When Ted finished high school, he was happy to get a job at the local factory. He was a blue collar guy, carried his lunch pail, and worked hard. He pictured himself staying in that job until he retired. He enjoyed life with his wife and kids, and found time to fish and hunt.
As Ted grew in his job, others began to rely on him for help and direction. He began to realize that he was smarter than he had thought when he struggled through high school. When he was offered the opportunity to be a manager and wear a shirt and tie to work, something shifted dramatically in his self image. He saw himself as smart and important. He began to look at his wife, and even his kids, as being beneath him.
At social events with his co-workers Ted began to think another woman was attracted to him. She was smart and pretty and he looked at her as being in a different league from his wife. Flirtation led to an affair and the affair led to a divorce. Ted tried to begin a new life with the other woman, but found that happiness with her was only a mirage. She could never really trust him, because she saw him as a man who would leave his wife. After all, he had left his wife to be with her.
Sometimes success in life destroys a marriage. There are women who have worked to get their husband through medical school, only to be dumped for another woman after her husband became established in his career. There are men who encouraged their wives to pursue education or career, and were left when their wives began to gain newfound confidence.
The key to avoiding this pitfall is seeing yourself and your spouse as God sees you. God has taught us not to put ourselves or anyone else in classes or leagues. He has taught us not to think of ourselves as better than anyone else. He has taught us that we are all gifted and we are all loved. If you see yourself as gifted and loved by God now, encountering success later won’t make your head inflate. You will recognize that your gifts came from God and the doors you walked through were opened by Him.
When Paul writes about using our gifts to serve others, he first warns us not to have an inflated view of ourselves.
For by the grace given me I say to every one of you: Do not think of yourself more highly than you ought, but rather think of yourself with sober judgment, in accordance with the measure of faith God has given you. (Romans 12:3)
Later in the same chapter he shows us that we need to ignore the barriers that often separate people, and to treat everyone with respect.
Live in harmony with one another. Do not be proud, but be willing to associate with people of low position. Do not be conceited. (Romans 12:16)
You need to nurture a healthy attitude toward your spouse, viewing him or her as the one God has given to you to help you in this life. Adam had the benefit of having no one else to compare Eve to, other than the animals.
So the man gave names to all the livestock, the birds of the air and all the beasts of the field. But for Adam no suitable helper was found. So the LORD God caused the man to fall into a deep sleep; and while he was sleeping, He took one of the man's ribs and closed up the place with flesh. Then the LORD God made a woman from the rib He had taken out of the man, and He brought her to the man. (Genesis 2:20-22)
Since Adam could only compare Eve with porcupines and lizards, he would have been in awe of her. We can each maintain that awe if we keep a humble view of ourselves and a grateful attitude toward the One who gave us our spouse.
In Malachi the Lord tells us that He hates divorce. He says,
Another thing you do: You flood the LORD's altar with tears. You weep and wail because He no longer pays attention to your offerings or accepts them with pleasure from your hands. You ask, "Why?" It is because the LORD is acting as the witness between you and the wife of your youth, because you have broken faith with her, though she is your partner, the wife of your marriage covenant. Has not the LORD made them one? In flesh and spirit they are His. And why one? Because He was seeking godly offspring. So guard yourself in your spirit, and do not break faith with the wife of your youth. "I hate divorce," says the LORD God of Israel, "and I hate a man's covering himself with violence as well as with his garment," says the LORD Almighty. So guard yourself in your spirit, and do not break faith. (Malachi 2:13-16)
God is speaking to us married folks when He says twice, “guard yourself in your spirit.” There are many wrong attitudes to guard ourselves against, and thinking we have become too good for our spouse is one of them.
In verse 14 He says, “she is your partner.”
The Hebrew word for partner “chabereth” is from a root word “chabar”, which means to unite. If we are partners, then whatever success, failure, hardship, and joy we face in life belongs to both of us. If things come along that are “better” than we were expecting, we should enjoy them together.
Talk About It – Since you married, what has been better than you expected? What effect did it have on your marriage?
Wednesday, March 25, 2009
Tuesday, March 24, 2009
5 – Keeping Your Promise
God Leads Forward – If you get hopelessly lost in the forest, there is still a way to get from where you are to where you need to be. If someone who knows every path in the forest came to your side to help you, they would be able to show you the best way. God knows the best way forward from where you are now. If you’ll obey Him, He will show you that path. He has no interest in ridiculing you for getting lost, and He’s not ready to give up on you. He’s ready to put the past in the past.
