God Is in Our Lives, In Our Marriages and In Our Singleness

February 12, 2019

In 1 Corinthians 7, we see all these married and unmarried people asking Paul for counsel. Should I get married? Should I get divorced? Paul took seriously the actual conditions of people’s lives and gave the best counsel he possibly could. He worked hard at helping them. The gospel is never indifferent to what’s going on in our lives, whether in our marriages or in our singleness.

Where you are right now is God’s place for you. Live and obey and love and believe right there. God, not your marital status, defines your life.

1 Corinthians 7:17, The Message

But Paul was careful to tell the Corinthians that his counsel had no divine authority. Several times in 1 Corinthians 7, he cautioned them that he was writing out of his own experience and reasoning and that God hadn’t given him any direct word on the matter. He was trying to be authentic, not authoritarian.

Paul interrupted himself, though, and said, in essence, “There’s something far more important than what we’re doing with these questions and answers: God is in our lives, and the invisible God is more real than our visible problems” (see verse 19).

We’re in the habit of thinking that our married status, our vocational status, and our economic status make us who we are. They don’t. They’re important, but they don’t give us our identity. None of these things is unimportant, but none of them is of central importance They are the raw materials that God takes to shape his life in us.

And so Paul’s words to the Corinthians are good words for us as well: “God, not your marital status, defines your life” (verse 17). Read all of chapter 7 from The Message Bible at https://wpmu3.northcentralus.cloudapp.azure.com/messagebible/scripture/?text=1+Corinthians+7.

“God Is in Our Lives” is just one of the more than 600 insights found in The Message Devotional Bible. Compiled from Eugene Peterson’s writings and sermons, these notes and reflections are set alongside the passages that inspired them. They open the door between Scripture and your world.