Toward Sexual Wholeness for the Single Christian
Confession: I've never really been single. I got married at 22, and am less than two months away from celebrating my 40th anniversary with Lisa. I've now been married almost 2/3 of my life (and I was in toddlerhood and adolescence for the other third), so I'm not one to turn to in order to discuss the sexual tension of being a believer who is single. But Dr. Carol Tanksley, author of Sexpectations (see her earlier post HERE), didn't get married until her forties, and now is a widow. She knows and understands what it is to be sexual and single, and what that means for a believer in Jesus. I love her advice and am eager to share it with you this week. Also, please consider checking out her book; it's one I highly recommend.
So, what’s a single person supposed to do? If you listen to much of what’s both said and unsaid in church, you’d get the message that, because God intended sex to be enjoyed between a husband and wife within covenant marriage, to be a good Christian you turn off your sexuality until you say “I do.” And then if your marriage ends, you’re supposed to turn it off again. And if you’re not, can’t, or don’t want to get married, tough. Or maybe that idea is just old-fashioned and it doesn’t matter what you do.
How’s that working for you?
It hasn’t worked for me. I lived single until God brought my husband into my life in my forties, and I’m living single again since he passed away. If you’re not married right now, you’ll probably agree with me that your nature as a sexual being and your need for intimacy don’t correlate with your relationship status. I could rant about how the Christian church has, for the most part, utterly failed unmarried people. If you’ve heard any teaching at all, it’s likely been, “If you’re not married, just try harder and don’t do it.” There’s been precious little help for those without a spouse to address their sexuality or their need for intimacy. But ranting isn’t helpful. Instead of cursing the darkness, let’s turn on the light.
You have your own personal story and your own collection of emotions, shame, disgust, desires, vulnerabilities, needs, and experiences with others and with God. You might have lots of questions and struggle with what it means to follow Jesus faithfully as an unmarried person.
Some see the classic Christian sexual ethic as leading to the conclusion that God is an ogre. You either try hard and fall in line or you’re bad, dirty, one of “those people.” There must be more to the story. We’re contending in this book that sex is never just sex. Behaviors matter, but what’s underneath, the matters of the heart, matters at least as much if not more. Addressing these matters of the heart doesn’t mean you can do whatever you wish without consequences. But stuffing facts or laws into your left brain is not effective at bringing you wholeness.
So here’s to addressing these matters of the heart for those of us who are single, Christian-and sexual.
Single and Fully Alive
In the opening of this book, I told you of how I found myself alone in a hotel room with a married man. (Note: my clothes did not come off.) One thing that experience pushed me to deal with was the lies I had come to believe. Our culture has promulgated the idea that in order to be a fully alive, whole human being you must have a satisfying sex life. The modern church has often extended that to the (often unstated) belief that to be fully alive you must therefore get married.
Really? Does that mean I wasn’t fully alive until I got married in my forties? Have I slipped in status now that I’m single again? Are you somehow a second-class human being, or at least a second-class Christian, because you’re not wearing a wedding ring? Should you make it your goal to get married?
In the first fifteen hundred years of the church, being a single, celibate Christian was viewed as the highest, most spiritual life. The Protestant Reformation changed that, and for the last five hundred years the married Christian life has usually been held up as the pinnacle of “success.” Paul did not believe that either of these views were “the answer” spiritually. Right in the middle of his discussion of marriage and singleness he says, “Only let each person lead the life that the Lord has assigned to him, and to which God has called him” (1 Corinthians 7:17).
Rachel commented on our website, “Singleness is viewed as shameful and wicked. There’s no doubt in my mind that the only real members of Christ’s body are the marrieds. We [singles] are not truly part of Christ’s Bride. I’ve been repeatedly told, ‘Only married people can appreciate Christ’s love for His Church.’ I sure don’t feel loved by Christ or His Bride.” Part of me wants to weep with Rachel because I’ve felt that message oozing out of many churches and their leaders. And part of me wants to grab some Christians by the shoulder and yell, “Wake up!”
This is not advocating for either singleness or marriage—we’re addressing the matters of the heart. And for many singles the desire for sex becomes shorthand for the desire for intimacy. Your sex drive may be very real, but you may also be more troubled by the assumption that “not having sex” means “not experiencing intimacy.” What are you really hungry for when you want sex? And whether you desire sex or not, you absolutely must have intimacy in order to thrive.
Looking to Jesus is always the ideal way to go. And Jesus was never married, never had sex. Would Jesus have been more fully alive, more fully human, more fulfilled, if He had gotten married or had sex? Certainly not. If Jesus was fully human, as we believe, He had all the sex hormones, sex organs, and sex drives that any of us humans have. How did He deal with His sexuality?
I was talking about this very point with a group of men and women going through our Sexpections course. One twenty-something single young man (I’ll call) Dan said, “But Jesus was a special case. He was without sin, unlike the rest of us. Jesus was extremely tight with His heavenly Father.”
Bingo! Dan was assuming that Jesus’ example didn’t really apply to him. But his response was truer than he first realized. Jesus wasn’t encumbered by the belief that the spirit is good and the body is bad. His whole being, including His body, was daily, intimately connected with His Father.
That’s a huge clue for those of us singles who are wrestling with our sexuality. Your sexuality is not something to be either hated or made into a god. Wholeness means your sexuality, as well as every other part of you, is welcomed into the full picture of who you are becoming. And that whole integrated you is undergoing ongoing transformation, becoming the beautiful thing God and you are cooperatively working toward together. You come to submit your sexuality to your heavenly Father every day just as Jesus did.
