In the words of John Piper, "I fear that we have settled into our land and our culture and idolized the family, idolized marriage! We're here for a vapor's breath and then we're gone! What happens here is relatively minor compared to what will be after the resurrection."
I do think that some people have idolized marriage. An idol is anything that we place before God and I know that I've certainly been guilty of that at times.
Yes, I think we've idolized it, as we tend to idolize everything at some point in time or another. As Pixy said...whenever we put something before God. And, I believe we often do so in our desire for a spouse...out of loneliness, fear, comfort, etc. When we put our purpose, dreams and desires above God's.
As far as marriage is concerned, while God did create marriage, the point of life is not to get married, but rather to glorify God. A large subset of that is leading others into a saving relationship with Him. Marriage is good, but many who are called to singleness are used in far greater ways to impact people's lives for Christ, which is of far greater importance than having a family.
God uses parents in the lives of their children to lead them to Him, but is it not greater to lead many more of the Lost to Him? Too often, people are looked down on like they did something wrong because they do not have a family, but that singleness should be viewed as a gift, and that time should be used to grow your spiritual family.
After all, when we leave this present age, all that will really count will be who is in Heaven with God and who isn't. Can you lead people to Christ while married? Absolutely. But let's make sure that we don't place marriage itself higher than we ought.
You never caught onto the whole "speaking with love" thing, did you?
"Leading someone to Christ" is just verbiage. God uses Christians in the life of others to draw them to himself. There. Is that better for you?
That was far from the point though. The point is that the Church has started to treat marriage and raising a family as way more of an accomplishment than it really is, and if you don't do either, it's like you're doing something wrong.
Tulip, if there is anything (besides my boyfriend) that I have taken away from this site, it�s that semantics are EVERYTHING.
I love that you started this thread, although a lot of people who probably need to realize this are probably not going to give the thread much thought. Something that always bothered me about other girls my age is the OBSESSION with getting married. My short stint at a four-year college in an all-girls� dorm was filled with conversations built around �I don�t know what I�d do if I wasn�t engaged by graduation�. Most women can tell you all the ridiculous details they want their wedding to have, or the names their children will have, without having any prospects. I realize I am pinning a lot of this on women and just venting frustration�.
I really feel like a lot of society today puts a huge emphasis on being part of a couple: you work out your marriage no matter how terrible and un-marriage-like it is, all time spent being �single� is spent looking for somebody to be not-single with, and everybody in the world is trying to hook you up with that �nice girl/boy� from so-and-so�s Bible study. Also, I don�t think a lot of people are putting much thought into what �marriage� really is/should be before deciding they desperately want it.
Time spent being single should be devoted to God, and time spent being not-single should be devoted to God and each other.
