To Marry Or Remain Single (Part 2)

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Thanks for tuning in to No Compromise Radio with pastor and author, Dr. Mike Avendrock. Today on No Compromise Radio, we'll be hearing

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Pastor Mike open the Word of God in a recent message he preached at Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston, Massachusetts.

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Now let's join Pastor Mike in progress as he preaches through the Scriptures verse by verse with No Compromise.

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Similarly, he says in verses 29 -35 for our second consideration, Singles who have been redeemed by the blood of Christ respond to their great salvation and their

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Savior by obedience and consideration to the Word. Number one, the first consideration is, marriage brings extra trouble and tough times, so consider singleness.

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Number two, marriage distracts from spiritual things, so singleness might even be better.

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Marriage distracts from spiritual things, verses 29 -35. By the way, it's really kind of a neat thing.

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If I were to preach at another church, I have some speaking engagements coming up, I would never pick this passage.

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Why? Because, A, it's difficult, and B, it seems to narrow the scope of things, a lot of problems in it in terms of interpretation, but I know you need this.

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Why? Because all Scripture's inspired, and it's all what? It's all profitable. It's all for us.

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So then once you dig in, you think, yeah, that was right. That's good. Paul broadly applies this truth of marriage distracting from spiritual things.

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Verse 29, 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.

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Those who mourn as though they were not mourning. This is great poetry here. Those who rejoice as though they were not rejoicing.

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Those who buy as though they had no goods. Those who deal with the world as though they had no dealings with it.

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The present form of this world is passing away. He gets specific now.

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I want you to be free, verse 32, from anxieties. An unmarried man is anxious about the things of the

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Lord. How to please the Lord. But the married man is anxious about worldly things. How to please his wife.

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His interests are divided. And the unmarried or betrothed woman is anxious about the things of the Lord. How to be holy in body and spirit.

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But the married woman is anxious about worldly things. How to please her husband. I say this to your own benefit.

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Not to lay any restraint or lasso upon you, but to promote good order. And to secure your undivided devotion to the

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Lord. Don't forget that last little part. What's the goal of Paul? Paul is Jesus, is worth it.

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You can't over exaggerate how great he is. Shouldn't you serve him with all your heart, soul, mind, and what?

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Strength. So be careful, look before you leap. Verse 29. The appointed time has grown short.

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Life is like a vapor. It's here for a little while, and then what? Vanishes away. Time's short.

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How do you live when times are short? If it was short for Corinth, how much more for us?

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He uses this poetry, five examples of poetry. And here's what he does with this poetry. He's going to take eternity, and he's going to compress time so you can see it right here before your face.

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When I thought I was going to die, a few months ago, six months ago, I thought, I don't know if I really was or not, but I felt like I wanted to die because I had just so much pain.

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And it was interesting because eternity seemed like it was a lot closer. Something bad happened,

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I thought, well, it doesn't really matter. Something bad happened, I'm dying. Something good happened, didn't really matter that much to me because I thought,

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I'm dying. I'd have friends do some really good favor for me or something nice for me. And it just seemed like eternity was right here.

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It was compressed. And Paul now right here in this language, he compresses time so that you don't get caught up in the moment and you think about eternity.

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So you don't reduce your devotion to the Lord so that you serve him. And as he does this, he doesn't say, your identity before God is,

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I'm married. Your identity before God is, I'm single. Your identity before God is, you're in Christ. Paul is trying to say with poetry what

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Martin Luther said in a song, let goods and kindred go, this mortal life also. The body they may kill,

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God's truth abideth still. His kingdom is forever. He kind of moves away from marriage just a little bit to try to say, you know what?

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When you're grieving because you've lost one, you can be so into your mourning, you forget about everything else.

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When you gain things and you accumulate things and you become rich, you can be so involved in your riches, you forget about everything else.

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That's this whole section here. Because eventually, he's going to get back to people who say, you know what?

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I so desire to wanna be married that it consumes everything else. So Paul uses this great poem to say,

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Christian, don't divert your activities from Christ Jesus. Things possess you, don't let them.

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Money possesses you, don't let them, don't let it. Mourning can be all engrossing, be careful.

