Single and Singularly Devoted to God

This sermon is from Grace Fellowship Church in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. To access other sermons or to learn more about us, please visit our website at graceedmonton .ca.

Like I did last week, I want to start with another story from church history, coincidentally also from Germany. On April 9, 1945, a theologian and a pastor by the name of Dietrich Bonhoeffer, I'm not sure if that name rings a bell for anyone, was executed at a concentration camp in Flossenburg, Germany.

Just two weeks, if you think about this, just two weeks before the Americans would swoop in and take control of the camp and liberate the prisoners, Bonhoeffer was escorted to the gallows and hung for conspiring to kill the leader of the Nazi party, the infamous Adolf Hitler.

You see, unlike many Christians and Christian leaders in Germany at that time, Bonhoeffer was a fearless opponent of the Nazis and of their murderous regime. Even though Dietrich Bonhoeffer was, and I didn't know this actually as I was looking at his life, was at a safe teaching position in New York when Hitler took over.

He was teaching at the Union Theological Seminary. When Bonhoeffer began to hear about all that was happening back in Germany, these troubling developments, he felt compelled to go back to Germany to stand up for what was good and for what was right.

And about this move, he wrote this, he said, Jesus Christ lived in the midst of his enemies. At the end, all his disciples deserted him. On the cross, he was utterly alone, surrounded by evildoers and mockers.

For this cause, he had come to bring peace to the enemies of God. So the Christian too, he says, belongs not to the seclusion of a cloistered life, but in the thick of foes. And so that's exactly what Bonhoeffer did.

He moved back to Germany, and there in the thick of foes, he preached. He ran an underground seminary that he called his Seminary on the Run. He wrote books. He served as a courier for the German resistance movement.

And then during the latter part of his time in Germany, he met and fell in love with a young lady, also a very similar name to Martin Luther's wife. Her name was Maria von Wiedemeyer. And just two weeks after he proposed to Maria, he was arrested by the Nazis.

He spent his remaining time in a concentration camp there. And at the age of 36, just as he found the love of his life, he was executed. Two weeks, if you think about this, two weeks after he proposed, he was arrested.

Two weeks before he would have been released, he was executed. And so Bonhoeffer lived, as he said, in the thick of foes. He lived alone. He died alone. He was a man, I would like to think, acquainted with radical, risk-taking singleness for the glory of God.

Now, the reason I bring up this story is that I want to rely on something that Bonhoeffer said to help all of the single men and the single women in this room hear me out for the next 40 minutes. I was talking to someone last week, and they admitted to me that they find it very difficult to hear a married man talk about all of the benefits of singleness.

And so I'm going to rely, I'm going to lean on something that Bonhoeffer said. And even Nicole and I were talking about it this week, I was reflecting on it. I have been married, or I've been in a committed relationship with my wife now for over half of my life.

And I went back and thought about it. In terms of the number of days of experience that I have being a single man, I have seven days of singleness to my credit as an adult man. And so I'm probably the least experienced person in the whole room as it pertains to singleness.

And this might be an obstacle for some people. I recognize that. But I want to quote. This is something that Dietrich Bonhoeffer wrote when he was a 33-year-old single man, just at the beginning of the Second World War.

He said this, he said, The Christian, even the one who is single, needs another Christian who speaks God's word to him. He needs him again and again when he becomes uncertain and discouraged. For by himself he cannot help himself without belying, that means misrepresenting, the truth.

He needs his brother as a bearer and a proclaimer of the divine word of salvation. So if you're like one of those people that I spoke with last week, that finds it hard to hear about singleness from a married man, at least hear it from this angle.

Today I don't come to you as an expert on singleness. I simply come to you as a brother to speak the word of God to you. To bring the word of God. I'm not going to come with my opinions, but I'm going to come with the attributes of the scriptures, with the sufficient, the clear, the authoritative, the necessary, the inerrant words of God.

And so even if you don't want to hear me, hear him as it relates to singleness. So this week we're looking at 1 Corinthians 7, verse 25. And as we've heard from what Lowell read, Paul is moving on from the topic of marriage and contentment to this issue of singleness, or as we see if you're looking at the ESV, betrothal.

