Tag Archives: Bible

Are You Prosperous?

Posted on by
5

A couple of weeks ago someone emailed me and asked if I would write some about singleness in the context of Jeremiah 29:11.  This is of course the verse that says, “For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.”

Basically, what this person was asking about is if God wants to prosper me and I desire a spouse, then why is He not providing one?  They rightly pointed out that you could try your best to follow God and still seem pretty non-prosperous.  Why do people point to that, especially as it relates to singles?

This is a really important thought, not just related to singleness but certainly including that.

First of all, a lot of times this stuff gets served up to singles as spiritual platitudes by often well meaning friends and churches.  It fits under the “Everything Happens For A Reason” group.  Things like, “This is God’s best for you”, “Just wait on God,” and “God has someone for you.”  Now any one of those could be true in a particular situation but they shouldn’t be tossed out as truth for every situation.

This particular verse is one of the most misused verses in the Bible. 

To begin with we can’t just pull sentences out of the Bible and apply them to the question I’m currently asking.  We have to look at what it says in the context that it was written. Mainly it is important to ask who is it written to.  In this case God is speaking through Jeremiah to the Israelites who at the time are in exile in Babylon.  In the sentence before, God says that after 70 years he will bring them back to Israel.  So in a straight up reading of that scripture, in context, God is promising something to the Israelites at that time (which by the way He delivers on).

But I think it’s fair to go beyond that a little.  In other words when you look at the whole of scripture I think it’s fair to say that God does have good plans for his people.  Now granted His people screw it up about 90% of the time, but God’s plans for us are good not bad – always.  I think this scripture (when included in the full context) is a good picture of an example of that.

But even there the example doesn’t stop in verse 11.  A huge part of our problem is we pick what prosperous means, and then we demand God give it to us.  But what does prosperity really look like?  If you read even just the next sentence you get a picture. “Then you will call on me and come and pray to me, and I will listen to you.  You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart.”

In other words, God is most interested in us and Him.  Seek ME!  Find ME!  I’m HERE.

I once heard a 20 year old single mom speak on this in front of about 3000 people.  She had been abused, abandoned, and neglected.  She lived in community living, was trying to work and go to school.  She stood up there and read this scripture (all of it, not just verse 11) and then after sharing that God wanted us to seek Him she said, “I AM PROSPEROUS!”  She said it with such authority that Jesus might as well have been standing at the mic. She got it!

We are prosperous if we have Jesus.  We are not if we don’t.

This idea that I can look at my singleness and just assume that God wants to give me a spouse is not a very good approach.  If I were you I sure wouldn’t hang my theology of singleness on a verse about the Israelites.

But here is what I would do.  I’d trust what the whole of scripture says about God’s love for you.  You see God does care.  He is interested in your singleness, dating and everything else.  He promising to lead you if you will seek Him.  And He for sure wants to lead you to life to the full.

And here’s one last thought.  What if your identity was in Christ, not singleness or in whatever you see as prosperity?  What if you saw yourself as prosperous to begin with?  If you really believed that, lived out of it even, how would that change how you view your singleness?  How would it change how you interacted with the opposite sex?  Which do you think is more attractive – someone who views themselves as prosperous or someone who doesn’t? It’s a lot easier to love someone out of prosperity than out of neediness.

So let me ask you, Are you prosperous?  Do you approach your singleness out of need or prosperity?

The Church Doesn’t Get Singleness

Posted on by
32

Here’s a fun experiment.  Go to amazon and search for Christian marriage books and then search Christian Single books.  It’s not pretty.  (Then for real fun go through the Christian single list and try to find books written by a guy.)

Here’s the point.  The Church loves to talk about marriage.  They are like the marriage experts.  As I’ve said no matter what your theological beliefs, you can find a marriage book for you.  I mean you name it – you like Keller? Eldredge? Piper? Jakes? Bell?  You can find their take on marriage. Books about how to navigate singleness – not as much, (apparently ladies you are supposed to do a lot of waiting and being satisfied, and us guys are supposed to figure it out without any help whatsoever).

