“In view of the present distress”

I was thinking about 1 Corinthians 7 as one does, and further to a comment on a post on singleness last year, I’m warming to the idea that when Paul is saying that singleness is better (1 Corinthians 7.38), he is addressing a particular redemptive-historical context. Could “the present distress” (v. 26), the “appointed time” which has “grown very short” (v. 29), the fact that “the present form of this world is passing away” (v. 31), and the requirement for some slightly odd behavior more in keeping with a temporary situation than normal life (v. 30), be referring not to the whole of the last days, but a particular crisis, maybe even AD 70? Jesus advice for AD 70 (see e.g. Matthew 24.17-19) bears some resemblance to vv. 29 and 30. That then forms the context for the anxiety and divided interests the married man faces which Paul wants to avoid (vv. 33 and 34).

The implication of Paul’s teaching for us in the chapter as a whole is therefore first to be content with our current situation, second realise that there may be particular situations of crisis which makes singleness a better state to be in (not morally, but practically), and since Paul’s aim is to promote good order and secure undivided devotion to the Lord, it seems fair to say that those in some kind of courtship or marriage should be to make sure that they are charactised by good order and undivided devotion to the Lord.

All things in subjection under his feet

For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive. But each in his own order: Christ the firstfruits, then at his coming those who belong to Christ. Then comes the end, when he delivers the kingdom to God the Father after destroying every rule and every authority and power. For he must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet. The last enemy to be destroyed is death. - 1 Corinthians 15.24-26

Christ has been raised from the dead, ascended into heaven, and is now reigning at the right hand of the Father. When he returns, he will hand the kingdom to the Father. But he will only hand the kingdom over after everything has been put in subjection to him, death included. This subjection of all things, the last of which is death is a process that takes place while Christ reigns before he returns and hand the kingdom back to the Father. I take it therefore, in this time after the ascension of Christ, that we can assume that to an increasing extent, Christ’s enemies will be conquered, so that by the time he returns, all his enemies will have been conquered (then the last enemy, death, is destroyed and the kingdom is handed over to the Father).

I warmly recommend Doug Wilson’s sermon on the Ascension, which I think is a great exposition of Philippians 3.20-21. Because of the ascension, earth has a new capital city, heaven. ‘Our citizenship is in heaven’ doesn’t mean that we’re just passing through this world and then we’ll go to heaven for all eternity. It means that the church is a colony of heaven, that is, ruled by heaven and intended to spread the rule and influence of heaven around it (just as Philippi was a Roman colony, and that didn’t mean that everyone would retire from Philippi to Rome). Bishop Tom Wright makes the same point in his in many ways excellent book Surprised by Hope. We do not live in a gnostic two-storey universe in which we’re waiting to be saved from this terrible world to go to heaven where everything will be nice. When we go to heaven, it will be appropriate to ask, “How long before we get to go home?”. When we die, we visit the capital city temporarily, before Christ returns and renews the earth. In the meantime, we look forward to his coming, when all things will be subject to him. We can expect that before his coming, most things (death excepted) will be subject to him. This will be achieved by the preaching of the gospel. The fact that the earth will be transformed rather than thrown away means that our labours in the Lord now are not in vain, even if the labours of the world’s empires are (where is Assyria now? Babylon? The Medes? The Persians?). We should start Christian businesses and schools with the hope that they will pass from one generation to another and still be there in a few hundred years’ time. God behaves inappropriately towards us. He shows us grace and mercy in redeeming us, sending his Son to die for our sins, which we don’t deserve.