If you hurt a friend or a relative, they may forgive you, but continue to remind you of what you did. They may use your past wrongs as leverage in the future. God not only forgives sin, He forgets it, and develops a new plan to get you from where you are to where He wants you to be. Here are some great Scriptures that show God’s heart.
As far as the east is from the west, so far has He removed our transgressions from us. (Psalm 103:12)
My offenses will be sealed up in a bag; you will cover over my sin. (Job 14:17)
You will again have compassion on us; you will tread our sins underfoot and hurl all our iniquities into the depths of the sea. (Micah 7:19)
In your love you kept me from the pit of destruction; you have put all my sins behind your back. (Isaiah 38:17)
Does it sound like God has any further interest in your sin after He forgives you? Does He want to remind you of them? He has truly put them in the past.
God has a great future for you. If you have made a bad decision in the past, God doesn’t want to dwell on it or remind you of it. He wants you to confess it, be forgiven, learn from it, and let Him lead you in the right direction from here.
Maybe you did make poor decisions at the time you were married. Maybe you weren’t listening to God or anyone else. God’s plan now, though, is to make a good marriage out of the mess you may have created.
God Expects Us to Keep Our Vows – Joshua, when he was Israel’s leader, made a covenant that he never would have made if he had asked God first. The Gibeonites wanted to make a peace treaty with him, agreeing to protect each other from enemies. Joshua had been told not to make treaties with the people who had been living in the Promised Land, so the Gibeonites lied about where they were from. They said that they lived far away. They put on old shoes and said they were new when they left home. They took old moldy bread and said it was hot out of the oven when they started their journey from home.
The men of Israel sampled their provisions but did not inquire of the LORD. Then Joshua made a treaty of peace with them… (Joshua 9:14-15)
Joshua made a treaty without praying and with people who had lied to him. Surely this treaty wasn’t God’s will. But, did God want Joshua to keep his word? It’s amazing to learn that God not only expected Joshua to keep it, but He expected the leaders of Israel for hundreds of years to continue to keep that treaty.
When neighboring kings heard about the treaty, they attacked Gibeon. Joshua and his entire army came to the aid of Gibeon and God helped them to defeat five kings that had joined forces against them. God was so involved in this battle that He threw hailstones on the enemy and made the sun stand still to give Joshua time to finish the battle. Joshua summarizes:
There has never been a day like it before or since, a day when the LORD listened to a man. Surely the LORD was fighting for Israel! (Joshua 10:14)
About 400 years later David didn’t understand why times were hard:
During the reign of David, there was a famine for three successive years; so David sought the face of the LORD. The LORD said, "It is on account of Saul and his blood-stained house; it is because he put the Gibeonites to death." (2 Samuel 21:1)
It looks like the covenant that Joshua made was serious business to God. Saul was king before David and had broken the covenant, killing some of the Gibeonites. During David’s time God sent a famine to force Israel to make things right with the Gibeonites.
If you have made a vow, even one you shouldn’t have made, God wants you to keep it. He may do something as drastic as making the sun stand still to help you keep it.
Our point is that God wants you to commit yourself to your marriage. He wants you to work hard at your marriage, and He wants to bring good out of it. Even if I made a mistake getting on a ship when it sailed, jumping overboard would be a bad decision. Staying on the ship and making the most of the trip will be my wisest choice.
Talk About It – Since you married, have you reinforced the commitment you made to each other? Or, have you questioned your commitment and talked about divorce? Discuss what you can do to strengthen the confidence you each have in the commitment of the other.
If you hurt a friend or a relative, they may forgive you, but continue to remind you of what you did. They may use your past wrongs as leverage in the future. God not only forgives sin, He forgets it, and develops a new plan to get you from where you are to where He wants you to be. Here are some great Scriptures that show God’s heart.
As far as the east is from the west, so far has He removed our transgressions from us. (Psalm 103:12)
My offenses will be sealed up in a bag; you will cover over my sin. (Job 14:17)
You will again have compassion on us; you will tread our sins underfoot and hurl all our iniquities into the depths of the sea. (Micah 7:19)
In your love you kept me from the pit of destruction; you have put all my sins behind your back. (Isaiah 38:17)
Does it sound like God has any further interest in your sin after He forgives you? Does He want to remind you of them? He has truly put them in the past.
God has a great future for you. If you have made a bad decision in the past, God doesn’t want to dwell on it or remind you of it. He wants you to confess it, be forgiven, learn from it, and let Him lead you in the right direction from here.
Maybe you did make poor decisions at the time you were married. Maybe you weren’t listening to God or anyone else. God’s plan now, though, is to make a good marriage out of the mess you may have created.