But it’s not just books.  Marriage retreats, forums, conferences, sermon series.  Its even part of churches’ missional approach, “we are going to be doing a series on marriage – invite all your friends.”

Sure somewhere in there they like to throw in the obligatory thought on singleness, which is usually short sided, un-researched, full of platitudes and impractical.  And then the best part is we kind of get a pat on the head as if to say, someday you too can be a grown up married person.

Now someone will say that I’m bitter or just seeing the grass as greener on the other side.  I’m not mad – I’m just right.  In 20 years of walking with Jesus and going to church (including the last eight at a church that has 50% single people) I’ve never had a married friend say, “The church just doesn’t get marriage.”  Single people feel it all the time.  It’s a no brainer and it’s real.

Have you ever thought about why it’s this way?  One main reason that I’ve talked about before if that most pastors don’t get it.  But there are other basic reasons.

First it’s just flat easier to talk about.  There’s more clear scriptures on marriage.  There’s not much on singleness and exactly zero on dating.  Also, it’s more obvious if a marriage is in trouble than if a single is.  So the fact is it’s just easier.

Second, married people fit the church structure better.  They are more comfortable showing up to church to begin with. Much easier to go with someone than alone.  The church knows that if you love kids then you will get parents.  A lot of Christian parents are married – (side note – we are not very good with single parents either.  Holy smokes.  Let’s hold another moms group during the day – that helps – yikes).

The truth is almost everything we do is set up for the family – training the family, protecting the family, growing the family. In fact I would submit that family is an idol in our church today, but that is another post.  Now it is helpful as a single person, especially if we didn’t grow up with it, to see and be engaged with solid families and I’m all about that.  But where does the non married person fit into all of that.  What real practical help are we giving to them for where they are right now?

Third, the church assumes that you should get married.  We talk about being called to singleness but we do absolutely nothing to help anyone determine that.  Our theology of singleness is messed up at best and completely lacking at worst.  

Finally, because they don’t know what to do and what to say, they offer up spiritual platitudes about waiting on God, not settling, perfect definitions of who we should marry, and how to not have sex – which is their biggest concern.

Now some of this is our fault as singles.  Here’s what I mean.  We are way more likely to church hop (in fairness some of that is due to the stuff above).  We can leave any time – we don’t have to convince a spouse or pull kids away from their youth group.  Secondly, married people typically give more money and assume more Sunday leadership roles.  I can’t back that up with statistics but I’d stake any amount you want on that being true. We often have less invested.

But here’s the thing, and you, me, married people, the church and everyone else might want to grab a hold of this.  The day of reckoning is here.  50% of America is unmarried and the trend is upwards.  80% of people age 18-29 have never been married and that trend is upwards.  So unless the church wants to get smaller it might want to think about how to help, reach out to, walk with, encourage, engage, and challenge singles.  They might want to figure out how to empower them in leadership.  Perhaps they could help them figure out and pursue their calling to marriage or to celibate ministry.

The church could be a place where singles are welcome, treated equally and held accountable through real relationships.  Or it can keep ignoring reality and miss out on the opportunity.

Is Jesus Enough?

Posted on by
8

When I was a much younger single person, I remember a lot of conversations with older folks (mostly married) in which I was challenged with the thought of, “Is Jesus enough?”  In other words, “You’re single right now so Jesus will have to be enough.”

Man that sounded holy to me (It also made me want to sing the Doobie Brothers version of Jesus Is Just Alright – still does actually).  That’s right dang it, Jesus is enough.  I don’t need someone else.  However this is only sort of true, depending on what question you are actually asking.

Part of the problem with the Church’s response (or lack of) to increasing singleness is that we say stuff that not only sets singles up to fail, but also in turn sets marriages up to fail. The reality is that we need a good theology of both marriage and singleness.  One will not work without the other.  We need a lot of help with both.

When we say to a single person that Jesus is enough that implies several things. First off, it could mean that Jesus needs to be enough for right now.  But this makes no sense.  Jesus is enough for now, but not for later?  If you get married, then Jesus won’t be enough?  This goes right along with what I’ve written before about the idea of singleness being a “season where you focus on the Lord.”  This idea is so rampant and so just flat bad.  There is no season where you should not be focussed on the Lord.  And again, if singleness means being closer to the Lord than marriage, no one should get married. Marriage is not a concession to not being tight enough with God.  Yikes!

