1 Corinthians 7:36-38 (NIV)
If anyone is worried that he might not be acting honorably toward the virgin he is engaged to, and if his passions are too strong and he feels he ought to marry, he should do as he wants. He is not sinning. They should get married. But the man who has settled the matter in his own mind, who is under no compulsion but has control over his own will, and who has made up his mind not to marry the virgin—this man also does the right thing. So then, he who marries the virgin does right, but he who does not marry her does better.
Paul next turns his attention to the subject of people who are engaged to be married. Based on what he is already written, some might be wondering if Paul is telling them that the godly thing to do is simply to walk away and commit to being single.
But Paul isn’t making new laws forbidding marriage. He is simply encouraging those who are considering marriage to not get married merely to meet societal norms or family expectations, but to realize clearly that every such decision carries with it consequences as well as blessings.
In the case of a man engaged to a young lady, a virgin, someone who has not been married before, Paul says that if he wants to get married, he should get married and not string the young lady along. On the other hand, if he has decided not to marry but to devote himself fully to the Lord, he should let the young lady go, clearly breaking off the engagement so that she can marry someone else if she chooses to.
In either case, whatever the man decides to do, he has not sinned. Engagement in those days was closely guarded and did not include the sexual component that is all too common in more recent times. So, even if a woman has been engaged, she would still be a virgin and perfectly marriageable if her current fiancé broke off the engagement.
In consideration of all these things, Paul restates his final opinion on the subject. If the man wants to marry his fiancé, he should simply marry her. It’s not a sin. But if he chooses not to marry her, the better choice in his opinion, then he should make that choice clear and move on.
Father, an interesting point here is that the sexual element, absent in Paul’s day but endemic in ours, really complicates matters. Even among Christians, sexuality before marriage is sadly quite common, at least after engagement, as is “living together” to try out marriage before marriage. But if the marriage is later called off, whether due to a “divine calling” or for some other reason, the dynamics become much more like a divorce than merely canceling a wedding, and much more damage is done to both parties and even, tragically, to the children that have been produced before the marriage. How much better is your way, Lord, even though many reject the call to absolute purity before marriage because it slices across both societal norms and physical desires. Help us, Lord, as your people, to do our relationships, all of them, in your way, not in the world’s way, and to teach the next generations to do the same. Amen.