And in doing so, you experience true intimacy with God. Your journey with God comes to the place where you truly feel seen and known by Him. He’s the one filling your deepest heart needs, available 24/7/365. You’re doing life with Him.
That may sound too . . . mystical. In the real world you’re coming home to an empty apartment every night. Your sex hormones go on a rampage with some frequency. Your body is in the here and now, and it wants what it wants. And would anyone know or care if you didn’t wake up tomorrow? As I once heard a six-year-old girl say, “I need God with skin on.” There’s no way intimacy with God can ever feel like kissing or holding your lover, or satisfying sex.
Here’s something you may be surprised by: there’s a sense in which intimacy with God wasn’t by itself enough for Jesus either. A moment-by-moment connection with His heavenly Father was the air Jesus breathed, and He also needed people. Intimacy with God needs to become the air in which you breathe also. And, as human beings, we also need, truly need, intimacy with other humans.
Jesus, in His human nature, needed people. He pursued intimacy with people even at the risk of getting hurt. And He did get hurt! It was messy. His bids for connection weren’t always reciprocated. He was betrayed by one of His close friends. One of His three most intimate friends denied Him. He was let down by those He relied on right when He needed them most.
And Jesus still pursued intimacy with people. A few people.
If Jesus needed that, do you think you can get by without doing the same?
But practically, what do you do with your sex drive as a single? You do need a plan for when your sex drive is raging and you feel tempted to act out in whatever way you are tempted to by your brand of sexual brokenness. If you haven’t created an escape plan already, do it now. If the plan you have isn’t working, update it. Make your plan practical. What you do with your body and your mind at those moments will make a difference. An escape plan is the first of three recommendations I give to anyone struggling with sexually acting out.
The other two things I regularly recommend are pursuing intimacy with others and intimacy with God. How do you do that as a single?
Intimacy with Others
New Testament professor Joseph Hellerman describes how in the ancient Mediterranean world the sibling relationship was seen as the closest and most affectionate bond, even above marriage.[1] That’s the kind of connection the New Testament is talking about when it described the church as a family.
If you grew up with brothers or sisters, you know sibling relationships are messy. Sometimes you fight. It may be a love/hate relationship. If you’ve got several siblings, you feel closer to some than others. Sometimes you get enmeshed in unhealthy ways. Sometimes you become estranged or angry and don’t speak for long periods. But your siblings are your siblings; you can’t divorce your brother or sister. You may have never had siblings, or have never developed any real bond with the siblings you do have. There may have been so much trauma between you that you have set up necessary boundaries between you just to stay safe. Most of us need to learn healthier ways to relate to our siblings, but you’re stuck with the siblings you have.
The family of God is messy too. But the only way to address our God-given need for intimacy is to stick around, as Jesus did with His closest friends. Who are your Peter, James, and John?
When I tell people my three recommendations (see previous section), the “others” one is almost always the hardest. But you need intimacy, just like Jesus did, even if it’s messy and hard. I’ve never met anyone who struggled with a significant sexual or personal issue who experienced long-term transformation and wholeness without connecting deeply with a few others. If you want to know where to put your energy in working together with God toward wholeness, work hard at finding a few of your people. And when you get hurt, pause for a moment, regroup, and pursue it again.
Knowing God As Your Spouse
This is not weird; this is biblical. “For your Maker is your husband, the Lord of hosts is his name; and the Holy One of Israel is your Redeemer, the God of the whole earth he is called” (Isaiah 54:5). It’s a dimension of intimacy with God that all people need regardless of relationship status, but it’s perhaps especially important for singles. A few practical ideas:
Bring your body into your time with God. If you have five minutes, take the first minute or two to just be still, feel your breathing, and relax your body. If you have longer, make sure your body is present. Involve your senses: a candle, fragrance, music that draws you in, a comfortable chair, even a good cup of coffee. Time with God outdoors can be powerful. Feel the wind. Touch a tree. Listen to the birds. Look up at the stars. Your physical senses can be part of actually experiencing His presence.
Bring your emotions into your time with God as well. Whatever you’re feeling, feel it in His presence. That’s intimacy. Angry? Sad? Lonely? Worried? Excited? Express that to Him. Cry, yell, scream, throw rocks if you need to. You’re bringing your messy emotions to Him; that’s what you do with them. That’s what God’s very best friends in Scripture did—just read the Psalms. You intellectually know He sees you, but now you’re experiencing Him seeing you. If you’re scared to do so, you tell Him that too. And then get quiet. Just be still, be with Him.
And then begin practicing the presence of God. Set reminders on your phone for two or three times during the day when you simply pause for a moment; “God, I’m here to connect with You again right now.” The One Minute Pause app from author John Eldredge is one helpful way to do this. You’re doing life with God. He’s involved in everything including your time, money, entertainment, work, friends, plans-and your sexuality. He’s part of your good times, hard times, ugly times. You’re not holding anything back.
Inviting Him in, allowing Him in, will take practice. But keep taking the walls down around your heart in being with Him. Like Peter when Jesus asked him, “Do you want to go away as well?”, reply “Lord, to whom shall [I] go?” (John 6:68).
Just keep coming back. And keep saying yes.
[1] Joseph H. Hellerman, When the Church Was a Family: Recapturing Jesus’ Vision for Authentic Christian Community (Nashville: B&H, 2009), 37–38.
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