Which leads to point two.  Marriage happened while Adam had a perfect, sinless relationship with God.  In other words it wasn’t a lack of God being enough that made Him create Eve and put them together.  God looked at Adam and said it was not good for man to be alone.  Wait!  You mean even when he was totally with God, Adam still needed someone else?  Whoops.

Finally there is the idea that gets floated that if Jesus is enough for you, that means you must be called to singleness.  Once again, Jesus wants us to be focussed on Him regardless.

The question in regards to the call of singleness is not a question of how much you are focussed on Jesus.  It is a question of calling to vocation – to what type of ministry you will do.  It’s the second vow, not the first vow.  The first vow we have to make is to Jesus.  We all have the same first vow.  WE HAVE TO GET THIS.

In addition, the Jesus is enough question can lead us to other bad places as a single. Mainly that we don’t find true community.  In other words, regardless of marital status, it is truly not good for “man to be alone.”  We need other people.  We were created relationally, by a relational God, for the purpose of relationship.  If we are told enough that Jesus is enough we can end up not only avoiding marriage based on personal holiness but avoiding true community as well.

At the end of the day Jesus is actually enough in a lot of ways that matter most.  Jesus is enough for salvation – in fact nothing else works for salvation.  Jesus is enough for full life, but when we follow Him, He usually helps us get that by leading us to others and speaks to us not just directly but through the Church (his people) and the Scriptures.  But the truth is that we are not guaranteed that.  In other words He doesn’t promise earthly community and in fact lots of people have followed Jesus without the Bible.  We certainly are not guaranteed a spouse.

But a married person doesn’t have any of those guarantees either.  I could get married this week, and my spouse could be taken away the week after.  Would Jesus be enough? Get what I’m saying?

I think a better question might be, what are you staking your life on?  Now our answer to that needs to be Jesus.  Because at the end of the day He is the one sure thing.  And that has absolutely nothing to do with marital status.

Can You Date A Non-Christian?

Posted on by
13

One thing that almost every Christian organization agrees on when it comes to singles (other than Don’t Have Sex of course) is that a Christian should not marry a non-Christian. Now when you tell young singles this they all nod their head, make big commitments to the Lord and dream of the perfect Christian Courtship.  This is all so simple, right up until that doesn’t happen or you meet someone who you really like, who isn’t a Christian.

Then it’s rationalization time.  “I haven’t met any Christians I’m attracted to.” “Well we aren’t really dating – they are just a friend” which is usually followed with, “well if they were a Christian I would date them but they aren’t so. . .I’ll just hang out with them like we’re dating but not call it that until we are dating and then whoops.”  Or, “Well I won’t marry them unless they come to follow Jesus but I’m hoping that will happen.”  “I’m just sharing Jesus with them.  I mean if they got it then yeah maybe but. . . ”  Here’s the problem – we will always want to date who we are attracted to and guess what, we marry who we date.

This is such a hard deal on a lot of levels.  First we really can’t help who we are attracted to.  Attraction isn’t really a choice.  Now what you do with attraction is and we need to get a hold of that.  But still it’s hard.  Also there are a lot of really cool non-christians. Ha!  It’s true right? And there are a lot of Christians that aren’t cool (funny, exciting, adventurous, hot etc).  Not only that, but guess what, everyone is created in God’s image and everyone can love.  That’s right even non-Christians can show love.  Crazy I know.

What makes this even trickier is that the Bible is not as clear here as we might like it to be. The problem is the Bible doesn’t talk about dating at all and when it comes to who to marry, really we’ve got one passage that says it straight up and another that kind of leads to the idea.

Paul in 2nd Corinthians 6 talks about not being unequally yoked.  While this is not about marriage I think it’s obvious that if we aren’t to be partners with unbelievers then it’s not a very big leap to assume that would include the biggest partnership of your life.  And in 1st Corinthians 7 Paul says that widows are free to remarry but they must marry a believer. That’s about as straight up as you can get.  But that’s it.  And before you try to go old Testament Israel marry within the tribe on me, remember Hosea.

