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Currently in South Africa we have some 24 million singles (well over half of our adult population) and marriage statistics continue their rapid decline, with more people waiting longer to tie the knot, if ever.  Top reasons South African singles give for delaying marriage are:  “Desire for independence; self-esteem and relationship reluctance; economic and social reasons; past relationships and fear of commitment”.  All four of these reasons have one thing in common: they are usually selfish excuses.  It is no minor offense to reject God’s good institution of marriage, His wise creation ordinance that is the cornerstone of civilisation and the primary building block for all of society.  A nation rises or falls based on its view of marriage.

Hardly a week passes that I do not see or hear about another godly young lady nearing the end of her child-bearing years and desiring marriage, yet still waiting in vain for a husband.  How long, O Lord, until the men wake up and see their need for a wife, until they open their eyes to the beauty and goodness of Your design for marriage and family?  Have men outsmarted their Creator and now revised His Word by saying, “It is good for man to be alone”?  Is this our Protestant version of Rome’s unbiblical vows of celibacy, where singleness becomes more spiritual than marriage? (See 1 Tim. 4:1-6 which refutes all forms asceticism and forbidding of marriage.)

Both Jesus and Paul affirm that there is only one good reason for staying single:  “for the sake of the kingdom of heaven”, for a missionary calling or during fierce persecution and “distress” (Matt. 19:12; 1 Cor. 7:29-35).  That kind of necessary, gospel celibacy is a very unique, special “gift” and calling from God (1 Cor. 7:7,20,24).  But all other forms of singleness are not a gift, but a hard trial.

God’s grace is all-sufficient for the lonely burden of singleness; but we should not air-brush or gloss it over as a blessing, when God’s Word clearly shows it is an unnatural affliction that violates His design for our sexuality (Gen. 2:18-25; Matt. 19:3-6).  Never does Scripture call a barren womb a blessing (1 Sam. 1-2; Ps. 113:9).  In the case of an eligible bachelorette whom blind and immature men fail to pursue, it is one of God’s “thorns” beyond her control, and He will enable her to be content and use her singleness for Him (2 Cor. 12:9-10; Php. 4:11-13; 1 Cor. 7:29-35).  In the case of passive men failing to pursue marriage, it is a self-imposed curse (1 Pet. 2:20; 4:15).  But in neither case is it some ‘gift of singleness’, as some mistakenly label it.

For members in good standing in their local churches, here are eight unbiblical reasons for staying single.  These warnings especially apply to Christian men who have a job, are able to provide for a wife, but don’t pursue marriage; yet many of these cautions also apply to single ladies who’ve been playing hard-to-get for too long.  By the grace of God and godly counsel and effort, you can learn to break any of these bad habits and overcome these excuses; but only after you first identify and renounce them.

(1) Unrealistic expectations – Is no one good enough to meet your standards of perfect character?  As if you are the perfect spouse?!  As the book title sums up well, Christian marriage is When Sinners Say, ‘I Do’, when two very imperfect people, by the power of God’s Spirit, learn to love each other as Christ loved the Church (Eph. 5:18-33).  Mature believers do not wait to find a soul mate; they get married in the Lord and learn to become soul mates.

(2) External focus – Are you more concerned about their looks than their character?  That can be selfish lust more than biblical love.

(3) Fear of commitment – Are you married to your own selfish autonomy and individualism?  Do you have more of a consumer view of marriage rather than the biblical, covenantal view of a deep unity through self-giving?

(4) Selfish habits – Are you hooked on your own immature or ungodly habits: porn, video games, endless hobbies, travel, etc.?  Have you allowed our culture of endless information, entertainment and diversions to distract you from the clear, biblical priority of marriage and starting a family?

