Singled In
Phillip Ryken
October 1, 1997
Last Sunday I needed someone to pick me up after midnight at Philadelphia's 3oth Street Station. Needless to say, I did not begin by calling my married friends. Not that they aren't helpful enough in their own way. It's just that—in my experience—somebody single has more freedom to run an errand of mercy in the wee hours of the morning.
My life is so immeasurably enriched by unmarried friends that it was refreshing to read honest, positive presentations of life as a Christian single in the most recent rq. (Full disclosure: I was never single. Since I was married at 20, I went straight from puberty to matrimony.)
In the church I help pastor, very little gets accomplished without the ministry of singles. Partly this is because our congregation includes five hundred or more singles (attention singles: contact tenth@libertynet.org for membership information). But it is also because so many of them have a singular devotion to Jesus Christ.
The apostle Paul knew what he was talking about when he said that unmarried men and women are "concerned about the Lord's affairs" (1 Corinthians 7:32, 34). Most of our volunteers who tutor inner city children are single. Most of our workers who feed the homeless are single. Most of our elders and deacons in the Center City are single.
The friendship of these singles has taught me valuable lessons about the communion of saints, that neglected doctrine from the Apostles' Creed. The communion of the saints is the living fellowship of all believers in Jesus Christ.
Christians have communion with one another because they have union with Christ. The Bible thus describes our communion as living together in Christ's body. "The body is a unit, though it is made up of many parts; and though all ...
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