But we have to live in reality and reality is this: If you are following Jesus then your life is heading in a direction.  And that direction, regardless of how much you like them or how much you have in common etc, is not the same as that of someone who is not.

There are all sorts of other problems.  It is easy for this other person to become your mission.  In other words you are somehow going to win this person to Jesus.  Here’s the thing, it could happen, but it could not happen and then you spend the rest of your life in different places.  Not to mention that they might end up pulling you in their direction – away from God.  This is a cheesy analogy but one person is standing on a chair and the other is on the ground.  Is it easier for the person on the floor to pulled up or the person on the chair to be pulled off?  As a bonus you are WAY more likely to fall into sexual sin.

Also, how can you have a covenant marriage with you, this other person and God, if this other person doesn’t believe in God.  Biblical marriage is a covenant, not a contract or an agreement.

But most of all, it is harder to follow Jesus and almost impossible to do ministry.  I have been in full time ministry for nearly 17 years.  I have worked with literally hundreds of people serving in our work.  Like anything missional, it’s hard and people leave for all sorts of reasons.  But the number one reason people get taken out – sexual sin.  The number two reason that usually leads to the first – dating someone who is not following Jesus.  This happens directly and indirectly.  The person who is not a Christian is going to have a hard time supporting you giving your life away for the Kingdom, which if you are following Jesus is exactly what you are called to do.

This raises other questions like, What is Christian enough? and How do I know who to marry?, and I plan to address some of that soon.  I also concede that this might not be “law” so to speak.  So tell me what you think?  Is what I’m saying right?  Are you rationalizing a relationship you’re in right now?  If you’re dating a nonbeliever how has that affected your walk with God?

The Bible Won’t Tell You Who To Marry

Posted on by
3

I sometimes wonder if I could see the whole picture of my walk with God in the area of dating if He would say, “Well Justin I tried to send you Mary but you were too focussed on Sally to hear it.”  Or maybe another time He would say, “Well I tried to send you Jill but she just didn’t listen to me.  That one wasn’t your bad.”

WIthout a doubt one of the most frustrating things about singleness is trying to listen to God in it.

I know that God speaks to us. There are so many times where He has directed me.  Of course we hear first through the Bible.  At the end of the day it’s the baseline.  Everything can be tested against it. And the great news is that the Bible can tell me a lot about marriage, and even some about singleness. But the Bible won’t tell me who to marry.  It’s not in there.  There’s no Book of Justin.  In fact it won’t even tell me if I should get married at all.  Therefore I’m going to have to actually walk with God.

It is dang hard to hear God clearly in this area of our life.

It’s hard for a variety of reasons.  For one thing, we have a lot of different emotions in all sorts of different situations.  If I’m not dating anyone I can feel desperate, discouraged or angry.  That can cause me to shut down or just choose to date whoever.  I could be dating someone and really like them even though I know in my heart it’s not right – but the more attached I am the harder it is to hear it’s not right.  I can make marriage an idol which can cause me to rush into something or to put so much pressure on everything that nothing has a chance to go anywhere.  With all those emotions floating around it’s hard to hear clearly.

We can also fall into sexual sin.  Unrepentant sin always gets in the way of hearing God clearly.  I can also want to hear Him so bad in this area that I lose focus on God altogether. It can become all that I pray about.  There have been times in my life that almost my whole prayer life centered around this stuff.

Or we can go the complete opposite direction.  To be honest I went through a time where I just flat got tired of talking to God about it.  I literally didn’t talk to Him about it at all. Basically it was like, “what’s really the point?  I’ve prayed it already.  Screw it.”

But we can’t afford to do that.  We have to engage God, we have to keep going there.  But we need to learn how to do it as a grown up.  Here are some things I think can help, or at least have helped me or others around me.

Learn to listen to God in other things that are less emotional.  If I’m not praying and listening to God to begin with hearing Him here will be even more difficult.  It’s pretty hard to hear the big stuff if I’m not listening in general

Start by being willing to hear anything.  