And this is what we find in our text. This is the big idea, I think, from our study. Here Paul, inspired by the Spirit of God, puts before us at least four encouragements. Four encouragements that I'm going to point out for the single and the unmarried Christian.

And these four encouragements that Paul issues, it seems, he's done to maximize both the holiness and the happiness of the single Christian that he has in mind. So that's what we're going to look at today.

And what I'm going to do, as a married man preaching about singleness, is I'm going to bring up some illustrations from church history, from ages past of single men and single women, and how they lived their lives, and how they reflected on their lives in service to God, even in the midst of their singleness.

So I'm going to lean on some authorities outside of the Scripture, just to lend some credibility to what it is that I'm trying to say as well. And so if you're single, I hope, I trust that this is going to be good for you.

Now if you're married, last week I said, if you're single, don't tune me out. If you're married now, don't tune me out. I'm looking at the married people in the room. It is very likely that for those of us who are married, if you look at your spouse, one of you is going to die before the other.

Very rarely do both spouses die at the same time. And so it seems to me that at least amongst us married couples, some of us are going to be acquainted with singleness. And not only that, but all of us should be ready to encourage and to help and to understand some of the challenges of our single brothers and sisters.

So pay attention. And kids, this also applies to you. You guys too are going to be in this situation at some point as well. And so pay attention. So this is what we're going to do. We're going to look at singleness according to Paul.

Singleness according to God. So starting at verse 25, Paul says this, Now concerning the betrothed, I have no command from the Lord, but I give my judgment as one who by the Lord's mercy is trustworthy.

I think that in view of the present distress, it is good for a person to remain as he is. Paul begins, if you look at verse 25, with that same expression, peri de, now concerning, the same expression that he used in verse 1, he now uses in verse 25.

And what he's doing is he's addressing again part of, or one of the elements of a letter that's come from the Corinthian church. He's answering this question about the betrothed. And that word betrothed is something that we're not that familiar with, but in the biblical sense, it's essentially someone that is involved in a formal engagement, a legal engagement.

But the word that Paul uses there for betrothed is actually a feminine Greek noun. It's the word parthenon. And it literally translates to mean virgins. I think it says that in the King James Version, that it refers to them specifically as virgins.

And that word parthenon is used always to refer to single women of marriageable age in the Bible. The only time it talks about men with that same word is Revelation 14 .4. And so it seems here that Paul is addressing this issue, or this idea of these single marriageable women.

And he says that, he says, I give my judgment as one who by the Lord's mercy is trustworthy. What does that mean? Does that mean that this doesn't belong in the Bible? Does this mean that this is not inspired words from God?

I think what Paul is doing here is the same thing. If we look back, I didn't point it out last week, but in verse 10, where he says, To the married I give this charge, not I, but the Lord. And then in verse 12, he says, To the rest I say, I, not the Lord.

All Paul is getting at here is that, not that he's not saying this is not inspired scripture, and it's not, it doesn't belong in the Bible. He's simply saying that there are some things that Jesus Christ, during his earthly life and ministry, taught.

He taught about issues of divorce, but he did not necessarily teach about issues related to virgins or to the betrothed. But he says, I think in view, sorry, but by the Lord's mercy, it is trustworthy.

It's reliable.

It's something that we should pay attention to. And he says this, I think that in view of the present distress, it's good for a person to remain as he is. Now, if you were paying attention last week, and we looked at chapter seven and verse one, where he says, it's good for a man, or sorry, but because of temptation, the sexual and of sexual temptation to sexual immorality, each man should have his own wife.

You might wonder, is Paul schizophrenic here? He said, because of this temptation, everyone should get married. And now here in verse 25, he's saying that people should remain as they are. What's going on here?

Why is Paul getting at this? And if we look at verse 26, I think that holds the key. He says, I think that in view of the present distress, it is good for a person to remain as he is. So if you're familiar with the historical and cultural context of where Paul is going here, historians think that Paul could be referencing a couple of things.

There was a famine in Greece in AD 51 and 52, right here where the Corinthians were, probably right here when Paul was writing this letter, and it's creating large scale food shortages amongst that part of Greece.

