Terry Virgo On Marriage

"Let me recommend marriage to you. Some of you young guys and girls, don’t be scared of commitment. Don’t be shaped by the modern drift. I know that statistics tell us that marriage is going out of fashion, but break with fashion! Ask God to help you find a partner and then ask Him to help you be loyal, faithful and fruitful to the praise of His glorious grace."

These are the words Terry Virgo used yesterday on his own blog to encourage us young-uns not be be afraid of the c-word.

They stood out to me starkly. The reason is that though we are now seeing more and more excellent teaching on marriage and singleness (see below), we don't often hear someone from another generation say "let me recommend marriage to you."

The confidence that statement puts across about the right-ness of Christian marriage is helpful for us. There is much teaching around which seeks to validate being married and validate being single. But it must be possible for an older generation to recommend marriage, without that being interpreted as an attack on singleness. Both marriage and singleness are good, and yet we can clearly see God's intention for man to have a helper at the outset in Genesis. I'm not sure we can ever move away from that.

Recent teaching which has caught my eye on the subject of singleness are:
John Piper: Single In Christ - A Name Better Than Sons & Daughters
Adrian Holloway: Single In The City
There are many others too.

My point is that we mustn't marginalise the single. And we mustn't marginalise the married. And though we are more and more exposed to good teaching on the issue of singleness, that does not take away from the fact that marriage was in God's original plan for the world. Although we won't experience marriage in heaven, I believe it is very good for us to desire it for the very reason that God himself calls it "very good".