharing your marriages with us.
When you get married, it's just easier to identify with married people. You're struggling through similar things, sharing similar victories, looking for similar advice, tend to be on similar schedules.
I've done it--I get the draw.
But as I just shared in the aforementioned point about us being part of a family...it's hard to be part of a family when that family is insistent on retreating into itself all the time.
You've gleaned lessons from being intimately known by someone that we singles (or even other marrieds!) haven't been clued in on yet.
When married couples disappear into their married bubble and forget to come back out sometimes, you're not allowing members of our spiritual family to learn from you (or you learn from them!).

Truth: We're meant to share life together...not just when we're in the same life stage.
Open your homes to each other, meet each other's needs, break bread together--Acts 2:42-47
Submit to one another--Eph 5:21 (This includes the single people in your life!)
Honor each other above yourselves--Rom. 12:10
Instruct one another--Rom 15:14

Keep your special things special, and keep yourselves fortified, but come out from the bubble and share your lives with us, yo!

5. Talking about singleness like it's a waiting period.
A lot of material that I've come across addressing singles includes large segments on singleness as a season of waiting. A time to be preparing our hearts for marriage. I don't really think this is the case, at least not in the way we've been talking about it.

Truth: From what I've read, the Bible never speaks about singleness like a latency period for growth, maturity, and ministry.
Paul spends a lot of 1 Cor 7 laying out God's heart for singleness, marriage and divorce. He speaks many times of singleness as a good (or even a better) state, since someone who is single doesn't have the pull of their attention (although there's nothing wrong with this) on maintaining an intimate relationship with another person.
He really never talks about the purpose of singleness as a waiting period for marriage...as if your life was on hold until this goal was achieved. Talking about the purpose of singleness is kind of like talking about the purpose of...life. What are we supposed to do in all seasons? Pursue Christ faithfully. Grow in faith. Show God's love to others. Make disciples.

I just don't see any biblical evidence of "use this time to dream up your ideal mate and obsess over them until your heart is so discontent in Christ and hostile toward His waiting to give you a spouse that your marriage, should it come, is worse off than if you wouldn't have done any of that 'preparation.' "
Okay, that was an exaggeration.

I see no problem in people praying for and intentionally trying to let God prepare their hearts for marriage...only done with the humility and willingness to embark on whatever journey God has for them.

Singleness isn't any more or less a season than anything else in life. The only thing we know for sure is that it's a gift. So...let's talk about it like it's that.



I love how marriage and singleness are both talked about as gifts in Scripture. Not plan A and plan B, not more ideal and less ideal. In a decade-old sermon written by Tim Keller, he quoted Stanley Hauerwas and said singleness and marriage are both necessarily part of the kingdom:

"If singleness is a symbol of the church's confidence in God's power to convert lives for the growth of the church, marriage and procreation is the symbol of the church's hope for the world."

(Also, go do yourself a favor right now and get a copy of Tim Keller's The Meaning of Marriage. Both married and single will benefit hugely from its wisdom.)

I love Jesus, but I Hate His Wife

You all remember this guy, right?

It's a great video in a lot of ways. I resonate with his call to get back to the person of Jesus and to strip away the establishment, get rid of "religious professionals," follow Christ, love people, and die to self. Peaches.

However.....his voice echoes the many Christians in the Western Church right now who are disenchanted with the institution...and are walking away from the church disillusioned, burned out, and frustrated.

Oh man. I feel that!

From the religious right claiming a corner on all things moral, to plenty in the American Church parading patriotism hand-in-hand with theological orthodoxy, to different churches overemphasizing certain political hot points (abortion, illegal immigration, gay marriage) to the neglect of others (caring for the poor, living generously, combating sickness and poverty), to the Rob Bell and universalism fiasco, to the mind-numbing amassing of denominations behind certain theological giants while greatly demonizing others, to some denominations neglecting church history/the liturgical calendar/pursuit of intellectual faith altogether, to other denominations overemphasizing education/intellectualism but neglecting religious affections/faith, to disgusting scandal after scandal...

Guh. Who WOULDN'T want to pack up their stuff and poop on the floor and leave?

Not that our deep discontent is that surprising...Matt Carter, pastor of the Austin Stone church in Austin, Texas, talks about how we as a culture have
~a serious problem with commitment
~a serious problem with authority
So aside from the fact that we are already predispositioned to these issues straight out the womb (Psalm 51:5), we have our socio/historic location working against us, as well.

