THAT book
Well, I have previously raved about the book Did I Kiss Marriage Goodbye by Carolyn McCulley, and hinted at things to come, but I think the best that I can do is to recommend that people read it. I don’t think I'll end up saying anything original. But before I do say anything, one thing that struck me in the book were the scattered references to singles ministries, great books for single people to read, and so forth, mostly coming out of the circles of people that the author moves in. Now, I have never been to a church that had a singles ministry. But it also struck me that it is quite possibly a gaping need. Whether or not you’d get anyone to be involved in such a thing here in Australia, owing to the great stigma that hangs around the whole notion, is another question. But, if you ask me, single people could more often than not use some input: they are often people becoming more and more angst-ridden, with burgeoning insecurities and all sorts of struggles. (And the classic 1 Corinthians 7 sermon that tells us we have more time and more disposable income than married people to use for the gospel - which often sends us away feeling like a waste of space if we are not in full-time ministry, and which is no longer necessarily true in today’s world - is not all that could be said.) If people could actually be taught some of what’s contained in this book, they might be in a much healthier place. Anyway, perhaps that is something I can think about developing myself as I look for a new church (rather than suggesting someone else does it!).
There are founts of practical wisdom in the book. But I found that one of the most helpful chapters, for me, comes right at the beginning, in setting the foundation for singleness, and is called "Esteeming the Gift". The basic idea comes from that 1 Corinthians 7 passage and verse 6, that singleness is a "gift", which is no news to most of us, but she goes on to make the point, with the help of Gordon Fee, that here it would be best translated as "gracious endowment", with the emphasis lying on the grace involved in the giving of the gift. It’s not a gift that we need to spend time identifying, it’s not an activity or a role, but a blessing – like the free gift of eternal life in Romans 5:15, given without any merit of our own. And if you are single now, you have it - irrespective of how you feel about it. Carolyn then moves through the argument of 1 Corinthians to state that God assigns the gifts, and here I’ll quote:
"Do you see God’s will at work here? Ultimately, we are single because that’s God’s will for us right now. That’s it. It’s not because we are too old, too fat, too skinny, too tall [I’m glad she put that in], too short, too quiet, too loud, too smart, too simple, too demanding, or too anything else. It’s not wholly because of past failures or sin tendencies. It’s not because we’re of one race when many of the men around us are of another. It’s not because the men we know lean toward passive temperaments. It’s not because there are more women than men in our singles group. It’s not because our church doesn’t even have a singles group. Though perhaps these things seem like valid reasons, they don’t trump God’s will. One look at the marriages we know or the ones announced in the newspaper will assure us that these factors are present in many people’s lives, and they still got married. We are single today because God apportioned us this gift today."
I’ve only recently heard it said that the church needed to work harder to evangelise men, and that "someone" needed to work harder to organise inter-church social activities (and I am sure I have thought such things myself) ... All of these things might well be needed, but we can’t blame their lack for our singleness. God could quite easily bring a guy or girl from nowhere, if that were his plan. And so a poisonous resentment against "the church" by single people is extremely misplaced (not to mention just plain poisonous).
The next paragraph, which I am very glad she included (though it proves how often such a thing must be said) is this:
"One more thought: I’ve often heard married people say to singles that we won’t get married until we’re content in our singleness, but I humbly submit this is error. I’m sure that it is offered by well-meaning couples who want to see their single friends happy and content in God’s provision, but it creates a works-based mentality to receiving gifts, which can lead to condemnation. The Lord doesn’t require that we attain a particular state before He grants a gift. We can’t earn any particular spiritual gift any more than we can earn our own salvation. It’s all of grace. However, we should humbly listen to our friends and receive their input about cultivating contentment; we just shouldn’t attach to it the expectation of a blessing."
If I had a dollar for every time I’ve heard someone, usually someone who was married before 25, say that, well, I could have had a one or two of cups of coffee :). But it is so true that such notions generate the feeling that marriage is something you earn, or can manoeuvre to obtain, and also provoke a person to look sideways and think ‘well I don’t know that that was true for so and so who got married when they were 21 and always just wanted to be a Mum’ ... And it can prompt a kind of psychological madness – I doubt the possibility of ever being content with what you have in order to gain something else. That said, it is well to "humbly and peaceably accept God’s will for our lives right now", as the author later states it, without designs for our future.
One final point made in this chapter, building on the 1 Corinthians argument about gifts, is that singleness is given for the common good, as is marriage – and so we should use it for the common good. Carolyn then writes "Friends, we have to stop here and ask ourselves if being gifted for the benefit of the church is important to us". Hmmm. I think most us would like to say "yes, of course", but earnestly hope we get the marriage package and not the singleness one all the same.
Anyway, hopefully that has done some justice to beginning of this book and its usefulness.