A Fresh Look at 1 Corinthians 7

What is the life-narrative of our culture? We’re born, we grow up, finish school, get a good job, get married, buy a house, have some kids… It’s familiar right? It’s not just a cliché, it’s the way the world works. But we need to ask some hard questions about the narrative our culture – even our Christian culture – is telling us, because it is not the life-narrative of the Bible. The trajectory our culture would have us on centres on romance. In a story polished to a fine gleam by Disney, pop music and the rolling fairytale of our Instagram feed, we are told that the destination we are all heading for and the only thing that will complete us is our soul mate. Marriage, in this narrative is an idol. And when the story goes off course, it leaves us feeling empty and hopeless. But Paul has a different story to tell us in 1 Corinthians 7, one that gives us a blueprint for greater contentment: stay where you are; serve God where you are. 

What does this mean for how we view singleness? Paul is so convinced about the goodness of singleness that he actually calls it better than marriage. In verse 38 he says, “So then, he who marries the virgin does right, but he who does not marry her does better.” For me this line rings a little pathetic. It’s used to pat me on the shoulder when I’m feeling a bit sorry for myself and chanted by the myriad of married friends seeking to validate me as they reassure me that marriage is not all it’s cracked up to be. It’s the mantra of the unchosen.

But this is not a sad little self-validation, this is God’s word. Do we really believe it? It seems like the whole trajectory of our culture, our narrative structures, our relationships deny this truth. Singleness is rarely chosen, and often resorted to. But Paul is telling us a different story: a story in which singleness is not a curse, but a blessing; a story in which single people can look forward to a life of meaningful, rich service to the Lord, not one of unfulfilled loneliness. In v32 Paul tells us, “I would like you to be free from concern. An unmarried man is concerned about the Lord’s affairs.” This is a different, better trajectory. A trajectory that is about the Kingdom of God rather than romance. When I was a teenager, an older single woman, Kate, told me her singleness allowed her to be “selfish for Jesus”. Her attitude has stuck with me. Kate got what Paul was talking about in this passage. She appreciated the freedom that singleness gave her with her time, her money and her relational energy and she used that in service to God. Singleness in itself is no virtue, but it can be the context for serving God in a way not available to those who are married.

Does that mean it is sinful for a Christian to feel sad in their singleness and want it to change? No, I don’t think so. I think there is a genuine place for mourning some of the good gifts God doesn’t give single people. This may be particularly acute in some seasons.  Paul wouldn’t need to write 1 Corinthians 7 commending singleness and its benefits if he didn’t recognise its struggles. Sinfulness comes when we wallow in that grief, when that grief turns to resentment, anger and complaining, when our grief means that we make excuses for ourselves and don’t use our singleness to serve God and don’t grow in the maturity we are all called to as Christians. 

One way that I’ve been helped in dismantling the idolatry of marriage in my life is in meaningful relationships with couples and families. I am so grateful for some precious friends who have invited me into their homes (one family for 5 months straight!!) where I have been able to see the arguments, the impatience that come from sleepless nights and the lack of romance in dirty dishes and unpaid credit card bills. These realities have helped me see marriage more clearly for what it truly is. And it isn’t as pretty as I was led to believe. It isn’t all bad though, I also get to see the small, generous gifts that couples give to one another of time and kind words, the comfort in having someone to back you up without having to ask, the goodness in the way these couples complement each other and spur one another on in their spiritual growth. 

Single people do not have the market cornered when it comes to discontentment, however. Discontentment can happen just as much in marriage. It can create just as many excuses and just as much resentment as singleness does. A number of my friends who are mothers of young children speak of how they feel their identity has been lost under the title of “mum”, that no one sees them as a person within themselves, but only as complete with a baby fused to their hip. And they’re actually struggling to remember what they looked like without him there too. Newly wed friends speak of the shift in their friendships. Their single friends don’t invite them to things anymore and many married people are suddenly interested in them just because they’re part of a couple now. A married friend asked me once, “Do you ever wish you weren’t single?” I thought that was a bit of an obvious question and answered, “Yes, of course.” Her reply surprised me though, “Sometimes I wish I weren’t married.” Is she allowed to say that? Is she allowed to feel that? She and her husband are still happily married, but that doesn’t exclude her from wrestling with discontentment. But Paul’s word to her is the same as his word to me. “Stay where you are. Serve where you are.”

The damage that the romantic narrative and idolatry of marriage does for single people continues on into marriage. This other person is supposed to complete me. I am supposed to never feel lonely again. Sex is supposed to be the thing I will now never be able to live without. All the problems I experienced as a single person should now be resolved. Any married person reading this is probably cringing, because these claims seem ridiculous. And neither you, your spouse, nor your marriage can handle that kind of pressure. Marriage is good, but it’s not everything. Discontentment comes when we expect marriage to bring us fulfilment. 

The thing is, that if we can’t find contentment on this side of the fence, then I don’t know if we’ll be able to find it on the other. Because our contentment, our fulfilment, don’t come through our relationship with another person, or lack of one.  It comes through our relationship with Christ. Before I am, or am not, the bride of any man, I am part of the church, the bride of Christ. The narrative I am part of is much bigger than a romance, it’s the narrative of redemption, begun in the garden of Eden and ending in the city of Revelation. The trajectory I am on is one of sanctification, and the maturity I am striving for through the power of the Holy Spirit is in Christ, not in checking off the tick list of worldly achievements that qualify me as an adult. My singleness may be a season, it may not. Even the longest marriage is only for this lifetime. My contentment lies in something far more secure and permanent than this world or any person can offer me. It lies in Jesus. Do I feel this contentment every day? No, but I’m growing in it. As I grow closer to Jesus, my satisfaction in our relationship grows. No fairy story, love song or Insta post can compare to these glorious riches and so, by God’s grace, I seek to live as God has commanded me, “as a believer in whatever situation the Lord has assigned to me, just as God has called me.” (1 Cor 7:17) 

Jocelyn came to Moore College from country Tamworth, but now finds herself in inner city Petersham where she works as a pastor on a church staff team