(5) Paralysed by your past – Maybe you grew up in a home full of conflict, watching a miserable marriage end in an ugly divorce or cold standoff?  Or perhaps other past hurts or failures have left you nervous about ever marrying?  But if you are truly saved, Jesus is your Lord, not your past.  God’s Word defines you, not your hurt or emotions.  The gospel is your identity, not the abuse or pain you’ve faced, nor your own failures (Tit. 2:11-14; Gal. 2:20).  His grace is sufficient, our hope for change is real as Christians (2 Cor. 5:17; 12:9-10).  The tomb is empty, Jesus is alive, and in Him you are an overcomer, “more than a conqueror” (Rom. 8:18-39).

(6) Laziness – Are you avoiding the sacrifice, hard work and effort required in marriage?  In Proverbs, that person is called a “sluggard” (Prov. 6:6-8; 13:4; 20:4).  It’s also robbing your own parents, your church and your community of godly offspring, of more disciples of Christ, of the salt and light so badly needed in our dark and decaying culture (Mal. 2:14; Matt. 5:13-16; 28:18-20).  You wouldn’t be here today if it weren’t for marriage, so you owe it to the next generation.

(7) Materialism – Are you afraid of any financial instability, instead of trusting God to provide and working hard?  Beware of materialism and affluenza (Matt. 6:20-24).  Ironically, those who do marry are far more likely (statistically) to be financially stable.

(8) Career-olatry – Are you making an idol out of your career, instead of living for biblical priorities, and seeing the high value and big price tag that our Maker puts on marriage?

Perhaps a 9^th excuse could be, ‘I am pursuing marriage, but keep getting rejected!’  But make sure you ditch the dating apps and let your local church do the matchmaking as they truly get to know you.  Where better to find a godly spouse if not in a healthy church (or through recommendations between likeminded churches)?  Good pastoral counsel is also available for the African context in dealing with common cultural barriers to marriage (e.g., lobola, family pressure, etc.).

I love the way one wise pastor put it, “Seven Reasons Young Men Should Marry Before Their 23^rd Birthday”.  That’s a preacher who takes the Bible seriously about the blessings of marrying young and having lots of children (Psalms 127-128).  That’s a loving shepherd who specifically “points the way” toward godly choices and right priorities (1 Tim. 4:6; 5:14; Titus 2).  Our Puritan forefathers saw “undue delay of marriage” as a violation of the 7^th Commandment, a snare to the soul, a tempting of both God and man, and a potential cause for suspension from the Lord’s Table or church discipline.

In the past three years, my wife and I have had the great joy of seeing our three older children marry young (at ages 21, 20, and 19).  Of course it isn’t easy letting them go, but that’s what we raised them for – “arrows” are meant to be sent (Ps. 127:5).  Our church in Johannesburg built a beautiful sanctuary with also this aim in mind – celebrating as many weddings together as possible with our church family.  Local churches must be loving islands of biblical hope amid the raging seas of a hateful society attacking the home.  We must be lighthouses of sexual purity that shine all the brighter as our immoral world gets darker.

Our children and grandchildren must grow up seeing lots of worshipful weddings, happy couples, and fruitful families.

Married life is God’s norm for most believers and is a noble, high and holy calling – “to be held in honour among all” (Heb. 13:4).  Yes, this should include rigorous pre-marital counselling (ensuring eligibility, etc.); here is my first homework assignment for every couple.

To my younger brothers in the Lord, I especially say:  ‘Soldiers of Christ, arise and go fetch a bride!  Man up, be strong and courageous, for the Lord is with you’ (Josh. 1:8-9).  “He who finds a wife finds a good thing and obtains favour from the Lord” (Prov. 18:22).

 

Prayer is how our entire Christian life began – asking God to save us, calling on Jesus’ name.  Prayer sustains us throughout our Christians lives – both individually and corporately as His Church, day and night.  Our last breath will probably be a  prayer uttered to our heavenly Father before we arrive home in Heaven, where prayer will no longer be necessary.