It's also possible that there was impending persecution. This was around the same time that people were saying of Paul and some of the other Christians, they're turning the world upside down. If you remember from the very first study that we did in 1 Corinthians, Paul is probably writing from Ephesus, and it was in Ephesus that there were these massive riots that were rising up against Christians and their teachers.

Great is Artemis of the Ephesians, if you remember them chanting that in Acts 19. So it could be a famine, it could be persecution, it could be some other kind of distress, but regardless of the circumstances, Paul says here that singleness is more advantageous.

It's more advantageous during times of hardship. He says in verse 28, those who marry will have worldly troubles, and I would spare you of that. You see some of the mercies of Paul. He doesn't get into it in detail, but he's saying I want to spare you the difficulty of having a family in the midst of persecution, in the midst of famine, in the midst of whatever this is that we're talking about.

And if you're taking notes, this is the first encouragement that I want to point out for our single brothers and sisters. I'm kind of using the same form as we go through it. It's this. Seize this opportunity.

Seize your singleness. I'm not going to tell you how good it is to be single. I'm going to tell you how to live in light of your singleness. Seize this opportunity to serve Christ wholeheartedly, especially during times of great difficulty.

So recognize this. As a single man or a single woman, you have a unique ability at this very moment in your life, all you brothers and sisters, to serve Christ with a whole heart and without hindrance during times of trial and when the stakes are high.

So in one sense, your worldly troubles are minimized to some degree, Paul says, because your responsibilities are different. Now let me explain. You might go, how does that really work? I have family.

I have a job. I have commitments. How is it that I don't have worldly troubles? I think the other parents in the room are going to find this helpful or at least humorous. But in my household, if it isn't the dead of winter, it's minus 35.

The wind is howling. The snow is blowing past the door. And there is an imminent crisis. And we need to get out of the house in the next 10 minutes. In the next 15 minutes, I'll tell you where you're going to find our bodies.

You're going to find, you're going to find our bodies about 10 feet away from the nearest exit, probably close to the boot closet. Because if you've had children, you know that getting out of the house in 10 minutes or 15 minutes or 20 minutes in a snowstorm, or even on a warm day seems very difficult.

As families, we just move slower. It seems that the more that we add people to the mix, the more we add difficulty to the mix. We add trouble to the mix. It's a silly example, but what I'm trying to point out is this, that as you multiply, as you add, it adds responsibility.

And not only that, but in times of great difficulty, one of the best situations you can be in is in a situation when you just need to look after yourself right now. You just need to get out alive. You need to move.

You need to do whatever it is that you need to do. And I think about Francis Bacon, something he said, it's so true. He said, children sweeten labors. They make life sweet, but they make misfortunes more bitter.

A few things make me happier than my family is happy, and a few things make me more distressed, bring me more pain than when I see my family suffer. And Paul says that at least for the moment, remaining single spares you from this trouble.

It removes the encumbrances. It lightens your load. You get to travel light as a single man or a single woman. A single man or woman has increased capacity for risk-taking service to God. You have a certain kind of flexibility, what I call ability and agility, that will almost immediately vanish as soon as you get married.

As soon as you get married, it's gone. And so like Dietrich Bonhoeffer with his seminary on the run, you can serve on the run. So whether it's a pandemic, or a famine, or a persecution, or maybe if the Lord calls you to missionary service somewhere overseas in a hostile country, God has given you something.

He's given you something that married people do not have, or no longer have. You may not see it this way, but God has given you a gift in your singleness. I think sometimes when we think about gifts, the gift of singleness, we think about it like a spiritual gift, right?

It's this permanent thing. You have the gift of singleness, or you don't. But maybe it's possible that God has given you the temporary gift of singleness, even for this time. If we look back in chapter 7, in verse 7, Paul says this in relation to being single.

He says,.

I wish that all were as I myself am, but each has his own gift from God, one of one kind and one of another. And so Paul seems to imply here that to be single, even temporarily, is God's gift for you in this moment.

If we look at what Christ said, he speaks in very similar language in Matthew chapter 19, speaking about eunuchs. In Matthew 19, 10, beginning in verse 10, he says this, or I should say, it starts this way.

His disciples say, If such is the case of a man with his wife, it is better not to marry. This is in response to Christ's teaching on divorce and singleness, or divorce and the permanence of marriage, excuse me.