You have to be willing to hear the actual answer no matter what it is.  Half the reason we don’t ask God is we are afraid of the answer.  We don’t trust Him.  It’s akin to the person who says, “I don’t say God send me anywhere because I know He will send me to Africa.” The truth is if you aren’t willing to hear any answer it will be tough to hear the answer He does give.

In that way, I think it is good to start with praying about whether God is calling you to be single or married.  Again hard to hear but be willing to hear either.

Next, obey what you do know.

It’s hard to say, “God should I marry this person” and hear the answer clearly if you are sleeping with said person.  It’s like saying, “God I’m going to ignore what you FOR SURE are telling me but then try to discern what I’m not so sure you are telling me.  It will be hard to hear that I’m called to be single if I’m serial dating or looking at porn etc.  Obviously none of us live perfectly but we have to fight to obey what we do know.

Finally we need to invite others to listen with us.  I talked about this last week, but we need people who can see us and others that we date, and affirm or challenge us as need be.

God wants to lead us in this area of our life.  We have to fight to listen.

How Do You View Sex?

Posted on by
24

A couple of years ago I was fortunate enough to be in an Old Testament class with a ridiculously brilliant professor.  I mean this guy might be the most knowledgeable guy I’ve ever met.  At one point we were talking about The Law and I decided to ask a fun question, just to stir the pot.

I asked him, “Does the Bible literally say that I can’t have sex outside of marriage?” Without flinching (have you ever noticed professors never flinch) and he said, “No it doesn’t.  But it does say that if you have sex with someone you have to marry them right then.”  We all laughed.

One of the things that is hardest about being single is not having sex.  I love when married people tell me that sexual temptation doesn’t go away when you get married.  I know that’s true but, it’s not the same thing. We have to choose between not satisfying the desire or sin – you have another option.

This is the one thing that the Church is for sure going to tell single people – Don’t have sex. But that is not enough.  And the way we tell people can often set us up to fail.  It’s shouldn’t be about “waiting for marriage“, making the act of sex unholy, twisting bible verses to make them about sex, making the desire for sex bad, or even pretending that somehow I can crush that desire. It’s about understanding what sex is – biblically speaking.

Our culture has separated sex from marriage.  It says the purpose of sex is pleasure and personal enjoyment.  It’s something that we do to make ourselves feel better.  Now there is some truth to this of course, sex does feel good.  God created it to be pleasurable, which is awesome.  But that is not the end result.

This view ultimately makes sex less powerful.  We’ve had it drilled in our heads over and over that it is just a physical act.  And when the Church runs around telling us not to do it, without telling us what TO do, then it just adds to the problem by basically keeping it as a physical act – just one we shouldn’t do.

The message can end up being that It’s just about pleasure and feeling good in marriage (if I get married I get pleasure) but it still sells sex short and could mess up married sex. Worst of all we sometimes paint sex in such a negative light that when people do get married they struggle to enjoy it.

But the Bible talks about sex as much more than a physical act to do or not do.

From the very beginning, right after He creates Adam and Eve, God says that they will leave father and mother and become one flesh.  Jesus echoes this later of course when he is asked about divorce.  He essentially says, “You don’t get it at all.  Marriage is permanent and sex is part of what makes it that way.”

Sex is not just physical.  It is meant to be a spiritual act.  It bonds two people together in very real, one flesh way.  This is why where ever sex is talked about all through scripture it is always either within the context of marriage or the context of sin. There is no in between.  But we can also know for sure that the desire for sex is from God.  We can’t just throw that out or pretend it away, just because we as singles are not in a position to have the desire met.

We are going to desire sex.  A lot actually. Probably even if I’m called to singleness.  In my opinion trying to kill that desire is crazy.  But here’s the thing, I have all sorts of desires.  I don’t get to do them all, I have to submit them to God.

What I can do is not feed it the wrong way.  Paul (while talking about this subject) uses food as and example.  I can’t just eat what I want all the time.  I want a cookie every day, and if I eat that cookie every day, I’ll want it even more the next day.  We are not to be controlled by our desires.