But until that day, we must pray:  We cannot see God’s true power at work in this world outside of prayer.  We saw last Sunday in Matthew 17 and Mark 9 the disciple’s failure in ministry because of the sin of prayerlessness, rooted in unbelief.  But I also wanted to explain a bit more about Christ’s powerful remedy of believing prayer, as reiterated further in Mark 11:

And Jesus answered them, “Have faith in God.  Truly I say to you, whoever says to this mountain, ‘Be taken up and thrown into the sea, and does not doubt in his heart, but believes that what he says will come to pass, it will be done for him.  Therefore I tell you, whatever you ask in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours (Mk. 11:22-24).

We’ve all heard these kinds of Bible verses twisted, manipulated, and hijacked beyond recognition by prosperity preachers, stripped totally out of context.  But what then does it actually mean?  Do we dare to accept the full and joyous weight of what Jesus is truly teaching here?

Jesus is now headed into His final Passion week, with the agony of Good Friday in view.  He is saying to His disciples:  ‘Men, you are about to face the toughest week of your entire life.  Your faith is about to tested and refined through the fiery furnace of suffering.  You will be tempted to panic and despair, you will want to give up.  But don’t do it!  Keep trusting My Father, just as I had to trust Him throughout my earthly life.’

Further, our Lord is teaching the Twelve and us all:  ‘Remember what God did for Me through faith.  Remember that cursed fig tree, remember Lazarus walking out of his tomb, remember the 5,000 being fed, the calm seas after I rebuked the storm, the sick healed, the lame raised.  Remember that I worked these miracles through prayer. Remember the whole nights I spent in prayer, remember how often I lifted My eyes upward, how often I groaned heavenward in prayer.’

Here is the one unshakable conviction that led Hudson Taylor to suffer and give his life for 51 years to see inland China reached and at least 18,000 souls won to Christ:  “There is a living God.  He has spoken in the Bible.  He means what He says and will do all that He has promised.”  After Taylor died, one bishop said this about him:

The power inherent in a simple faith, without any accessories…, remains an awe-inspiring and tremendous fact. …We can be thankful for the one deep lesson taught to this generation by the founder of the China Inland Mission, the power of the pure flame of passionate belief.  …The spiritual force has been so great that no church or denomination can show so imposing a mass of missionary agents in China as the Inland Mission….

By the time of Hudson’s death, over 800 missionary recruits had come to join him in China!   His biographer states:

…the secret of it all was Hudson Taylor’s simple, childlike, unshakable faith in God.  He is simply inconceivable apart from his faith in the Word, and character, of God.  There is no other explanation of the man. …If there is one Scripture, more than another, inseparably associated with [the name Hudson Taylor], it is [this]: Mk. 11:22,  “Have faith in God.”

 Oh that God would raise up among us here more Hudson Taylor’s who will trust God so fully that they too will take great risks and accomplish great exploits in Christ’s cause!

But let’s be real clear on what faith is and what it is not. There is nothing that Satan works harder to confuse Christians about than the nature of true faith:

What Faith is Not

Biblical faith does not say, ‘I can do this; I have enough faith; I have the potential, I am capable; I’m positive, I refuse to be negative; and I expect God to grant my every wish (like some fortune cookie or genie in a bottle).’  Disney theology is unbiblical, selfish, and very man-centred:

There can be miracles, when you believe
Though hope is frail, it’s hard to kill
Who knows what miracles, you can achieve,
When you believe, somehow you will
You will when you believe.
…Just believe, just believe…

Faith is only as good as its object.  People of every religion and people of no religion talk about “faith”.  Even faith in Coca-cola or boerwors may feel good for a while, and it can even improve your health and enhance your life temporarily just to have some kind of faith/hope – it’s called ‘the placebo effect’.  But Christian faith trusts only in the God of the Bible, the “God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ” (Eph. 1:2).

