Transcript
Ben Fallon: Last week on Ask Paul Tripp, Episode 100, we found two older answers from Paul on the subject of intimacy in marriage and showing grace to a struggling spouse. But what about those who are single and unmarried? The first question in today’s episode addresses that: What advice do you have for single people in the church?
Paul Tripp: I think that we have made a tragic error in the church in the way that we’ve talked about marriage and causing single people to feel like they’re relegated to Plan B. The marriage is God’s Plan A and anybody that’s not married will never be on the A Team. You’re always going to be on the B Team.
And I think that we have carried marriage as an identity at a level that’s unbiblical. My primary identity should not be that I’m married. My primary identity ought to be in Christ: child of God who’s married. Just like your primary way of thinking about yourself should not be that “I’m single”, but that you’re a child of God with all the gifts and graces, presence and promises that are meant to fulfil the longing of your heart.
I don’t get my identity from Luella and she better not get her identity from me. We will fail with that. We don’t get our deepest inner security from our marriage. We don’t get our hope from one another. I love Luella, but she’s not what gets me up in the morning and she cannot satisfy the deepest longings of my heart. Marriage never does that. There is a Messiah. It just doesn’t happen to be my wife.
And so, you should never ever think that the deepest riches that are available to a person are unavailable to you because you’re not married, because those riches are not the product of marriage. Those riches are the product of redeeming grace. Now, I don’t think that we’ve unpacked that well for single people and I think that we could do better. I wish I had a list of resources to recommend to you. What I would recommend is don’t fall into thinking that marriage will provide inner spiritual satisfaction in a way it was never intended to do. That only comes vertically. It never comes horizontally.
And there are people in marriage, everyone in marriage at some point realizes, “This marriage is not my savior.” All of God’s good gifts are available to all of us, regardless of whether we’re single or married, young or old, weak or strong. The playing field is leveled. We only find what will fill that void in our hearts in our Savior.
BF: Because we are dipping back into the archives of old Ask Paul Tripp answers, these episodes will contain a compilation of questions, not all on the same topic - but we trust will still be encouraging and helpful, either for yourself or someone you know that you might be able to share the answer with. Paul’s next answer is a response to a question is from a young couple who just became new parents: How do we adjust to newborn children?
PT: Parenting is terrifically demanding. You know, think about it when you bring that child home from the hospital, that child is utterly dependent on you. This is not a pretty picture but if you would leave that child in a crib and walk away, in several days, the child would be dead. They have no ability to care for themselves to sustain themselves, and so, parenting becomes this 24/7 focus.
Now, it’s right for you to have a servant spirit towards your child, but you also have to understand that long-term, the greatest gift that you will give to your children is a beautiful, loving marriage of unity and understanding and cooperation and service. And you can’t let the demandingness of parenting get in the way of the health of your marriage relationship.
Luella and I, early in our marriage, realized that we were going to be parents and we were going to have a busy ministry life; and if we did that, we would have to protect our relationship. And we determined that we were going to spend time outside of the house every week, so that we could just be together as a couple, so that we would have time to talk about the things that we needed to talk about, to deal with the things we needed to deal with, just to enjoy one another, and remember our love and affection for one another.
It wasn’t always easy. Sometimes, we had no money and we would go to a park and just sit on the park bench. Sometimes, it was hard to find people who would watch our children for us, but we did it religiously and it was just tremendous help to us. You have got to make time for the continual development of that relationship.
Listen. You can’t have a sinner living with a sinner in a fallen world and not be working on your relationship. Maybe this will surprise you. I’m deeply persuaded that the number one reason marriages fail is not adultery. It’s neglect. Long before a person gives way to the temptation to be unfaithful, that person has been unfaithful to that marriage in neglecting it.
Marriage is a lot like planting a garden. Once you’ve cleared the land and you plant those seeds, you have committed yourself to daily work because there are weeds that will grow and it will choke out the life of those flowers. Your marriage is a garden. It needs to be weeded and you need to make sure that in your dedication to be good, loving, available, active parents, you also continue to make investments in your marriage. That takes commitment. That takes planning. That takes schedule. That takes time. Don’t let your children get in the way of the health of your marriage.
BF: And lastly, to conclude this episode that covers marriage and parenting and family life, Paul answers the question from a pastor and his wife: how do we protect our marriage while in ministry?
PT: Ministry life is a demanding life. Everybody in ministry has a job description that’s bigger than they could ever do; and it’s tempting for there to be an unhealthy competition between marriage, family and ministry. Now, I want to say something. Maybe it surprised you if you study the New Testament, there is no lengthy or detailed conversation about the tension between marriage and ministry. None.
And that is because God would never call us to do one thing that would make it impossible for us to do another thing He’s called us to. He will never put us in that catch-22. He’ll never call us to one set of commands that means we have to break another set of commands. I am persuaded that the conversation about the tension of ministry is needed because of the wrong choices we make in ministry.
Listen. If ministry becomes your identity, your family will pay the price for that. If ministry success becomes a thing that you live for, your family will pay the price for that. Isn’t it interesting that one of the cardinal qualifications for someone in pastoral ministry in Timothy is one who manages his house well? If I am not committed to pastor the people that are closest to me, with all the time and energy and commitment, that means, how am I qualified to be a minister in Christ’s church? I’m not.
And so, you have to make critical choices. I can’t make all of those for you because there are all kinds of details that are attached to making those choices. I could tell you what I did. As a father of four young children in pastoral ministry, other than a bi-weekly meeting, I accepted no appointments in the evening. That’s when my children are home. That’s when we would have our family time. I could not be an absentee father. And I know I told people, “I’ll meet you late at night after my children are gone to bed. I’ll meet you early in the morning, ridiculously early. I’ll meet you at lunch. There’s a way we can make it work. But I’m not gonna be night after night after night unavailable to my own children.
People would complain and I would say, “Look, if you had an impacted wisdom tooth and your dentist said, ‘I can only meet you at 6:00 in the morning,’ you would gladly go at 6:00 in the morning.” Don’t allow yourself to let ministry demands call you away from the pastoral responsibility you have to your own children. It’s possible for these two aspects of God’s calling on your life to exist well together. Commit to making that happen.
BF: Our prayer is that in every resource we produce, you’ll find gospel principles that directly apply to your life, but maybe you’re not single, maybe you don’t have newborn children, and maybe you’re not a married ministry couple. But I’m sure that you know multiple people who are, and we would love you to partner with Paul Tripp Ministries by sharing our gospel resources with others. So go ahead and share this episode, forward an email that we send to you, or share a social media post. Every time you do, you are connecting the transforming power of Jesus Christ to everyday life and helping us proclaim the right here, right now gospel message. We thank you for your partnership!
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