I've felt the pull to disassociate completely from the local church more times than I've ever admitted to anybody. Fortunately (and unfortunately?), it's not that simple.

Two realities hit me pretty hard.

1. It's an issue of Biblical obedience.

Isolation is our default and our demise.

Our hearts are hopelessly wicked and deceitful. Jer 17:9

Spur each other on to love and good deeds.

(how?) Do not forsake meeting together. Heb 10:24-25

We need people to bump up against to be more like Christ.

Iron sharpens iron. Pro 27:17

We expose sin in each other and call each other to repentance. Matt 18:15-20

We need others to keep watch over our souls. (this is big)

Obey your leaders and submit to them,

for they are keeping watch over your soul. Hebrews 13:17

If there is no Biblical requirement for you to belong to a local body...then to which leaders are you as a believer supposed to obey and submit? Local church elders. Titus 1:5 (Paul left Titus in Crete to appoint elders in every town)
Let's be honest with ourselves...the Epistles are fraught with Paul addressing, setting up, rebuking, or praising organized local churches.
(He was often frustrated with them, as well! We're in good company.)

I think this merits more digging into for a sec.
Why would I need someone to keep watch over my soul?

As Matt Carter of the Austin Stone church puts it:

"Scripture is teaching YOU--Christian--you have an enemy.

And he is smarter than you, he is stronger than you, he is wiser than you, he is more determined than you, and he has one desire for your life and that is to TAKE YOU OUT."

According to Scripture, Satan is not in hell. He's here. Now. (1 Peter 5:8, Ephesians 6:12)
We can't afford to be naive, family. We are at war.
He canNOT take away your place in Jesus--that's the beauty of the gospel (John 10:28 "No one can snatch them out of My hand).
But he CAN attack every other area of your life. Your intellect. Your interests. Your hobbies. Your marriage. Your kids. Your health. Your vocation. Your emotions. Your friendships. Your purity.

We need a place of protection. A place for someone to keep watch over our souls.
Don't believe me?
I Corinthians 5:1-5 (This is huge, y'all!)
In this passage, Paul is instructing the church to remove a sexually immoral, unrepentant believer from the fellowship and to "give him over to Satan for the destruction of the flesh, so that his spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord."
I believe this means that there is protection from the enemy afforded in the gathering of believers and submission to church authority. The enemy, it appears, has much greater access to this individual than if he were within the fellowship.


So...it seems from what we've just read that it's pretty clear...

We have to do some pretty lethal jacking with Scripture to justify leaving the local church.
Now, if we want to have a discussion about the inerrancy and infallibility of the Bible, we can have that discussion.
Because that's a discussion we MUST have if we're going to disassociate from the local church in the name of...piety? Enlightenment? "Real" Christianity? Badassery?


So to recap #1: obedience. sanctification. protection.


2. It's the Father's very heart.

This one really gets me.
See, active participation in a local body is not just a mandate. It's not arbitrary.

It's visionary.

Ephesians 4:2-7--"...with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love, eager to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. There is one body and one Spirit--just as you were called to the one hope that belongs to your call--one Lord, one faith, one baptism...but grace was given to each one of us according to the measure of Christ's gift.


We cannot say we love Jesus if we do not love what He loves. He loves the Church deeply and intimately based on nothing other than the fact that He is good and loves us when we're not.

This isn't doctrine. This is Gospel.

He is faithful to His bride in spite of the fact that she isn't always (or often) faithful to Him. This above all, I think, supercedes any reason we could muster to think we're above actively engaging in a local body.


Ephesians 5:25-30..."...Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, so that he might present the church to himself in splendor... For no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ does the church, because we are members of his body.



Looking into my own heart about it, walking away from the local church isn't just an act of Biblical disobedience for a believer...it's also an act of glaring arrogance.
To behave like I'm not in a war, to overestimate my own ability to stand against the enemy alone, to think much of myself in my pious isolation and well-reasoned enlightenment that I could somehow outsmart or outscheme the most serious and formidable enemy I could imagine OR wade through and successfully discern pursuing Christ on my own...is not to take God at His word that I am constantly as a sheep to be slaughtered.