Also, as I mentioned briefly before, if I separate sex from marriage there is way less reason to get married.  As crazy as it sounds, one of the surest ways to stay single is to have sex outside of marriage.  
Our culture is at set up in opposition to the scripture.  This isn’t new of course, its always been so, but now we are inundated with it.  We have to walk with God and we have to own our view of sex.  What is your real view of sex – the one you practice?

Getting Married For Sex

Posted on by
19

One time in college I was meeting with this older gentleman who I looked up to and as we were talking the subject of relationships and marriage came up.  We were talking about a couple of relationships of people we knew as well as one I had just gotten out of.  Now this guy had gotten married really young and had been married for a long time.

The conversation turned toward the decision to get married.  He said, “I always tell people this – don’t get married for sex.”  Now I was young and arrogant so I nodded knowingly but I really had no idea what he meant.  Ha.  He went on to explain it basically saying that desire to have sex was not a good reason to marry.  I think he was wrong.

I would maybe say that sex shouldn’t be the only reason you get married.

But actually, sex is part of the reason.  God created us with a sex drive.  Again this is pre-sin.  Adam and Eve have sex – heck they are commanded to – before the fall.  God did not create our sex drive so that we could sit around and not use it.  And, as is fairly obvious in the whole of scripture (more on this soon) sex is to be enjoyed (key word) in the context of marriage.  In fact one of the functions of sex is to bond the two together in marriage (hence the whole becoming one flesh thing).

One of the reasons that we have more single people than ever in history (49% of adults in the U.S.) is that we have separated sex and marriage.  

Sex is an industry in our country.  It is readily available in one form or another every day. This really screws up single people.  For one thing, almost everyone has had sex before marriage.  If you haven’t that is great but it’s not the norm at this point.  So if you are having or have had sex, it makes marriage less urgent.  If I can have sex, oral sex, and/or meet my own sexual needs through a constant stream of porn and masturbation without marriage – then there is less of a pull to get married.  This is not rocket science.

Even worse, once you have sinned sexually you can allow the guilt and shame of that to drive you.  It can drive you to continue doing it, or only date people that also have, among other things. It can make you feel like you’ve messed it up so you now can’t have it the right way.

On the flip side, and this isn’t talked about much, delaying marriage is one of the big reasons that people end up seeking sexual fulfillment outside of marriage.  Even just 50 years ago in 1960 (not exactly ancient times) 59% of those aged 18-29 were married.  That number is now 20%.  So basically 60 years ago you started thinking about sex in your early teenage years and you waited 4-10 years.  Now you wait 10-20.  That is no joke.  It’s hard to do.

Add to this the fact that a lot of religious people have turned sex itself into the bad guy, which leads to all sorts of problems, not the least of which is married people still feeling bad about sex. This is why it is so important to do more than tell single people to not have sex – it can mess up both singleness and marriage.

Here’s the point.  Sex should be part of the reason you get married.  

This is one of things Paul talks about this in 1st Corinthians 7. He is speaking to a group of people trying to navigate marriage and sex in a completely crazy society (sound familiar?).  He says it straight up – if you are going to have sex – get married. In a way, Paul is saying, part of the way to avoid sexual immorality is to enjoy sex in the context of marriage. Paul says some have the calling to be single, but if you don’t, get married and have some sex.

This is so important.  There are no easy fixes here in our context, but one of the things we have to do is get two things clearly in our heads.  The first is we need a solid biblical view of sex (that it is good, from God, and part of marriage).  The second is that it is indeed a part of the reason we get married – God intended it that way.

I’ve joked with friends before that if it weren’t for sex, would anyone get married?  Look, there is way, way more to marriage obviously.  And, obviously just wanting sex with someone is not a stand alone reason to get married.  However, it is a part of the driving force – and that’s a good thing, not a bad thing.

Is There “The One”?

Posted on by
29

If you’ve been single long, you’ve had this conversation about why you are single, and someone says these words, “Well I guess you just haven’t met THE ONE yet, but it’ll happen”.  Now if you are younger you might say this yourself, but usually the older you get the less you say it because you realize, 1. it might not happen – after all it hasn’t yet, and 2. there is not just one.

You read that right.  I’m declaring it right now, right here.  There is not THE ONE, at least not in the way we usually talk about.

