Here is a section from an article on making singleness better:
But perhaps his [Paul's] strongest response would be to the extreme loneliness many single people experience. I do not think that, in commending singleness, Paul was also commending a life without quality long-term relationships. The thought would have distressed him. A quick tour through his letters gives us every indication that he knew a lot of people, and that he knew them well; in some sense, Paul experienced our future—a multitude of great relationships with his brothers and sisters in Christ from every nation, people and tribe. Paul was not married, but neither was he lonely. I think he would see this epidemic of loneliness as a major moral failure of the church to be the church, and, perhaps, more particularly, a moral failure of families to treat those not in their family as family. The church is a family, and we are to treat those in the church as family—not by lowering the standard with which we treat our family, but by raising the standard with which we treat others. For this ideal to become a reality, I suggest that our thinking and action proceed along two lines—firstly, in the habits of families and secondly, in the structure and design of our churches.
It’s old, but I highly recommend reading the whole thing.