Here's some more reality. God called us out of darkness and separation into fellowship with Him for a specific purpose in His story, and as His child you were created with a specific role to play in His body. No one else was meant to do it, and no one else can. (I Cor. 12)

Does this mean we resign ourselves to our despondence and succumb to the homogenizing effects of the ills of American evangelicalism? Absolutely not. Paul (and plenty of Church fathers and church participants over time--do some homework!) were constantly brawling with the local church, calling her to excellence and repentance. Admonishing them to care for widows, orphans, and the poor. Challenging them to steward their money well. Exhorting them to love better. But they did it as participants.

Part of loving someone (in this case, the Bride of Christ) is accepting their brokenness and flaws while acknowledging your own brokenness and flaws and walking toward excellence with them. We do it with our friends and families everyday.
And this is, most certainly, our family. Our big, crazy, broken, marvelous family whose sanctification is being worked out by a perfect and loving Husband.



Three quotes on this by my favorite author, then I'm done. Promise.

C.S. Lewis writes about his own gradual understanding of Christ's vision for the church in God in the Dock:

When I first became a Christian...I thought that I could do it on my own, by retiring to my rooms and reading theology, and I wouldn't go to the churches...But as I went on I saw the great merit of it. I came up against different people of quite different outlooks and different education, and then gradually my conceit just began peeling off. I realized that the hymns (which were just sixth-rate music) were, nevertheless, being sung with devotion and benefit by an old saint in elastic-side boots in the opposite pew, and then you realize that you aren't fit to clean those boots. It gets you out of your solitary conceit.

I adore how he puts it in Mere Christianity:

It is at her centre, where her truest children dwell, that each communion is really closest to every other in spirit, if not doctrine. And this suggests at the centre of each there is something, or a Someone, who against all divergences of belief, all differences of temperament, all memories of mutual persecution, speaks with the same voice.

And then here in Letters of C.S. Lewis:

For the Church is not a human society of people united by their natural affinities, but the Body of Christ, in which all members, however different, (and He rejoices in their differences and by no means wishes to iron them out), must share the common life, complementing and helping one another precisely by their differences.

Opposite Sex Friendships Part 2: Genderless BFFs

Two caveats before I begin:

1. These are ideas that are forming, not formed. I'm still figuring this business out. So, as always, I'd love input.

2. I'd also love some pizza right now. 

My question is this: is there a Biblical precedent for close single guy/girl friendships?

(Notice that I said close. I'm not talking about a dating relationship, and I don't mean an acquaintanceship/casual friendship)

My answer is this: I'm not totally sure, but I tend toward no.

What do I use to form my answer? Welp...

Biblically, there's just not much there on male/female friendship. There is plenty on how to conduct ourselves with others in general (Colossians 3), and how to conduct ourselves in marriage (Romans 12, Ephesians 5, I Corinthians 7, etc), but not much about platonic relationships with the opposite sex. While there is a cultural/historical context that speaks some to why this is, I speculate that there's intentional wisdom in this, as well.

From what I can find, it appears that the most highlighted non familial male-female relationships are 1) in marriage and 2) in ministry. The best example I can find is in Acts where Christians in the early Church fellowship, meet in groups, and serve alongside one another.
That's about it.
There's no, "And Paul spent 2 hours having a rousing heart-to-heart with his awesome girl best friend down at the well." His traveling companions and closest ministry partners were men. Jesus' inner circle was men.

So for starters, what DO we know for sure about this business?

We know that our close friendships should be:
~Equally yolked (II Corinthians 6:14-18)
In the Church we spend more time emphasizing the application of this passage to marriage and romantic relationships, but tend to leave out the friendship aspect. Our closest friends are the ones we're most likely to turn to for advice, most likely to spend long periods of time with, and most likely to be vulnerable with. Of course we're in the world but not of it--we have good relationships with nonbelievers frequently--at work, in our own families, in our communities. We are salt and light in our communities, and people get to see that salt and light by being in relationships with us. But those we elect to be in our inner circles...Paul speaks clearly about the need for them to be believers.

~Above Reproach (Titus 2:7-8, I Timothy 4:12, Ephesians 4:17-5:21)
Paul talks in a number of places about conducting ourselves in a way that's blameless before everyone so that 1) we won't cause others to stumble and 2) no one can say anything against us. This is highlighted in Ephesians 5:3 when is says we should have "not even a hint" of immorality.