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If you look back at verse 31, for the present form of this world is passing away. Don't get into things that are going to be gone.

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Just think about it, let's just do possessions for a second. Everything you have in your house, in your garage, everything burning up.

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Can't take any of it with you. Paul uses this language here to say, do you know what?

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Think about eternity, think about eternity. Because, listen, will you be married in eternity?

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Probably, you will remember your wife, of course. But marriage isn't ultimately significant.

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Glorifying God is. If you're going to spend your life on things that last, then you don't say to yourself, yes, but my identity is consumed by I've got to get married.

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No, the Lord's work is at hand. Luther said, behave like guests on the earth, using everything for a short time because of need.

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Now, thinking of Martha, look at verse 32. I want you to be free from anxieties or concern being split.

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This is the exact word used there in Luke 10. The unmarried man is anxious about the things of the Lord. How to please his wife.

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Men, listen up. If you don't have as one of your top goals in your life as pleasing your wife, you should.

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What did you think I was gonna say? This is not negative language. This is not, I've got concern about worldly things like my job, and health insurance, and a bunch of other things.

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No, this is, I'm concerned about worldly things because 1 Timothy 5 says, if I don't care about my own family, then

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I'm worse than a what? Unbeliever. Do married men need to work? Yes.

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And if you can't find a job, then your job is finding a job. Lord knows that. But Paul, I want you to know in verse 32, is not saying, verse 30 rather, oh, pleasing your wife, that's down on the list of low.

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This is practical, and this is theological. Men, when you say, you know, I don't care about my wife.

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I've got other things to do with the Lord, and this, that, and the other, and just gonna leave her in the dust. Yes, you have to serve the

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Lord, and yes, it's God, and then wife. But if you say, I'm gonna just please the

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Lord, and I don't care about pleasing my wife, you're gonna have a tough marriage. Because if mama ain't happy, and you know, here's the great thing, guys.

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It's gonna say the same thing about the wives in just a second. And you need to get the new bumper sticker. If daddy ain't happy, nobody's happy.

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Yes. But it says here for the guy first. It just goes with the territory.

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You say, you know, that woman that I courted, and dated, and romanced, and bribed in my particular case, and all these other things,

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I still wanna please her. And as I've studied the passage the last three weeks, I thought, Kim wants to do this or that.

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I think, I want her to be pleased. It's not the ultimate, but there's a way that your wife can be pleased in a godly way, and you think, you know what?

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If I love my wife, I love her like I do my own body. I love my own body, and I wanna love her.

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So I don't want you to think that this is negative. How to please his wife. I can't serve the Lord because I've gotta please my wife.

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Can you please your wife and the Lord simultaneously? Absolutely. His point here is what?

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Anxiety or split. See how many times you can count that word, noun. Anxiety is verse 32.

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Anxious, verse 32. Verse 33, anxious. Verse 34, anxious. Verse 34 again, anxious.

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It's everywhere. And that's exactly what Martha was. Split, wholly devoted is the goal.

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Single -minded, stay in your lane, and hear for the person who says, you know what? I'm dying to get married.

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I can't be fulfilled unless I am. You've got kind of a why in the road, and Paul says, no, no, no. You think there's a why in the road, and you've gotta get married.

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You should be saying to yourself, yes, but while I'm single, I don't have to say, I gotta please my wife, and then

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I have to please the Lord too. You just say, I just please the Lord. The cares of the world.

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Get us off track. Martha was distracted by her preparation, and Jesus rebuked her for being anxious, split -minded, not wholly devoted.

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If you're married, it's just harder. If anyone does not provide for his relatives, and especially for his immediate family, he has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever.

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Married people, you can serve the Lord. Please the Lord. It's just harder.

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P .S., if you're a guy, and you're on fire for the Lord, and your wife's not where you are, and you're at church seven days a week, you ought to reconsider your thinking.

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If you're a woman, and you're all on fire for the Lord, and your husband's not there yet, and you're gone every single night of the week because there's a church function, you ought to reconsider your thinking.

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We want single -minded devotion, and Paul says, if you get married, verse 34, your interests are divided.

