But she is happier if she so abide, after my judgment: and I think also that I have the Spirit of God.
A widow is happier if she remains unmarried as she is, abiding without remarriage. If she does remarry, she is free to marry whom she will, provided it is only in the Lord. That means choosing one who belongs to the Lord's people, who shares the faith and obeys God, and not an unbeliever.
That requirement to marry only a fellow believer applies to unmarried believers generally and not to widows alone. It is a principle to keep God's people from being led away from Him through marriage to the world. The verse carries consecration before God into married life, which was especially needed then because of the customs of the heathen on every side. The same consecration is needed now because of the tendency to looseness on all moral questions.
The chapter counsels a wife already married to an unbelieving husband to remain with him and seek to win him to the truth by good living. For a believing wife whose unconverted husband requires food contrary to health and purity, she cannot be a conscience for her husband nor compel his obedience in her place. Obedience is of the heart, and the principle in the heart determines the character of the act, so when she is compelled to prepare what she would never use for herself, God recognizes the true spirit of obedience in her heart. He accepts her self-sacrifice and loyalty, counting as obedience and righteousness what would be sin if done for her own sake.
On the marriage relation, bringing children into the world under proper conditions for their care, education and training for immortality is right. Selfish yielding to appetite, the curse of the marriage relation ever since sin entered the world, is wrong. It must be overcome before the close of probation by those who are candidates for translation. The closing statement about having the Spirit of God shows that the epistles were spoken by the Spirit of God and are the inspired words of Christ, just as the writings of the holy prophets were inspired by the Spirit of Christ. Both the Old and New Testaments are thus the words of Christ that the Holy Spirit brings to the forgiven believer's mind to reveal the true basis of continued right living and to preserve him from returning to his former condition of sin. The apostle gives his judgment while affirming that he has the Spirit of God, so his inspired teaching cannot be set aside by private judgment nor by the claim that the Holy Spirit later reversed what he taught.
A widow is happier if she remains unmarried as she is, abiding without remarriage. If she does remarry, she is free to marry whom she will, provided it is only in the Lord. That means choosing one who belongs to the Lord's people, who shares the faith and obeys God, and not an unbeliever.
That requirement to marry only a fellow believer applies to unmarried believers generally and not to widows alone. It is a principle to keep God's people from being led away from Him through marriage to the world. The verse carries consecration before God into married life, which was especially needed then because of the customs of the heathen on every side. The same consecration is needed now because of the tendency to looseness on all moral questions.
The chapter counsels a wife already married to an unbelieving husband to remain with him and seek to win him to the truth by good living. For a believing wife whose unconverted husband requires food contrary to health and purity, she cannot be a conscience for her husband nor compel his obedience in her place. Obedience is of the heart, and the principle in the heart determines the character of the act, so when she is compelled to prepare what she would never use for herself, God recognizes the true spirit of obedience in her heart. He accepts her self-sacrifice and loyalty, counting as obedience and righteousness what would be sin if done for her own sake.
On the marriage relation, bringing children into the world under proper conditions for their care, education and training for immortality is right. Selfish yielding to appetite, the curse of the marriage relation ever since sin entered the world, is wrong. It must be overcome before the close of probation by those who are candidates for translation. The closing statement about having the Spirit of God shows that the epistles were spoken by the Spirit of God and are the inspired words of Christ, just as the writings of the holy prophets were inspired by the Spirit of Christ. Both the Old and New Testaments are thus the words of Christ that the Holy Spirit brings to the forgiven believer's mind to reveal the true basis of continued right living and to preserve him from returning to his former condition of sin. The apostle gives his judgment while affirming that he has the Spirit of God, so his inspired teaching cannot be set aside by private judgment nor by the claim that the Holy Spirit later reversed what he taught.