|
Page 1 of 5
Are you saying God wants all women to be married? That makes it sound like those of us who never get there are sinning or at least inferior.
I’m going to divide my response to your question into two parts. First I want to look at what the Bible teaches about women and marriage. Then we’ll discuss the issue you raise, which is what God thinks about a woman who doesn’t marry.
The Bible almost always describes women in one of three ways: either they’re virgins, or they’re wives, or they’re widows. Each of these classifications is based on the woman’s status in relationship to a man. A fourth group, harlots, are women in an improper relationship with men. But in all cases, women are defined by men…in a way that doesn’t work in reverse.
For many women in our culture, this is the point where they “jump off the train.” Even those who want to believe the Bible is God’s word find themselves looking for a way around what I just said. Doesn’t Paul write in Galatians 3:28 that there is “neither male nor female” in Christ? Very true, but that’s a discussion about our relationship to God, our “heavenly” status. It has nothing to do with our status on earth. What about Deborah, who was a judge in Israel? Well, if you study the story in Judges 4, you’ll see that God raised up Deborah (and also a woman named Jael) to shame the men, not to change the status of women. Notice that Deborah is still introduced (in verse 4) as “a prophetess, the wife of Lapidoth.”
I won’t go into further arguments here, but in my experience, all attempts to change this fundamental perspective of scripture regarding womanhood require the addition of extra assumptions that simply aren’t in the text.
The whole issue goes away, however, when we remember WHY God made men and women to relate to each other differently. As I’ve explained before, the husband/wife relationship is designed to be a picture of the God/human relationship. God doesn’t define Himself in relationship to us. We however only have significance in relationship with Him. In our fallen world, a woman’s urge to distance herself from a man, to make herself his equal, or even to raise herself above him…all these reflect human patterns of rebellion against God.
It shouldn’t really surprise us that womanhood has become a huge battleground in the
God vs. Enemy war. We’re enormously important people in God’s plan! If the Enemy can keep us confused and resistent…and single…he does great damage to the centerpiece of human society, which is of course the family.
But, you ask, what about those passages that really are in the Bible, that talk about the value of being single?
Good question…let’s look at them!
<< Start < Prev 1 2 3 4 5 Next > End >>
|
