I read an interesting article last night in the last issue of Christianity Today, called "The Case for Early Marriage." In it, the author suggests that amidst all of evangelicalism's emphasis on maintaining purity through your single years, we have not encouraged marriage nearly enough. The author makes a good case that our culture encourages delaying marriage to an age (typically mid- to late 20's) which makes abstinence much more difficult and for much longer than any culture ever has done in the past. His take is that at least part of the reason why we get the results we get in terms of Christian single sexuality (i.e., a bare minimum of difference between them and non-Christian singles) is that the church's teaching and expectations regarding marriage are virtually the same as that of the culture, whose message is "Wait until you're older, financially secure, spiritually ready, etc." This creates not increasing maturity, but extended adolescence, since marriage is a marvelously maturing institution. This could be a reason why young men continue to play "World of Warcraft" and X-Box well into physical adulthood. Moreover, people simply will not wait over a decade to have sex, no matter what God says in His Word. We might wish that weren't the case, but the data don't lie: 80% of Christian singles in a dating relationship are having some variety and frequency of sex. Encouraging people to marry another committed Christian before they graduate college, get that great job, finish paying off their car, etc., etc. might make some practical as well as spiritual sense.
Anyway, I was fascinated to find this article in a major Christian publication. It certainly cuts cross-grain with even modern Christian culture. But as a pastor, I'd say that young (early 20s) marriage has a lot to commend it. Read the whole thing...
6 comments:
Funny! I've been saying the same thing for a while. Glad people are catching on!
Great article, Joe. Thanks for that highlight and link. As with "The Rosetto's," I've been saying for many years that our young people need to be marrying younger. I was 24 and my wife was 20 when we married, and I felt I was too old then! A major problem is that our society raises children to remain children until they've graduated college. 150-200 years ago children were raised to be mature adults and were marrying in their late teens and having lasting marriages. They didn't grow up being coddled, told how they had to built their self-esteem and play, play, play. And we wonder why our society is going downhill!
Interesting thoughts from you both. It is becoming clear to me that we have elevated abstinence until marriage at the same time that we have moved the age of marriage further and further from puberty. I know God's standard does not change, but there are certainly things we can do to make it more realistic to obey, don't you think?
Seriously! How can you expect people to abstain from something at the time their bodies are screaming at them to do it? Obviously the Word says to abstain until marriage. So what do we do?
Hmm, I wonder if that is why porn has become so prevalent?
Tiffany-My point precisely, though I think porn is prevalent for a complicated list of reasons, not least of which is that we largely tolerate and embrace it as a form of "freedom" in our culture. (Weirdly, I just read somewhere that 50% of online porn users are WOMEN now). That said, I think that God created us to have the strongest urges to reproduce exactly when our bodies are best suited to the purpose. It follows logically then, that this is the time when we should encourage marriage, no?
I agree about the porn thing but def. see it as a big contributor.
And as far as the women thing goes...that is odd!
So are we arranging some marriages starting in about 6 years? (ONLY KIDDING) LOL
Post a Comment