The Importance of Marriage in the New Testament

Paul didn't say an overseer must be married, he just said the elder should manage his household well. Neither of those statements amount to an explicit mandate for marriage, says Paul. It appears that marriage was assumed, but that it was not explicitly commanded, and I expect that it was assumed because ongoing lifelong singleness in that culture is so rare. Nothing has ever said about Jesus being married or single. The topic of his own marriage never comes up.