For the single Christian who wants to get married, singleness is challenging thanks to unfulfilled desire and the needs of the body that only marriage can satisfy. For example, sexual pressure and the need for marital companionship. When you add that internal pressure to the external pressure from people’s opinions, you’d understand why singleness is a state many want to escape at all costs.
That cost can be sex before marriage to satisfy and keep a partner, dating unbelievers and unsuitable partners, or even walking away from God.
This makes the decision to honor God in singleness a critical one if you do not want your single season to end in regrets with emotional and spiritual wounds.
What Does It Mean to Honor God as a Christian Single?
To honor God in your singleness is to magnify his will above the temptations posed by the challenges of [unwanted] singleness.
To honor God is to say yes to him and no to your flesh. It’s to say no to the advice and opinions of men that go contrary to God’s word and will.
It is also:
- To find your joy in the Lord despite your challenges (Psalm 42:5; Philippians 4:4-6)
- It is to trust him with all your heart (Proverbs 3:5)
- To flee from sex before marriage (1 Corinthians 6:18-20, Hebrews 13:4)
- To seek God’s will and help as you find a spouse (Proverbs 3:6)
- To keep busy with God’s purpose for your life (Ephesians 2:10)
Choose to Honor God Even if Your Singleness Never Ends
It is easy to trust and honor God as a single when you’re younger and your future looks bright with the prospect of romance and marriage. But what do you do when it begins to seem like your singleness may last longer than you expected or last forever? Will you still honor God even if you never get married?
Many singles quit trusting God the longer their singleness persists. They quit honoring him. And even for those who don’t outwardly rebel in blatant sinning, their faith becomes destabilized, weakened by a lack of faith in God’s love for them. They quit believing God loves them. Prayer becomes boring and faithless, if at all they still maintain a prayer life. Bitterness and envy become constant friends.
Your decision to honor God as a single is not to be borne out of the expectation that you’ll get married. Make that bold decision to honor him whether you get married or stay single.
God is ever good. He doesn’t have to bless a single with a marriage partner to prove his love. Jesus’s death for us sinners is the absolute demonstration of a sinless God’s love for us (Romans 5:8). While a good marriage is a great blessing, the lack of marriage does not prove God’s lack of love for you.
Let Scriptures Encourage You to Honor God in Your Single Season and Beyond
Find hope and encouragement in scriptures, not because you will get married, but for strength to honor God when temptations want to pull you away.
You were created by God for his glory
- Worthy are you, our Lord and God, to receive glory and honor and power, for you created all things, and by your will they existed and were created – Revelations 4:11.
God wants you to glorify him with your body
- …You are not your own, 20 for you were bought with a price. So glorify God in your body – 1 Corinthians 6:19-20
Following God is to deny yourself
- And He said to all, If any person wills to come after Me, let him deny himself [disown himself, forget, lose sight of himself and his own interests, refuse and give up himself] and take up his cross daily and follow Me [cleave steadfastly to Me, conform wholly to My example in living and, if need be, in dying also] – Luke 9:23, AMPLIFIED VERSION
You’re called to live not like the world lives
- Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him…And the world is passing away along with its desires, but whoever does the will of God abides forever. 1 John 2:15-17
God has a better future for you, one that transcends this life
It is tempting for a single to think that if they honor God, he must give them a spouse. That’s putting God in a box. The promises of scripture should be your confidence that God does not disappoint those who put their trust in him. If all your desires never get fulfilled in this life, there’s another life after this, one in which you will know no sorrow. Or heartbreak!
- If in this life only we have hoped in Christ, we are of all people most to be pitied – 1 Corinthians 15:19
- God will wipe away every tear from their eyes; and death shall be no more, neither shall there be anguish (sorrow and mourning) nor grief nor pain any more, for the old conditions and the former order of things have passed away – Revelations 21:4 AMPLIFIED VERSION
Dear single, make that bold decision. Choose to honor God in your singleness, even if it prolongs beyond your expectation. Even if it becomes a permanent state.
May the Lord grant you the grace for this.
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