~Building up the Church (I Thessalonians 5:11, I Corinthians 14:12, Jude 20)
As people who identify ourselves as followers of Christ, we're part of a community whose main purpose in life is to glorify God. God loves His people and gives us resources (including each other) to make each other more like Him.

So...using what there is in Scripture about how we treat people generally (with proactive grace and truth), and how we treat marriage specifically (with protection, which I wrote about here and will explain more), I form these ideas intuitively (in my Steph brain):

You become the company you keep, right?

Men, you want to become men of God? Hang with men of God.

Women want to become women of God? Hang with women of God.

Conversely...

A man doesn't become a man of God by hanging out with mostly women.

A woman doesn't become a woman of God by hanging out with mostly men.


The question I'm processing through is, then...what kind of time/interaction with a single member of the opposite sex IS appropriate?
....I don't know yet. But I can tell you what it's NOT.

It's not friends with benefits (Eph. 5:3)
It's not hooking up (I Thess. 4:3)
And (perhaps controversially), I'd say it's not being close friends. (Heb. 13:4)

Let me explain.
Hebrews 13:4--"Marriage should be honored by all, and the marriage bed kept pure, for God will judge the adulterer and all the sexually immoral."
This verse talks about marriage, but it has implications for other relationships, as well. Especially those relationships that could LEAD to marriage.
While a lot of the verse addresses sexuality, I think the first part of the sentence is a tremendous catch-all. While it's a little more obvious to think about not crossing physical boundaries, a lot of us singles have emotionally whored ourselves out to the opposite sex. Like I talked about in my post on the consequences of breaking God-given boundaries, there are emotional and spiritual lines that shouldn't be crossed in addition to the physical.

Openness is a quality valued highly by our generation in the Church, and we champion buzz words like "authentic," "intentional," and "real." As well we should. Good times.

But openness in relationships is meant to accomplish one thing: intimacy. Who you are being intimate with and how you are doing so matters.


Another thing that strikes me about "platonic" guy/girl intimacy is this:
It's likely that fuzzy boundaries in friendships will carry over to fuzzy boundaries in marriage. The way I treat men--how personal I get with them and how quickly I do it--is a good indication of how I will relate to them later. There isn't a magical maturity button or switch that flips when you get married. The way you relate to the opposite sex won't just change because you're officially off the market.

If you've ever uttered these statements about your close opposite sex friend, listen up:

"Oh, but I'd never date him/her."
"S/He's like my sister/brother."
"S/He's my best friend."

There are a lot of problems with these statements, I think.

Just because you tell people that a certain guy is "like your brother," that doesn't mean he is your brother. He's potential, just like you are. Treating someone of potential like they're NOT potential sends a message contrary to truth.
Chances are that if he WAS your brother, people would probably think it was weird for you two to be spending so much time talking/texting/hanging out. Most opposite sex siblings are not like that, and when they are, they turn heads. They'd probably turn yours. That should tell you something.
Treating him or talking about him like he's one of the girls/your best friend is harmful rather than helpful to his becoming a man of God. It also kind of reveals that you don't want him to. Any woman worth her salt seeing your "best friend" being chummy with you all the time is going to lose interest in him. More on this in my next post.
He also may think he's getting (rather crappy) practice at being your spiritual leader. This is vastly troubling...because he's not.


So, practically speaking...
If my desire is to become a woman of God, but I spend a disproportionate amount of time with guys, or even a certain guy, I need to be honest with myself about what I'm getting from that relationship.

I recently took a hard and honest look at my friendships with single guys. The reality was humbling: most of them had either expressed some kind of romantic interest in me, or I had expressed it in them. 
So then...our saying we're friends is dishonest. Even if it's just dishonest for one of us, that's not the friend box. That's the...dishonesty...box. I dunno what to call it. But for Christians, Truth is our ally. And living above our hearts is not walking in Truth.

If our goal is to love the "other," and if love inherently seeks the BEST for its object, then it must become my desire to die to my need for approval and attention and ...protect the hearts and possible future marriages of my single guy friends. This, I think, is what Hebrews 13:4 is getting at. Honoring marriage while you're a part of it, but certainly honoring it before it's even in the picture.


If you say you're just friends, are you really interacting on the level of a casual friendship?