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Unmarried or betrothed woman, verse 34, is anxious about the things of the Lord. Single -minded, how to be holy in body and spirit, consecrated to God.

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God, I'm yours, use me. Married woman is anxious about worldly things, cooking, cleaning, diapers.

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This isn't the world evil system. This is just things that happen. Women, groceries, how to please your husband.

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Women, you ought to please your husbands. Queen Elizabeth I said that England was her husband.

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That's wrong, and with the same attitude, a wife could say, you know what, God is my husband, and I'll serve him full strength, and my husband on earth, he's just gonna kind of get left behind.

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So see, singles, this is the kind of stuff that you don't have to worry about. When I do premarital counseling, I always say, are you sure you wanna get married?

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Yes, and you can just usually see the couples are just kind of drooling with the anticipation of we get to get married and live the rest of our lives together, and then

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I say, I'm trying to spare you trouble. A man named

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Tom Shuck, he's a missionary in India who served with Sammy for a long time and Jeremy. He used to live in India by himself in a shack.

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I don't know on how much money a week, but it was like $10 a week, and he just went out and evangelized anybody he could, served the

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Lord 24 -7, and all he needed was a place to sleep and some food. How many hours a day?

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15, 16, 18 hours a day serving the Lord, and then now he's married to a wonderful wife and has a little set of twins, and his interests are divided.

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It's not a bad thing, but Paul says, if you're single, go for it. Years ago, I got here and they said, we need a singles ministry at BBC, and I said,

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I was a little bit nicer, but maybe not. I can't remember how I said it. You are the singles ministry. You know what a singles ministry is?

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Singles ministering. We married people have nooses around our neck. No, that's wrong.

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Wait, wait. No, no. No, verse 35.

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I say this for your own benefit not to lay any restraint upon you. Literally, put a noose on you.

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That was a different person. He's saying to the single people, listen, I'm telling you what's going on, and I want you to know that if you're single, you can serve the

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Lord better, but if you really wanna get married, I'm not gonna lasso you. I'm not gonna hogtie you.

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I won't put a noose around you. Consideration three. Consideration three to blood -bought

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Christians who wanna honor Christ Jesus, not to earn favor, but who have been favored by God.

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Number one, marriage brings extra difficulties. Number two, marriage distracts from spiritual things, and number three, if you're a single person and your passions, your sexual passions are strong and can't be controlled, you need to get married.

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Singleness is good, but it's still okay to get married, especially when you've processed it mentally and you know your body physically.

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This is no different than what Paul says early on. If you're single and you don't have the gift of celibacy, then you should get married, and it's not sinful.

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Verse 36 to 38. Marriage isn't wrong when your passions are strong. Singleness is good, but it's okay to get married.

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If anyone thinks he's not behaving properly towards his betrothed, his passions are strong. It has to be.

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Let him do what he wishes. Let him marry. It's no sin, but whoever is firmly established in his heart, being under no necessity, that's a sexual word there, sexual connotation, but having his desire under control and has determined this in his heart, it's his own decision, he knows it, he's considered this to keep her as his betrothed, he will do well.

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So then he who marries his betrothed does well, and he who refrains from his marriage will even do better. I'm not gonna bog you down with all the details, but here's the scoop.

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How many people here are reading from the NAS? Still have the NAS? Okay, it's different, isn't it? Two major views.

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There are many views, but the two major views. View number one, NAS. You're a dad, you've got a daughter, she's betrothed.

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You've arranged the marriage. There's end times going on. Should you say, honey, you know what?

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You ought not to get married because you should serve the Lord. We've got a crisis in the land. Days are tough.

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Wholly divided to the Lord. And you can either decide yes, if your passions are strong, your fiance's passions are strong, you know what, it's okay to get married, or it's okay to break the vow.

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You don't wanna really get married, let's break that vow that you're gonna marry someone else. That's the NAS. Almost everybody else in the

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ESV, this is our view here, my view, is what the ESV says. I'm not the dad here,

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I'm the fiance. I'm the male and it's been arranged that I marry this girl and if I wanna break it off,

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I can because singleness is better at these times, but if I wanna get married because I'm struggling with sexual desire, it's okay.

