"Nothing in Scripture negates the creation mandate to be fruitful and multiply or the status of children as evidence of God's blessing."
Captain Sensible writes: So says Candice Watters in a Q&A session on the Boundless blog. Her excellent book: "Get married: What women can do to make it happen", again speaks of the creation mandate - which God did not issue with an expiry date!
Getting this message out at a time when marriage is under serious threat from within the church, quite aside from our culture, is crucial, and Candice's brave, counter church-cultural stance is commendable.
Allowing false teaching to be spread through the actual blog, however, is not.
Galatians 2:11-13 shows Paul publicly rebuking Peter for just the appearance of wrong teaching, as he began to separate himself off from the Gentiles out of fear of "certain men":
"When Peter came to Antioch, I opposed him to his face, because he was clearly in the wrong. Before certain men came from James, he used to eat with the Gentiles. But when they arrived, he began to draw back and separate himself from the Gentiles because he was afraid of those who belonged to the circumcision group. The other Jews joined him in his hypocrisy, so that by their hypocrisy even Barnabas was led astray."
I hope the Boundless editor, Ted Slater, is not separating himself off from "creation mandators" because of a fear of men?
Getting this message out at a time when marriage is under serious threat from within the church, quite aside from our culture, is crucial, and Candice's brave, counter church-cultural stance is commendable.
Allowing false teaching to be spread through the actual blog, however, is not.
Galatians 2:11-13 shows Paul publicly rebuking Peter for just the appearance of wrong teaching, as he began to separate himself off from the Gentiles out of fear of "certain men":
"When Peter came to Antioch, I opposed him to his face, because he was clearly in the wrong. Before certain men came from James, he used to eat with the Gentiles. But when they arrived, he began to draw back and separate himself from the Gentiles because he was afraid of those who belonged to the circumcision group. The other Jews joined him in his hypocrisy, so that by their hypocrisy even Barnabas was led astray."
I hope the Boundless editor, Ted Slater, is not separating himself off from "creation mandators" because of a fear of men?
posted by Captain Sensible at 9:42 AM
7 Comments:
Dear Captain,
What do you say to people in the Church who don't see the current situation as regards single women in the church as a problem? People who know all the facts, but just turn a blind eye and are not concerned at all?
Are they loving their neighbor? Where is the sense of community? This is not what God intends for us to act. At least in my church married couple encourage young men to seek eligigle healthy women. Sadly very few of which are at my church
In general, maybe if they would remember what it was to be single, they might be more compassionate.
Anonymous - Sorry for the delay in writing this. I am still short of time, but I will address it briefly.
I think with most people it is not so much a lack of compassion, but a combination of a) ignorance, b) false teaching, and c) a feeling of helplessness to fix the situation, so they just try and make the person "feel better" instead.
To elaborate slightly:
a) Ignorance, because they got married at 20, so they believe they know what it's like to be single and they really enjoyed it!
b) False teaching that singleness is a gift, and that discontentment about anything is a sin, so they think the right thing to do is scold women that desire marriage and children and are unhappy being single and barren.
c) Platitudes abound, because frankly people don't know what else to say.
However - single women are actually their own worst enemy, because they won't admit their honest feelings. If every single woman rebelled against this nonsense, things would soon change. I recommend reading Debbie Maken's book "Getting Serious About Getting Married: Rethinking the gift of singleness", so that they are prepared with answers, and then making a big, stinking fuss about the situation. Withdrawing tithes (with a letter of explanation), and giving them to a men's outreach group, may also be particularly effective.
But women have to be very strong about all this! They will be bashed for doing it, so it's important to be prepared for that, and stay close to the Lord at all times!
Can't write all this without saying that at the same time, if they are over the age of about 25, they need to be making themselves available to be pursued by believing men that do not go to church. They will also be scolded for this (and in fairness, there are some legitimate fears), so that's something they will also need to be strong about and preferably try not to go it alone.
jwillsher - Great that your church encourages young men to seek a wife! If there are not many suitable women at your church, why not widen your search? See if you can arrange a social event with the other churches in your area, visit other churches yourself, join a Christian dating agency, etc.
The young men are doing such on things like e-harmony etc.
I have taken 1 year from dating for spiritual reasons. This 1 year is something that is being done with purpose[not sitting around playing Xbox]. However, I will be using something like eharmony or Christian Cafe to find a wife. Maybe visiting some other churches. But I want to enlist others in my search.
I agree with you on a., b., and c. I even been told I wasn't content. Which I laughed at and explained how stupid that comment was. But often it is c. that is the case in my opinion. It is even worse if they don't want to touch on sensative issues when women come to them for advice or a sensative issue. Such as weight or appearance.[fear of man?] Sometimes people need to take a brave and courageous step and come up with a solution. Like if you are not dating at all, work through the book 'How to get a date worth keeping.' It is horribly alarming when the Church accepts problems because fixing them might be hard or require an acts of faith.
"It is horribly alarming when the Church accepts problems because fixing them might be hard or require an acts of faith."
Very well said!
Not sure I would recommend the book you suggest.
Much better to read Debbie Maken and the new Candice Watters book!
Captain Sensible: I have been a reading your blog for sometime- let me tell you- it is all true.
I am 37 year old male and live alone- I took all the teaching about contentment to heart when "younger". However, the years quickly go by as your life is filled with work and school- I work two jobs by the way.
People have not a clue to the toll on your health and mind from isolation- and that is what singleness in essence is along with forced celibacy. I don't know what the future holds in this life, but I would strongly encourage those under 30 to make every effort to marry and enjoy gods wonderful gift of sex and blessing of children.
Dear Anonymous, 37 year old male - Yes, please do encourage younger males to not make the same mistakes you have.
But also, be encouraged yourself! The single women around the age of 35 or so are out there in abundance, so it's not too late for you to turn your life around too!
Sure, you can never get those early years back.
But your life can change from now onwards.
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