Did I Kiss Marriage Goodbye?
Jun 29, 2010 Print This Post
A few weeks ago at Riv, I asked for a single person to volunteer to read the book “Did I Kiss Marriage Goodbye” and to let me know what they thought of it. My friend Lisa took me up on the challenge and posted an exhaustive (and personal) review on her site.
Here is a shorter review specifically for the readers of my blog. Thanks, Lisa. You rock.
The author is theologically sound and covers a wide range of scripture to make her points. Most books on singleness seem to rely on either 1 Corinthians 7 or Ruth. McCulley touches on both, of course, but also digs into many more obscure, seemingly tangential passages. For instance, she actually references Leviticus 19:23-25 (you don’t actually get to eat any produce from a vineyard until year 5) to talk about how Proverbs 31:16 (“from her earnings she plants a vineyard”) is actually about long-term investment.
She offers numerous examples of how other single women have used their singleness to be a blessing. This is key. Other books seem to just say to use singleness well and leave it at that. For instance, if they’re talking about being an influence among children, they don’t seem to go much farther than suggesting that we should teach a Sunday School class. McCulley talks about strategically developing relationships with kids and their parents (volunteering to babysit so the parents can go on a date; getting permission to step in and offer corrective advice to specific children). The second half of the book offers up a ton of tips like these. The very fact that she goes for breadth – not depth – makes it a LOT easier to find ways to apply it to my own life.
She emphasizes singleness and marriage as both temporary states throughout. As part of this she makes it clear that the desire for a husband never really goes away. This gets a little more personal for me. Somewhere along the line I got it in my head that if I were truly “gifted” with singleness there would come a point where I functionally became an asexual being, and I’d no longer be attracted to the various men in my life. I’ve prayed while struggling with my feelings for various men that this one would be the last; that either he would be the one I’d actually marry or I’d just no longer have to deal with such feelings ever again. The fact that life just doesn’t work that way is so obvious that nobody ever bothers to actually state it. Most books instead focus on the whole “don’t be the aggressor in the relationship” thing. These books always feel like they operate under the assumption that (a) women choose when they fall in love and (b) single women are by default desperate enough for marriage to initiate a relationship. Okay, yes, it’s important to talk about that, but (a) initiating a relationship as a female may be unwise but does not guarantee its failure, and (b) some of us have long since learned that knowledge and can we please move on to something else. So it’s refreshing to have a book that helps you live like a single in spite of your emotions toward any particular man.
Tags: marriage, singleness
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