Now I can hear some married people disagreeing with me (mostly women – no offense just being realistic) but I don’t think there is any biblical, empirical or any other ‘cal evidence that backs this up.

You could maybe, and I mean maybe, make the case before the fall that there was just one.  But even that is shaky.  Marriage is pre-sin, but I think THE ONE is a post sin way of coping.  What about when someone marries someone and then they die, and they remarry – did God have two “the one’s” for them?  This idea that God has chosen just one for us sounds very romantic, or very Oprah, but I don’t think we are promised it any where. Which I think is actually good news and good for us – which might be why God set it up that way.

THE ONE is killing us out there.

For starters, let’s realize what most of us mean when we say this is – the one who is everything I want, the perfect one, (or more religious sounding – the perfect one for me). This is not marriage or realistic.  Getting married is not about finding someone who meets all of my needs or fulfills me. That’s romanticism at it’s best and consumerism at it’s worst.

This stuff can lead us, sometimes for years, to think that if I can just meet THE ONE then everything will be alright.  No it won’t! Because even if you could, THE ONE gets old, or sick, or hurt, or is mean to you, or veers away from God, or breaks your heart, or lets you down.

When it comes to finding fulfillment there is only one THE ONE and that is Jesus.  I know it sounds cheesy but it is essential we keep this in mind.  If we get this wrong everything will be messed up.

If we don’t get ahold of this we will be continuing to make marriage and THE ONE an idol.  

But there are even more side problems, including but not limited to:

  • Getting married, being let down and being able to declare, “Oh I must have gotten this wrong.  There must be a different ONE for me.”
  • Searching for a person that we are 100% attracted to all the time.
  • Thinking I’ve found THE ONE and then messing it all up because of the weight I put on the relationship or living in fear of losing THE ONE – which leads to all sorts of mistakes.
  • Putting huge pressure on every dating relationship because I have to figure out if they are THE ONE. This is a crushing pressure that almost no one can stand under.  And for free – if they can, something is off – everyone messes up – everyone.
  • Waiting for God to bring me THE ONE instead of engaging others and getting to know people.
  • Thinking someone that got away is THE ONE and spending all my time and thoughts figuring out how to make something work that is long over.

I want to be clear that I’m not saying that we should just go marry whoever.  Not at all.  I’m also not saying that God doesn’t bring you someone.  He brings people into our lives all the time (and not just romantically). We need to choose wisely and with the Spirit because even though there is not THE ONE we will hopefully only do this one time.

So here are some practical helps.  Maybe start by fighting the idol of THE ONE.  Jesus is the only person who can fulfill us.  Next, when dating people maybe instead of asking God if this is THE ONE ask questions like, “Do you want me to marry THIS person?”  If I’m not dating, maybe ask God, “send me someone You’d like me to marry” instead of, “Send me THE ONE.”

Finally, don’t ask, “Is this person THE ONE for me?” but instead ask these big questions:

1. Am I good for this person?  Are they good for me?  Are we good together? and if yes, 2. Do I want to covenant to love and care for this person the rest of my life, no matter what?

Once you answer yes to those – you will have THE ONE.

God Has Someone For You – Really?!

Posted on by
16

One of the most annoying things you hear as a single person is when someone says the words, “There’s someone out there for you”.  Ok, well that’s great. Even worse is the Christian version, “God has someone out there for you,” or other fun variations like, “God will bring the person in His timing,” (thanks Calvin), or one of my favorites, “God is just getting them ready for you.”  That one makes me laugh.

I’ve heard some of these from the pulpit believe it or not and of course at conferences when I was younger as well as from many well meaning friends (all married of course).  But well meaning as it may be it isn’t a good idea.  It touches on some things we’ll talk about more such as, thinking God owes you a spouse, thinking that it is all God’s fault you are single, thinking that it is all about you, feeling that God is holding out on you, the whole “This is God’s plan that you are single” thing, and worst of all, having your spirituality tied up in this stuff.  But there are more immediate problems for this post.

