Well, it is a Christian
Singles Forum, after all.
I think a lot of this comes back to how people interpret the idea of "contentment." A lot of times, as a Christian single, people will tell you that The Good Christian Thing To Do is to learn to be "content" with your singleness. And, supposedly, the way to become content with it is to repress your desire, or focus on it "less," or do more "ministry." Of course, the Bible doesn't teach us these things.
Also, when you're single, you're "unmarried." We don't call married people "unsingle," do we? To a lot of people, marriage is the goal, and singleness is the second-best consolation prize, the "gift" that nobody wants. The thing you have to "learn" to like, or "learn" to be "content" with. And sometimes, in church, the desires for romance/marriage/sex can be portrayed as "worldly" or unimportant or almost "carnal."
"There's more important things than marriage, you know." Or
"Remember, single folks....your Number One Priority is JESUS!" One well-meaning singleness book I've read put it this way:
"You're not going to die if you never have sex."
Touching on another point you made, think sometimes in Christian circles, married folks can be viewed as more "mature" than single folks. Marriage can sometimes be seen as a rite of passage, some sign that you're all "grown up."
I mean, when you get married, what do your friends and family do? They're happy for you. They congratulate you. They throw a big, expensive party called a wedding. We don't do anything like that for people who are single, or people who stay single, or people who choose to stay single (not that I think we should, I have no idea how such a celebration should go
) When you're single, well-meaning people will try to encourage you about how "your turn will come" or ask you when it'll come.
Even worse, as you get older, people start to speculate less and less about when or if you'll ever get married, and conclude that "Well, it must just be God's Plan for you to stay single." So, shut up, be content, stop whining, and get involved in "ministry."
To some Christians, maybe unconsciously, marriage is a sign of "maturity," so staying single can affect how others view your maturity, and, well, that can be painful sometimes.
I also liked your examples of childlessness. I know this is a different issue from singleness, but it’s interesting to look at the role of desire and emotion here. Rebekah was barren and prayed for a child. Rachel was heartbroken about her barrenness and basically demanded children from Jacob. Hannah cried bitterly and openly about her inability to have children, and Eli (after misunderstanding her) prayed for God to grant her request. When Jephthah’s daughter becomes a lifelong virgin (something she never has a choice in) she gathers her friends and spends two whole months in literal mourning. Where in the Bible are these people criticized or condemned for “idolatry”? Or for “whining” and “complaining”? Or being "discontent"? Nowhere.
Some of this is just part of living in a fallen world. In the Garden of Eden, when the world was perfect, God gave Adam a wife. The world was perfect, but God still said it "wasn't good" that man was alone. But then what happened? Mankind rebelled, sin entered the world, and everything has been screwed up ever since. I think this is important to note when talking about singleness. In Paradise, when things were perfect, there was marriage. In the post-Fall world, there’s people who desire marriage, but it doesn’t work out for them. It’s one of the many genuine disappointments that we all have to deal with in a fallen, sinful world. It’s OK to recognize it as such. Jesus even alludes to that in Matthew 19. I don't like it when people (often married people) try to minimize that, or dismiss it as some kind of First World Problem, or tell you things like
"Marriage is not your Number One Priority, Jesus is!" blah, blah, blah.
Yes, some people willfully remain single. Some remain single, however, even when they don't want it. I do believe that there's some people who lack the gift of celibacy who still won't be able to marry. I mean, I've often read that there's more Christian women in the world than there are men. If that's broadly true, it means that not everyone will be able to find someone to marry, even if they have strong desires. And in Matthew 19, when Jesus talks about people who don't marry, he mentions a few different types: people who
choose to live that way, people who are made that way by God, and people who are made that way by "other men." So some people stay single, and it's not because
they chose it
or because God chose it. It's just how life turned out. it wasn't
their plan, and it wasn't "God's plan" either.
Yes, God is good. But we live in a world that is
not good.
Idk what's up but so many on here lament about being single and when a really cool guy appears....crickets. I hope I'm wrong and you get some interesting pm's,
