It’s a question I’m betting all of us have asked at one point or another.
What’s more, I’m betting we’ve all tried our hand at answering it.
Maybe we blame men. They don’t know quality when they see it. They’re trigger-shy about asking women out. They’re too looks-focused. They’re too busy playing video games. They’re too content to be single.
Maybe we blame the woman. She doesn’t take good enough care of herself. She’s not content to be single. She’s not willing to put herself out there and talk to men. Her standards are too high. Her standards are too low. She’s bitter or catty or a flirt.
Maybe we blame circumstances. She belongs to a church with no single men, works in a female-dominated profession. She’s on the mission-field. Her family scares people off. She doesn’t have time to date even if she wanted to. She has an unfortunate hairy mole.
We can come up with thousands of possible reasons for why the girl we admire (or despise) is single. But we really can’t know which are correct.
Except for one explanation.
Because God, in His inscrutable (that means “impossible to understand”) wisdom (that means “excellent judgment”), has kept her single.
It’s not something we like to admit.
Well, actually. We like to say those words: “God, in His inscrutable wisdom” – right before we conjecture as to why God chose as He did or complain that it isn’t a wise choice.
Like Job’s friends, we come up with a dozen answers. God gave Job none – none except “Because I am.”
I remember complaining about being single and childless to a saint in her 90s who’d served over 60 years alongside her husband. “I always wanted to have children,” she told me, with tears in her eyes.
Why was I single? Why did she die childless?
Because God chose.
Amen. As difficult as that is to accept sometimes.