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So you can study on your own, but here the ESV nails it properly, facing a decision whether to get married or not as a fiance to his engaged one, to his betrothed one.

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Paul is going to try to help them make their decision on what to do. If you take just a look at a few of these things,

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I don't wanna get bogged down in the details. Like I said, that word necessity has an innuendo of sexual necessity.

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And even the word here, passions are strong, literally over the top. The man's sexual passions are so strong.

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He's already divided now as a single person because instead of wholeheartedly devoting himself to serve the Lord, he's got nine hormones and desires which are our good desires,

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God -given desires. It's better to marry than it is to what? Burn.

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But here's what Paul's saying. Not every marriage, excuse me, not every engagement needs to end in marriage.

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Not every betrothal needs to end in marriage. It's okay if you break that vow. It's not okay if you break it because of reasons outside the text, necessarily, but his focus is on the text in a betrothed society.

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Okay, I'll get your attention this way. If two people are in the church and they begin to date and court and do those kind of things, and they don't get married, don't ever say, oh, that's too bad.

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Oh, I feel so sorry for you. Now, there can be emotions that we would need to massage and to come alongside, and it's heartbreaking.

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That's not what I'm saying. But if couples date properly, court properly, are under the supervision of the dad and in public places, et cetera, things we talked about months ago, and then they realize, you know what?

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We're not for each other. This is not good. We're not gonna honor the Lord by being together. If you're together in marriage and you should marry someone else and be more honorable to God, then what do we say?

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Say hallelujah. And your faces say. You're like, what?

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Look it, establish in his own heart, verse 37. No necessity sexually.

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You're under control. It's okay. You can say no to marriage. Theology matters.

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But if you do, verse 38, so then he who marries his betrothed does well. He who refrains from marriage does even what?

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Good, better, best. Final consideration. There's another group of single people in the church and they're the widows.

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Consideration number four. Widows, remarriage is allowed if the person's a

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Christian, but it might not be the best. Consideration number four.

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It's brief. It's probably not the issue at Corinth, so he just touches upon it lightly. Verse 39 and 40.

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Wife is bound to her husband as long as he lives. If her husband dies, she's free to be married. If you're a widow and you'd like to be married, you're free, but here's just one caveat.

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Only in the Lord. Goes for everybody else too if you're a Christian. Yet, look what

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Paul does. Very pastoral, very kind. What Paul needs to hammer, he hammers, but not here.

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Yet in my judgment, she is happier if she remains as she is. If you're a young widow with children,

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Paul says in the pastoral epistles, elders, they should get remarried. Get remarried so they have somebody to take care of them, but here in the context of a church taking care of widows,

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First Timothy five, et cetera, she's happier if she remains as she is. And then

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Paul says with just kind of a wink in his eye almost, and I think too that I have the spirit of God.

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I think it's more with a wink than some kind of sarcasm. It's my opinion, she's happier if she remains as she is.

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Preaching note, wonderful note. Pay attention to this note. To see the text where it says, if her husband dies.

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Oh, that's a horrible translation. I know why they did it, but it's horrible. If her husband sleeps.

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Now why do you think they didn't wanna put sleep in there? Well, if her husband's sleeping, I told him not to take a nap.

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If you take one more nap, I'm gonna remarry in the Lord. Yeah, but honey, I just can't multitask like you can.

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Never said of an unbeliever who's dead, they're sleeping. Only Christians.

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Why? Because there's the hope of the resurrection unto life. There's the hope of the resurrection unto life.

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If you sleep and you're normal, you'll finally get up. Sleep implies waking.

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Your husband dies, he's a Christian. Guess what's gonna happen? You're gonna find your husband one day. One day, those here who have buried their husbands or buried their wives, one day, those men and women, if they're

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Christians, you wife, this widow to you husband that's a widower, you will pick up your wife's hand again one day and kiss it.

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I'm positive. Because they will be raised, their spirit will be going instantly to God when they die, and then they'll get a new body, those very hands that you kissed on the deathbed will be the hands of the spouse that's,

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I know it's not your spouse in heaven, but you'll still be glorifying God for that person in heaven. Here's my point. When I go to a funeral and I hear people say about unbelievers, oh, it just looks like he's sleeping,

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I say to myself, it looks like he's sleeping, but unless God did a work in his heart before he died, the only resurrection he can be assured of is a resurrection for a body that will be designed for the torments of the dam forever.