But Jesus said this to them. He said, Not everyone can receive this saying, but only to those whom it is given. It was given. For there are eunuchs who have been so from birth. There are eunuchs who have been made eunuchs by men, and there are eunuchs who have made themselves eunuchs for the sake of the kingdom of heaven.

Let the one who is able to receive this, receive it. And so the reality of singleness is a gift, whether you like it or not, that at least for the moment in time, I exhort you, I encourage you to humbly receive from the sovereign hand of difficulty.

It's a gift to leverage in times of difficulty. When I was thinking about this, a person came to my mind that exemplifies what it means to be single and to serve God during hardship. Has anyone ever heard of David Brainerd?

Does that name ring a bell?

Okay.

David Brainerd lived in the 1700s, in the early 1700s, and he was, he grew up in kind of the New World, Northeastern United States, and he went to, I believe it was Yale, and he was kicked out of Yale for criticizing one of his teachers.

He said, I think he said that they had less grace than a chair, something to that effect. And it was reported to the dean and he was expelled from Yale. And so he could never go on to live this life that he had always pictured God had made him for.

And so instead, he went to serve as a missionary amongst the tribes in that Northeastern United States, the Stockbridge, Delaware, and Susquehanna tribes. And he remained single for his entire young life, but he used this gift to serve God and to bring the light of the gospel to a people that had absolutely no knowledge of the gospel in that time.

And if he didn't keep careful journals, we would know absolutely nothing about David Brainerd, but thankfully he did. And in his journals, we find a man who was continually on the move. He went from one village to the next on horseback or on foot.

And he was a man really of peculiar holiness. When you think about someone who is committed to the Lord, you hear stories about him going to villages and preaching the gospel. And there were these immature believers amongst what they were called the American Indians at that time.

And they were weeping, and they were saying, we just wish that we could die so that we wouldn't sin again. And David Brainerd tells a story in his journal of one time when he climbed, he was on his travels, and he felt the urge to pray.

And he got down on his knees in a snowbank and closed his eyes and began to pray and lost track of time. And when he opened his eyes, because of the heat of his body, all the snow around him had melted.

He had been in the snow so long praying. That was David Brainerd. But he endured great hardship as a single man, and he saw that as his calling. He said this in one of his journal entries. He said, I cared not where or how I lived or what hardships I went through so that I could but gain souls for Christ.

There are very few men that can't care about hardships or where they live or how they live. But that's how David Brainerd could live as a single man.

He said,.

While I was asleep, I dreamed of the things, of these things. And when I awoke, the first thing that I thought of was this great work of gaining souls to Christ. All my desire was for the conversion of the heathen, and all my hope was in God.

And so David Brainerd, this single young man, poured himself into God's service, knowing that God had given him a gift, opened a door for him to live exactly how he needed to live, to live on meager rations, to sleep on the ground underneath his horse, to do whatever he needed to do to bring the gospel to these people.

And David Brainerd died of tuberculosis when he was 29 years of age. But because of his journal entries, his good friend, Jonathan Edwards, you might have heard of Jonathan Edwards, one of the last American Puritans.

He's become one of the most influential Christian missionaries since the Apostle Paul. So if you look at a list, I'm not sure how many people here know a lot about the history of world missions, but if you look at the list of all the people that were inspired to go onto the mission field because of David Brainerd, it reads like a who's who of world missions.

On that list, we see people like Robert Murray McShane, David Livingston, Andrew Murray, Jim Elliott, and you remember Jim Elliott and his fellow missionaries that died in Ecuador. And then even William Carey, who they consider the father of modern missions.

All of these people were inspired by David Brainerd to bring the gospel, to use Brainerd's words, to the heathen. Few married men, few married men could live like David Brainerd did. God used a single man,.

Essentially,.

To change the face of world missions. And I would like to ask you, what risks is God calling you to? What risks, yes. What risk is God calling you to as you live a single life? What can you do now that you can't do when you're married?

Living in Light of Christ’s Return and the Shortness of Time

Paul continues in verse 29. He says this, this is what I mean, brothers. The appointed time has grown very short. From now on, let those who have wives live as though they had none. And those who mourn as though they were not mourning.