Jesus says, ‘If you have true faith, even if it is the size of a tiny mustard seed, you can move mountains!’ (Matt. 17:20). It’s not about the size of our faith; it’s about the size of our God!  God can take the most pathetic, puny faith and do awesome things:  Like when Peter was about to drown at sea, but then he cries out in prayer to Jesus, and he is answered for his “little faith” (Matt. 14:29).  Or that desperate father of the demonised boy in Matthew 17, who runs to Jesus, cries out, “I believe; help my unbelief!”, and Jesus heals his son!  It’s not about the size of our faith; it’s about the size of our God!

What Faith Is

 Biblical, saving faith realises that God alone has unlimited power.  It is the childlike, desperate dependence upon our Father to accomplish His will, not my will.  “Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see” (Heb. 11:1).  Faith is the choice to trust Christ against all odds, despite everything else to the contrary.  Faith is expecting from the Lord what can be expected from no one and nothing else – trusting God to do what only He can do.

Faith was Satan’s first target in Garden with Eve and Adam. It was the lack of faith in the 10 spies, unlike Joshua and Caleb, that sent Israel into 40 years of wandering and perishing in the wilderness. Faith was central to Jesus’ ministry.  Again and again in the Gospels, Jesus declares, “Your faith has healed you; your faith has saved you; only believe!”

Faith On Display

 What is one of the best proofs of true faith in God, one of the clearest expressions of true dependence upon the Lord?  Our prayer life.  Through believing prayer, we discover Christ to be the ultimate ‘Rooter up of Mountains’, the ‘Lord of the impossible’!

Jesus is not saying that we can just ask God do spectacular things willy-nilly, any time we’d like.  When the Pharisees wanted to see Jesus perform a miracle, He refused to do so because of their unbelief:  “A wicked and adulterous generation asks for a miraculous sign” (Matt. 12:39).  God can do anything He wants to do, according to His will, not ours (1 Jn. 5:14).

No matter how hard I pray, God has never promised to improve my health or circumstances in this life, or to dethrone dictators, as much as we long for that.  But in His Word, God has given me thousands of spiritual promises of how He will: provide my daily bread; forgive my sin; glorify His name, use His Word, bring in His elect; build His church, work “all things together” for our eternal good, to make us more like Christ!  For those kinds of spiritual desires that seem impossible at times, I can pray confidently, knowing God will answer!

In Pilgrim’s Progress, Bunyan describes how Giant Despair locks up the Christian in Doubting Castle.  If you let it, doubt will lead you into the darkest nights of despair that you have ever known.

Whatever You Ask?!

 Beloved, I wonder what other mountains of impossibility are staring at you on the horizon?  Trusting God with your spiritual struggles? unsaved loved ones?  financial fears?  career changes?  family conflict?  health concerns?, and much more.

We’ve only begun to imagine all that God wants to do through us as believers and as a church when we trust Him and as we learn to slay every doubt (in our hearts) and storm the gates of Heaven in believing prayer!  That’s exactly how Jesus would speak in His Upper Room counsel the night before His crucifixion, daring the disciples to ‘expect great things from God’ in the work of the kingdom:

“…I will do whatever you ask in my name, so that the Son may bring glory to the Father.  You may ask me for anything in my name, and I will do it. …If you remain in Me, and My words remain in you, [nb, Christ-centred, Scripture-saturated prayers!] ask whatever you wish, and it will be given you. …I appointed you to go and bear lasting fruit…then the Father will give you whatever you ask in My name” ((John 14:13-14; 15:7,16).

Do we dare to believe this?  Hudson Taylor once wrote: Oh, for the clear accent, the ringing, joyous note of apostolic assurance! We want a faith not loud, but deep; a faith not born of sentiment and human sympathy, but that comes from the vision of the living God. …There is no dream that must not be dared…  Faith laughs at impossibilities; and obedience raises no questions.

Or as John Newton put in his hymn:

Thou art coming to a King,
Large petitions with thee bring;
For His grace and power are such,
None could ever ask too much!