Over the past few weeks, I’ve read several different blog posts from devout, godly, awesome women about the struggles of singleness. You can read them here, here, and here. These women are fantastic; they serve faithfully and accomplish astounding things for the Kingdom. I fully respect what they have to say about being single, and I deeply admire them for their perseverance in what is often a rough road for each of them. I think a lot of Christian women feel the way these women feel, and I am delighted that those women have such godly examples of good fighting to encourage them.
But I am single and I love it. Love it love it love it, dance around the house singing about how much I love it. I would love to say that I feel this way because I am spiritually mature or an empowered free-wheeling feminist, but that would be a lie. The truth is, I love being single because God has called me to a life of singleness, and He has given me deep and abiding joy and contentment in that state. Which is fantastic, and I am immensely grateful. But here’s the catch. All three of those godly women are aware, and wary of, the fact that the idea of marriage can easily become an idol in their lives. I’m here to tell you, singleness can be just as much of an idol.
I love singleness for the good reasons: God brought me to faith in Christ through my singleness, and then enabled me to work at a church, to go to seminary, to intern at another church, and to get licensed for foster care. All of those would have been much more complicated if I had been married. I have been able to be much more focused on God and working for His glory than I ever would have been if I weren’t single (not that married people aren’t focused on God, just that a married me wouldn’t have been).
I also love singleness for the selfish, silly reasons: I don’t ever have to have ESPN; I don’t have to do anyone else’s laundry or iron anyone else’s shirts; I can work/eat/sleep/read whenever I want; I don’t have to share; I don’t have to deal with anyone else’s extended family; I don’t have to argue; I don’t have to consult or cooperate with anyone else when I make a decision. I take great delight in all of these things; sometimes I exult in them daily. But they are dangerous. There is a lot of room for selfishness in singleness, and there is a lot of room for thinking that I am in charge of my space, my time, my life when actually God is.
If you read through that list of selfish reasons for loving singleness, you may have noticed something. By entering this foster/adopt journey, I’m about to give most of those up. I’m about to switch from a life that caters to my every whim (within limits) to a life that sacrifices at every turn. And I’ll be brutally honest. There are a lot of reasons to doubt the decision to foster; it is more scary and difficult than anything I have ever even come close to doing. But none of those reasons has held any sway over me. The thing that makes me hesitate, that makes me doubt, is the whiny two year old inside who doesn’t want to give up all the silly things you can’t have/do anymore when you become a parent.
Obviously, that voice isn’t winning. But just knowing that it is there, and that it is loud, has been really humbling for me. What’s even more humbling is the knowledge that Jesus left heaven to come to earth to suffer and die just because He loved selfish, rebellious, stiff-necked ol’ me. Which makes giving up control over my sleep schedule seem like the least I can do. =)
Do nothing from selfishness or empty conceit, but with humility of mind regard one another as more important than yourselves; do not merely look out for your own personal interests, but also for the interests of others. Have this attitude in yourselves which was also in Christ Jesus, who, although He existed in the form of God, did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied Himself, taking the form of a bond-servant, and being made in the likeness of men. Being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. --Philippians 2:3-8
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