And those who rejoice as though they were not rejoicing. And those who buy as though they had no goods. And those who deal with the world as though they had no dealings with it. For the present form of this world, he says, is passing away.

What Paul has in mind here is the second coming of Christ. So he's dealt with the hardship, the distress they're dealing with. And now he's going to address the second coming. The present form of this world, he says, is passing away.

And the gravity of this inevitable event should thrust us forward with a sense of urgency in our serving God. And this is a theme that we see all through the New Testament. If you think about it, all of these warnings that the end is coming, that the end is in sight, and so live in light of that reality.

In 1 John 2 .18, John says this, children, it is the last hour. In Romans 13 .11, Paul says to the Romans there, he says, besides this you know that the hour has come for you to wake from sleep, for salvation is nearer to us now than when we first believed.

He writes, the night is far gone, the day is at hand, so then let us cast off the works of darkness and put on the armor of light.

Let us walk properly.

As in the daytime, not in orgies and drunkenness, not in sexual immorality and sensuality, not in quarreling and jealousy, but put on the Lord Jesus Christ and make no provision for the flesh to gratify its desire.

I think about that line that he says there, so often, for salvation is nearer to us now than when we first believed. Christ's coming is nearer to us now than when we opened this service. Christ's coming is going to be nearer to us now at the end of this service than when I'm speaking.

In 2 Peter 3, Peter writes there in verse 10, but the day of the Lord will come like a thief in the night and then the heavens will pass away with a roar and the heavenly bodies will be burned up and dissolved and the earth and the works that are done on it will be exposed.

Then he says, since all these things are thus to be dissolved, since the world is passing away, to use Paul's language, what sort of people ought you to be in lives of holiness and godliness waiting for and hastening the coming of the day of God?

The coming of Christ should not only be a source of future hope, both for singles and for married couples. It isn't just a source of hope, but it's a source of motivation to serve the Lord, to be holy as He is holy.

Hear what Paul is saying in verses 29 -31 is that the reality of Christ's imminent return should have a profound impact on our lives, on the way that we live and how we live. One commentator writes this, he says, the day-to-day affairs of this world are not eternal.

The world as we know it is not going to go on forever. As much as we like it or as much as we don't like it, it's not going on forever. He says this, but passing away, Christians should prioritize their lives accordingly.

And so this means, as Paul points out, is that we have, we should have an eternal perspective, this eternal perspective that informs our marriages. It informs the way that we relate to our wives. It informs the way that we relate to our husbands.

It informs the way that we mourn. We don't mourn as those who have no hope. It informs the way that we rejoice. It informs the way that we buy things. Paul says, in our dealings with the world, how we use the things of this world.

And so my second encouragement as part of this is single brothers and sisters, seize this opportunity to live fully in light of eternity. I was thinking about it this week. One of the most precious commodities in all of the world.

Maybe I'll ask the kids. Kids, what do you think the most precious, do you guys know what a commodity is? Maybe thing. What's the most precious thing in all the world?

God?

Yeah, God is.

And God,.

I'm thinking God is even outside of this world. He's above this world. He's beyond this world. I'll tell you what. The most precious commodity in all the world, it's not money. It's not houses.

It's not clothes. It's not cars. It's not gold.

It's hard for me to say this, but it's not even books. It's not even books. The most precious commodity in all the world and in your life, outside of God, is time. It's time. With every passing hour, this world and everything in it is passing away.

And so is our opportunity to fully and faithfully serve God with all of our lives. James asks, in James 4, verse 14, he says, what is your life? Kids, what do you think the answer is? He says, he asks that question, what is your life?

He says, it's not a tree. It's not a stone. It's not even a puddle. He says, what is your life? Your life is a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes. We're here and then we're gone. Our life is but a breath.

And brothers and sisters, our time is short.

Every hour.

That we have left in this life is priceless. It's of inestimable value. I'm sure that if we were to track down, it sounds like a weird project, but if we were to track down every wealthy man and wealthy woman in the world and find them on their deathbed, if we could trade them all of their fortune for time, almost all of them would take it.

All the money in all the world can never buy us more time. But if you're a single person right now, I know you don't believe me. You really don't. You really don't. I'm not well versed in singleness, but I can tell you I'm well versed in marriage and in parenting.