First of all when someone tells me that God has someone for me I want to say, “Really?! You know this for sure?  You’ve prayed and God has told you that He has someone for me?  Tell me more.”  Look, I think a lot of people say this stuff because it makes them feel better and/or they hope it will make the other person feel better but it usually doesn’t. Now of course if you’ve actually prayed and felt like God gave you a word about this for your friend then by all means share it.  (I’ve had this happen to me actually – crazy story).

But otherwise this is not great advice.  For starters it’s not Biblical.  No where in the Bible are we promised a spouse.  You can’t read the Bible and think, “God has someone for everyone”.  Now to be sure marriage is set up by God and is a great thing.  It is also part of the original plan and it happens pre-sin so to speak (more on this later) but the problem is there are all sorts of people in the Bible who aren’t married.  There are people called to singleness.  And frankly, we did sin.  And friends, that screwed up every single aspect of creation, including this one.

We should not assume that we, or teach anyone else to assume that they, will get married. It’s just not a good starting point.  This has all sorts of ramifications.  I’ve had a couple of friends recently say to me, “Should this change what I tell my kids growing up?”  My answer would be yes.   As single people we need to have an attitude of submission to God in this area.  “God what do you want for me here?” would be a great starting point. It’s scary because we might not like the answer (either answer can be scary) but we need to ask it.  According to Jesus both marriage and singleness seem to be a calling of sorts. Maybe we should be working that out.

I think about how many times in my twenties that I prayed for God to bring me someone or for that matter to help me land a particular someone.  I don’t remember even really considering if He called me to something different.

We need to ditch the cliche answers that sound nice and actually engage the first questions first.

There Is No Biblical Dating Plan

Posted on by
13

When I was coming up into my early 20s there were a series of books about “Biblical Dating.”  Now the funniest part about this is that the number one book was written by Joshua Harris who was 22 when he wrote it.  He got married right after that which leads me to two conclusions. 1. It worked for him so way to go Josh and 2. Harris was never really single.

The general idea of these books was that dating as we know it was wrong and unbiblical. They suggested “courting” because that was biblical.  The idea was that dating/courting is always about figuring out marriage (with them so far), that physical and emotional intimacy should be saved for marriage (ok, still with them at some level) and essentially if you did this right you would get married and not get hurt along the way (whoops!).

There was one book (not by Harris) that went even further.  It literally had a chart in it for how far you should go, emotionally, spiritually, and of course physically, at each stage of the “courtship”.  Yes that’s right – a chart.  Here’s the best part – when I was 26 I dated (courted, talked with, got to know. . . whatever it was) a lady following this exact formula. We talked about it, I read the book and we followed the rules.  But, lo and behold, it turns out that I was not the only one this person was courting (or being courted by as the case may be).  So a few months into this “relationship”, she said basically, “So, I’m going to marry this other guy.”  I wish I was joking.  When I was hurt she said something to the effect of, “I don’t understand why we don’t all feel the same thing.”  In other words, why didn’t the formula work?

There’s so much here I’m not even sure where to begin.  First of all there is no formula to get married.  Every marriage story is different.  Secondly there is absolutely no correct Biblical dating/courting plan.  I mean try to find either in the Bible.  It’s just not there.  Think about ways people in the Bible found mates.  Some examples: Work 7 years for one wife and then 7 more for another, send your servant to a distant country to wait by a watering hole and pick one out, purchase property and get a wife thrown in.  It goes on and on.

The Bible doesn’t tell us how to find a mate.  It does give us important guidelines for our sexual behavior (much more on this later), it gives us some direction on the type of person to marry, and it does, maybe most importantly, teach us the right way to interact with people. But it just does not give us a plan on how to get married.

But the worst part about these books is that they create an illusion that if you did it the way they tell you (it’s Biblical after all), you will find a spouse and no one will get hurt.  This is of course, ridiculous.  This idea that if you do it God’s way then all will turn out the way you want it.  This isn’t true in any area of life and marriage/singleness is no exception.

No matter what you call it, dating, courting, or whatever, it is only going to work out one time – if ever.  And most of those other times someone is going to get hurt.  That’s ok. That’s part of trying.  It can be part of learning that at the end of the day Jesus has to be our number one love.  That’s true even if we do get married.  That’s Biblical.