Inviting Singles into the Church’s “Married Community” (1/3)

Understand the Stats on Singles in the Church and Why they Exist:

The truth is most of the church caters to those who are married (with children). The church does not cater to singles; those who have never been married, those who are widowed, divorced, or celibate. There is a huge hole in church ministry, for despite the fact that singles in America (and the American church) now make up 50% of the population there is a lack of community and friendship between these singles and their married counterparts. Look in any church and ask if half of those sixteen or older are single and you have your answer.

How does this happen?

First, many adolescents stop attending church by choice; whether by lack of interest, conflicting activities, or friendships. Additionally, many stop attending church once they get into college either questioning their upbringing or they stop going since they are no longer “required” to attend (they lack a solid personal spiritual foundation). For those who do still attend the difference isn’t truly felt when singles are in college or graduate schools as there are often many opportunities to pursue (and places that provide) community. Sadly, those singles left at ages 22-25 try to attend some church for a while but normally end up dropping out until years later when they are married and have kids, around age 35*.

Understand Those Who are Single:

Perhaps you are single and your friends are in relationships or getting married. Perhaps you are in a relationship and feel scared of moving forward or of ending it. Scared to be alone and scared to fight for what you want and desire most.

Singles live in a world of fear. Fear we cannot speak about because it shows our faults, our vulnerabilities, our weaknesses. The question that begs to be answered is: Why am I still single? And if singles dig deeper the scarier questions: What is wrong with me? Or Is there something wrong with me? Why can't I find someone I connect with? Someone I'm attracted to? Someone who will walk alongside me in life? Someone who will be there when I wake up and when I go to sleep? At first many of us have roommates to help possible feelings of alone-ness or loneliness, but as people move out to get married or pursue careers, we have the relegated options of living with our parents or living alone. We opt for alone. We know no other acceptable way, especially for males.

I felt after publishing the series I wrote a few months ago, "The Truth About: Being Single", that it might be beneficial to say that what I wrote, the feelings and thoughts, do not have to be the end of the story for those of us who are single, or even a part of the story at all. We as the church, as brothers and sisters in Christ, can create a new story, a new Kingdom community, one where we are not bound by class, gender, marital status, or any number of things which tend to separate and divide us.

But to reach past this issue here takes intentionality...

Intentionality on those single and those married.

To be continued…

~ Doubledb

Links*

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/govbeat/wp/2014/09/15/for-the-first-time-there-are-more-single-american-adults-than-married-ones-and-heres-where-they-live/

http://www.pri.org/stories/2014-09-14/singles-now-outnumber-married-people-america-and-thats-good-thing

http://www.forbes.com/sites/timworstall/2014/09/11/the-us-is-becoming-more-european-half-of-adult-americans-are-now-single/

http://media.bonnint.net/dn/0/78/7841.jpg

http://www.pewforum.org/2010/02/17/religion-among-the-millennials/

On the Tide of (Fleeting) Friendships (2/2)

In a world where friendships are fleeting and people seem to be forgetting each other, how long before those in the church stop being friends and just people all attending a ritual event each week? How long before people in the church stop trying to meet new people or introduce singles to other singles?

In a culture where friendships are zip-and-done, how do we disciple others to follow Christ if we can’t even understand how Jesus called someone his "friend". In a culture that hails in high-esteem individualism and public image, how willing are we to be daring, to be brave, to be courageous? If we can’t even be friends, can we be brothers and sisters in the faith? If not, then how are we different from the world? Then, are we not merely full of selfish ambition, only seeing our own self-importance? Where is the care for the other?

What will the future of friendships become?

These questions need to be asked and are far from being answered, far from even being known, since the internet and texting are still relatively new technology in our culture. Still, even now I often find myself questioning if the benefits outweigh the potential downfall. I often wonder if I closed my Facebook how many "friends" would notice and reach out? If I refused to ever reply to a text but required friends to meet with me in-person, talk on the phone, or through Skype - How many friends would oblige? How many would take the time to sit and talk, to carve out time?

In a world where friendships are fleeting, expendable, disposable - the next step is that all others beside us become the same. We become a world full of self-seeking narcissist, all competing to see who has amassed the most wealth, the greatest status, and the greatest number of friends on Facebook and followers on Twitter. We live lives of no depth, no care, no concern.

I see this tide coming. I try to fight against it but it seems like a wave coming to overtake, like a hurricane coming towards the shore. One person or even a few cannot fight this wave of disillusionment. However, if each of us would make a change, if each one would do something different; put down their smart phone and speak to a stranger, sit down with a new friend, delete those “friends” on Facebook who we haven’t conversed with in years, or simply call up an old friend to catch up.

Well, we just might have a chance at having significant friendships.

Friendships with Significant Depth.

~ Doubledb

On the Tide of (Fleeting) Friendships (1/2)

I remember a time, a time when friendships were in-person, a time when friends met in-person instead of over the phone or through the internet or a text. I remember actually hearing people’s voices, seeing their body language and picking up on all the nuances from knowing and seeing someone in the flesh.

Friendships like this are sadly becoming abnormal, so it seems.

In our world of busy-is-good, where we are always seeking to reach out with and through the newest kind of technology, I fear while we may gain, we are losing something terrible at the same time, human connection. I am trained in a profession where I learn how to listen, how to hear, how to be; yet I see increasingly that the world is moving at a faster pace. Stillness is not a virtue. What we don't realize is when we give up being able to sit still and talk, we give up the ability to listen, we give up depth, we give up being vulnerable, we give up friendships, and we give up community. We become millions of individuals all connected through technology but most of us only related on the shallowest level of friendship possible.

When we cannot sit still, all the friends we make seem deep at first until we move onto the next thing. The problem is, there is always a next thing and we develop the seeming inability to make a new friend, reconnect with the friend we made last week, or friend we have't spoken to in years. We have already run miles from that context and are so wrapped up in our own world we forget and are often blind to those we have left behind... and for those of us who realize this is going on, we may feel it is us who have been left behind.

It seems like with this fast-paced world, you can meet a friend in a certain context; at school, church, or work - but when you try to initiate contact outside of that mutual context, things tend to get awkward. It's initiating us out of our comfort zone. We have unknowingly labeled that person, regulated them to a specific part of our life and out of that comfortable context we seemingly have no idea what to do with that friendship. 

In our world where everything has to be labeled, we have lost the art of good conversation, good communication, and knowing that it is acceptable and even good perhaps to make ourselves go through situations or friendships that are undefined, unclear, awkward, vulnerable, even daring.

~ Doubledb