You have more time now than you could ever. It's like Scotiabank. You're richer than you think. You're richer than you think. And too often what happens is you get to the point where you're married and you have a family and you look back.

And you say,.

I wasted that all. I wasted it on TV. I wasted that on hobbies. You have a whole new host of things to waste your time on. The world and social media and a million other things is monetizing your time.

Give us your time so that we can make money off of it. But Paul says that this cannot be. We cannot be undisciplined with our time. Single men and women, you cannot be undisciplined in the way that you spend.

Your hours.

And your minutes and your days. Our time is too short. It's too short to be captivated by the fleeting pleasures of the world. John writes this in 1 John 2. He says, Do not love the world or the things in the world.

This is in verse 15. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, this is what they're marketing, the desires of the flesh, the desires of the eyes, and the pride of life, that's a business plan today, is not from the Father but is from the world.

And the world, John says, is passing away along with its desires. But whoever does the will of God abides forever. So brothers and sisters, single men and women, how are you using your time? Would you classify it as a disciplined use of time?

Or are you wasting your time? To my married brother and my married sisters, how are you using your time? Are you living in light of eternity? To borrow from Paul's illustration, if we go to Romans chapter 3, where he talks about building out of gold and silver and precious stones and wood and hay and straw, are you building with your time out of precious stones and of gold and of silver and of stone?

Or is everything that you're building with your time going to be burnt up when it is tested by fire? Will it be a complete loss? When Nicole and I were younger, I remember that we used to have to go to the bank to re-sign our mortgage or to open up a new account or do something like this.

And there was this one financial advisor, I don't know if you can remember this, this one financial advisor that at these appointments would always hound us about RSPs. It doesn't matter how young you are, get an RSP, save for your retirement.

I remember she would say, try to compel us, it will pay off if you just start when you're young. I have nothing against RSPs, but I'm going to give you even better advice than that lady at the bank. While you're young, start storing up treasure in heaven.

While you have youth, serve God, be disciplined with your resources, be disciplined with your opportunities. Think and pray, what do I need to say yes to? What do I need to say no to? Be disciplined with your time and with your attention during this season of life that God has given you.

Approach singleness with a stewardship mentality. If I were to give you $100 and say, I need you to do some official church business with that $100, you would likely treat that very fearfully. You would have a sense of stewardship.

I need to make sure that I spend this rightly, I need to keep the receipts. God has given you much more than $100. $100 can't buy an hour of your time. God has given you a life to live. Don't take what God has given you and bury it in the ground.

Invest it. Invest it. Go and glorify God. Keep an eternal perspective. I think about the exhortations.

In scripture,.

Do not work for food that perishes, but for food that endures to eternal life. Think about Christ's words in Matthew 620. But lay up for yourselves treasure in heaven where neither moth nor rust destroy and where thieves do not break in and steal.

The decisions that you make today regarding your time.

And your money.

And your priorities will pay dividends. You're creating patterns even now. It's going to pay dividends in this life to some extent and massive returns in the life to come. Amy Carmichael. I've used a male example of singleness.

I'm going to use a female example of singleness. In December 1867, Amy Carmichael was born in Belfast, Ireland. She was the oldest of seven children and when she was about 16 years of age, she came to faith in Christ.

She saw that he was the savior of the world and found forgiveness in him and very early on in her life, she began serving the poor, the most poor and destitute people. And even though her family themselves were quite poor, at one point they declared bankruptcy.

Even as they moved around from place to place, everywhere that she went, she found a people to serve. And one day she became convinced that God was calling her to the mission field. And so she started in Japan and there in Japan, she was serving God all alone and she came to this day when she just had, she came to her breaking point.

She says this, one day she went to a cave to seek God alone in prayer. She writes, I had feelings of fear about the future. That was why I went there, to be alone with God. And Amy recounts how she felt.

She said, she felt as if the devil kept whispering, it's all right now, speaking about her singleness, about her being alone. It's all right now, but what about afterwards? You're going to be very lonely.

That played over and over in her mind. And she said, it's as if the devil painted a picture of loneliness that she could still see well into her adult years, well into her aged life. And she said, I turned to God in a kind of desperation and said, Lord, what can I do?

How can I go to the end?

As if to say,.