Day 6 – Singleness and Marriage

Today it’s 54 days until our wedding. Fifty-four more good-byes at the end of the day (give or take a few). Fifty-four more nights of sleeping alone.

¹⁸ The LORD God said, “It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper suitable for him.”

¹⁹ Now the LORD God had formed out of the ground all the wild animals and all the birds in the sky. He brought them to the man to see what he would name them; and whatever the man called each living creature, that was its name. ²⁰ So the man gave names to all the livestock, the birds in the sky and all the wild animals.

   But for Adam^[f] no suitable helper was found. ²¹ So the LORD God caused the man to fall into a deep sleep; and while he was sleeping, he took one of the man’s ribs^[g] and then closed up the place with flesh. ²² Then the LORD God made a woman from the rib^[h] he had taken out of the man, and he brought her to the man.

Genesis 2:18-22

K and I had a pre-marital counseling session with our pastor today. Last time we met, Pastor Mel gave us questionnaires to fill out individually. Today we reviewed them and Pastor Mel was most encouraging. He flagged a couple of areas that we might want to talk about with each other and, possibly, with a qualified third party, but for the most part he affirmed our thoughtfulness and our suitedness and at the end of the meeting he blessed us and that appears to be that. Two sessions and we’re off!

I suspect if we had more serious issues he would have worked longer with us or been more urgent in recommending that we see another counselor. We do need to start meeting with our officiating pastor, and I have a feeling he will draw out some of these conversations.

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So K and I are leaving singleness and entering weddedness. A year and a half ago, I front-loaded our relationship with difficult questions and intense emotional work. I didn’t want any surprises. I wanted to be sure of K. There was some wisdom in that approach—and, unfortunately, too much fear. After so many years of wondering if I was destined to be single and/or childless, I marvel that marriage is on my doorstep.

I never want to forget what it was like to be single for so long, with all of the emotional, social, relational, spiritual complexity. I know that marriage means trading one set of complexities for another, but I never want my coupled state to eclipse my awareness that it is difficult to be alone.

In an interview about his new book, Redeeming Singleness, Barry Danylak explains,

Paul is not contradicting Genesis—that is he is not say that it is good to be alone. Paul does not envision a life of singleness that is a life lived in isolation, but a life lived in close community and fellowship with the new family of God in Christ.

There is a difference between being lonely and being alone. Being alone can be a healthy state of solitude. Being lonely can happen even in a crowd—the sense of being disconnected, unseen, unsupported, unwanted. Aloneness needs no cure. Loneliness needs gentle care. “God sets the lonely in families,” the psalmist writes (Psalm 68:6).

K and I talk a lot about our home. We share a love for hospitality. Already, with his daughter and his cousin living there, we are and will be a blended family, and we love to include more. Lauren Winner resonates with this:

One of the many experiences America has privatized is marriage; we believe that marriage is something given to two people for their companionship, fulfillment, happiness, and perhaps for the rearing of children. While companionship, kids, et cetera, are clearly part of marriage, in the Christian landscape I think we have to see that marriage is not given exclusively, or even primarily, to the couple. (And insofar as it is given to them, it is for their transformation, not their fulfillment.) It is given to the community, the church, to be a sign to the community of God’s relentless faithfulness. Other people’s marriages instruct me in what faithfulness looks like.

Our marriage is not to be for ourselves, for our own pleasure and healing. It is to be for others, from Christ and to him and through him. We love because Christ first loved us. We love each other and we love others because of Christ.