1 Corinthians 7:25, commentary and pictures

The word virgins means daughters or other young women under a father's or guardian's care to be given in marriage, and with this verse begins the reply to inquiries from the Corinthian church about the duty of heads of families in giving such daughters, wards, or other virgins under their charge in marriage. The letter was written to Corinth, a rich, populous, and cosmopolitan city about forty miles west of Athens on the isthmus separating the Ionian and Aegean Seas, with two ports and great commercial and military importance. It was marked by luxury and vice and filled with merchants, pleasure lovers, and the idle and vicious from many lands, and was distinguished by the Acro Corinthus rising abruptly two thousand feet.

It was given as teaching on home relations to a church perplexed by marriage questions while living amidst a heathen and persecuting people surrounded on every side by heathen customs, and it carries a valuable lesson for the same perplexities today. That consecration before God in married life was especially needed then because of those customs on every side, and is needed now because of the tendency to looseness on all moral questions. The verse belongs with the sacredness of the body temple in chapters 5 to 8, with teaching on consecration before God in married life, and with the plain teaching of God's word on the marriage relation that every man and woman should study.

The chapter where the verse stands teaches that keeping the commandments of God is something, not nothing, so the commandments remain in force and are not abolished. The verse presents the speaker as one who had obtained mercy of the Lord to be faithful, showing that faithfulness is received through the Lord's mercy, and keeping that mercy continually in mind gave power to help others. The verse counsels Christians in marriages divided by faith who are already married to unbelievers to remain with them and seek to win them through faithful living, which applies to women who discover the truth after marriage to make the best of the situation through high thinking and right living.

That teaching on the marriage relation approves bringing children into the world under proper conditions for their care, education, and training for immortality. It condemns selfish yielding to appetite as the curse of the marriage relation ever since sin came into the world, from which those who are candidates for translation must be delivered before the close of probation. Faithfulness through mercy is exemplified in Powell's life, who despite repeated imprisonment remained a faithful witness, even refusing deliverance because he expected a better resurrection.