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Oh, but for the Christian widow, look at how pastoral Paul is. But if your husband sleeps, he's dead, that's what sleep means.

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If your husband's sleeping, he's gonna wake up one day. So if you wanna get married, marry in the

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Lord, marry somebody else. If you don't wanna marry, that's okay, you're gonna be happy. Isn't that neat?

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Sleep, hope of the resurrection. Paul's spirit inspired. Here's what we learned.

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Sometimes the good thing, marriage, isn't the best. Singleness could even be better.

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There's a say that if you're gonna try to get a new job, I don't know how many people have done this. I think I can make $40 ,000 more if I get that new job.

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And then what? And then you've gotta work 40 % longer and you're working 16 hours a day for the man and you're not pleasing your wife and you're not pleasing the

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Lord. I can tell you right from the bat and I'm not even a prophet. That's not a good deal. When Paul takes this passage and scrunches eternity up to your face, you're not gonna be going,

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I've gotta grab all these things. Money's not the problem. It's the human heart that says, I've got to possess it and be possessed by it.

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And so Paul says, just let everything go. And if you're gonna let everything go to serve the Lord, then you might even have to let go of the idea of getting married.

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Oh, I gotta get married, I gotta get married, I gotta get married. I know people, maybe some even in this church, not after today, but in the past.

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That wasn't supposed to be funny. Their identity is wrapped up in, they wanna get married.

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And you think you go through the list, you pray for people and you get to a certain person's name and you go, I better pray for a spouse for them.

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I understand that. And then you go, it's easy for you to say, you have a gorgeous wife. Matter of fact,

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I do. But it's easy for me to say because I think I too have the spirit. Not like Paul did, but I'm reading the text in terms of that spirit.

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And he says, you know what? If you are single, burn out for the glory of God with wholehearted devotion to serve him.

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And if you've got a desire to get married and even a physical desire, God can be trusted. If he saved you, can he be trusted to give you a spouse?

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So if you're a dad and you've got kids and they're about ready to be old enough to be dating, courting, betrothing, extolling, whatever all these things that people do, your job is

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A, to help protect your daughter and your son from marrying wrongly.

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But it's also to help them positively say, use that energy you have now to serve the Lord. Where are the

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Jim Elliots in our church? 15 years old, sold out for God and could care less about everything else.

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Where are the Mary Slessors, 14 years old? I don't care about anything else. Where are those young people?

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And it is the dad's responsibility and the mom's responsibility to come alongside of those young ones. And then it's our responsibility to say, yeah, that's exactly right, this is what you do.

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And young people, it's your responsibility to do it. Why, because you can do it on your own? No, because you've been given the spirit of God.

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Has nothing to do with Caleb Johansson, but I baptized him last week. And here's what I want you to pray for him, that he is going to flame out for the glory of Christ.

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He's just gonna spiral off, we're all gonna just sit back and go, what is wrong with that kid? But in the right way, and here we go.

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People are like, well, you know, we don't do youth ministries and family integrated is what we do. That's all a bunch of hogwash.

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Here what we do at the youth ministry. The youth ministry will teach these kids this exact same thing, wholehearted devotion for God.

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Wasting all this time at 18 years old wanting to get married when there's something that the best is right now.

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Because one day you're gonna sleep and then what? No Compromise Radio with Pastor Mike Abendroth is a production of Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston.

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Bethlehem Bible Church is a Bible teaching church firmly committed to unleashing the life transforming power of God's word through verse by verse exposition of the sacred text.

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Please come and join us. Our service times are Sunday morning at 8 .30 and 11 a .m. and Sunday evenings at 6 p .m.

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We're right on route 110 in West Boylston, Massachusetts. You can check us out online at bbcchurch .org

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or by phone at 508 -835 -3400. The thoughts and opinions expressed on No Compromise Radio do not necessarily reflect those of WVNE, its staff or management.