19 Oct Let’s Be Great For Jesus

I wanted to take a moment to talk to everyone—no matter where you are coming from, about something important to me and to the people of Mosaic—

and that is, our Singles.

Let me give you one main crucial theological (and totally practical) reason why our singles are (and ought to be) crucially important to our church:

Singles are important to the life of a church, Scripturally speaking.

Here’s what I mean:

In 1 Corinthians 7:17, Paul, writing about how to live for Jesus as either a married person or a single person, writes something that is and was astonishing, culturally speaking:

He writes, “Only let each person lead the life that the Lord has assigned to him, and to which God has called him.”

That is astonishing, and here’s why: in a day and age where marriage was everything, where you were nothing if you did not have children and especially if you did not have an heir, Paul is essentially saying:

Are you married? Great!
Are you single? Great!
Both are great!
Neither is better in God’s eyes!
Wherever you are, be great for Jesus right there!

You’ll notice he does not advise people to fundamentally marry, as the key to life’s problems. And, he does not advise people to remain single as the ideal way to live—although he certainly gives pros and cons each way.

The point is: Paul relativizes the importance of marriage, and says it is no inherently better or worse state of being than being single and vice versa.

What does this mean for our churches? It means that while we must minister to married people and the unique challenges that being married and having a family bring, it also means we must not make an idol out of marriage, being married, or as some have done, ministering exclusively to marrieds.

Paul’s listeners must have fallen out of their chairs when they heard that letter read to them in their 1st century churches: What’s that? My greatest status in the church isn’t being married, like it is in the culture? My greatest status is being a child of God and redeemed by Jesus?

Yes—and we should reinforce that message every chance we get.

I hope, as a local church body, that all our marrieds would root for our singles, not to get married (although that’s great if a person desires that), but to root for them to be great for Jesus RIGHT NOW; and, I hope that our singles would root for our marrieds to succeed in family life, given how difficult it is.

With all that in mind, now, if you are single, let me invite you to our upcoming annual singles retreat!

It is a great event with great people you are not going to want to miss!

It is coming up November 9 and 10, and if you were there Sunday, you heard that there is a special early bird discount of $45 that ends this weekend.

Please, if you are single, don’t make excuses, don’t think about doing something else, please don’t go somewhere else that weekend. Please just commit to being there with great people who love you and Jesus. You’ll never know what could have happened if you don’t take a step towards being “KNOWN”, which is the theme of the retreat! I desire our singles to love one another deeply as the family of God and to find deep, meaningful friendships that grow us in our discipleship as Christian people.

You can find out more details, and sign up here.

Let’s root for each other to be great for Jesus, right here, right now!

Love,

Morgan