God Expects Us to Keep Our Vows – Joshua, when he was Israel’s leader, made a covenant that he never would have made if he had asked God first. The Gibeonites wanted to make a peace treaty with him, agreeing to protect each other from enemies. Joshua had been told not to make treaties with the people who had been living in the Promised Land, so the Gibeonites lied about where they were from. They said that they lived far away. They put on old shoes and said they were new when they left home. They took old moldy bread and said it was hot out of the oven when they started their journey from home.
The men of Israel sampled their provisions but did not inquire of the LORD. Then Joshua made a treaty of peace with them… (Joshua 9:14-15)
Joshua made a treaty without praying and with people who had lied to him. Surely this treaty wasn’t God’s will. But, did God want Joshua to keep his word? It’s amazing to learn that God not only expected Joshua to keep it, but He expected the leaders of Israel for hundreds of years to continue to keep that treaty.
When neighboring kings heard about the treaty, they attacked Gibeon. Joshua and his entire army came to the aid of Gibeon and God helped them to defeat five kings that had joined forces against them. God was so involved in this battle that He threw hailstones on the enemy and made the sun stand still to give Joshua time to finish the battle. Joshua summarizes:
There has never been a day like it before or since, a day when the LORD listened to a man. Surely the LORD was fighting for Israel! (Joshua 10:14)
About 400 years later David didn’t understand why times were hard:
During the reign of David, there was a famine for three successive years; so David sought the face of the LORD. The LORD said, "It is on account of Saul and his blood-stained house; it is because he put the Gibeonites to death." (2 Samuel 21:1)
It looks like the covenant that Joshua made was serious business to God. Saul was king before David and had broken the covenant, killing some of the Gibeonites. During David’s time God sent a famine to force Israel to make things right with the Gibeonites.
If you have made a vow, even one you shouldn’t have made, God wants you to keep it. He may do something as drastic as making the sun stand still to help you keep it.
Our point is that God wants you to commit yourself to your marriage. He wants you to work hard at your marriage, and He wants to bring good out of it. Even if I made a mistake getting on a ship when it sailed, jumping overboard would be a bad decision. Staying on the ship and making the most of the trip will be my wisest choice.
Talk About It – Since you married, have you reinforced the commitment you made to each other? Or, have you questioned your commitment and talked about divorce? Discuss what you can do to strengthen the confidence you each have in the commitment of the other.
Monday, March 23, 2009
4 - The Right Person
I was talking with Pete about some of the trouble he was having at home. He surprised me when he said, “Maybe I married the wrong person.”
If you’ve ever wondered if you married the wrong person, we want to try to help you stop asking that question. This book is written for couples who are legally married. If you are married, God wants you to honor your vows. Frequently, we talk to couples whose marriages have gotten tough. Once you are married, though, it isn’t useful to ask if you married the wrong person. Once a ship has sailed, if you are on it, you need to stay on it.
Which of the following most accurately describes you?
· When you married, you were following God’s guidance. You were sure then and you are sure now that you married the person God wanted you to.
· When you married, you weren’t paying attention to God. You married the person you wanted, but you can see now that this really was God’s plan.
· You used to think you married the right person, but as marriage has gotten difficult, you began to think you may have married the wrong person.
· You weren’t following God when you got married and you don’t believe He would have told you to marry who you did if you had asked Him.
In any of these cases, we urge you to honor your vows. In this chapter and the next, there are three things we’d like you to see about God.
· He is a Redeemer who fixes things that are broken. If your marriage is a mess, God can fix it.
· He leads forward, finding the right path from wherever we may have gotten off track to where He wants to lead us.
· He expects us to keep our vows, even if they weren’t His will in the first place.
If you can see these three truths, our hope is that you will quit asking whether you married the right person and will give your whole heart to making your marriage all it can be.
God Fixes Things That Are Broken – The Bible shows us that God is a Redeemer and a Restorer. If your life is a mess, give it to Him to repair. Here is God speaking in the book of Isaiah.
I have seen his ways, but I will heal him; I will guide him and restore comfort to him. (Isaiah 57: 18)
There are many Christian couples who can tell you about great changes that happened in their marriages when they began to listen to God and obey Him.
Bill and Denise had a very rocky seven years at the beginning of their marriage. Bill was an alcoholic and could not be counted on for much of anything. He wouldn’t usually be home when he said he would and he had a hard time keeping a job. Denise mostly lived in pain, but at times sought comfort in an affair with another man. This marriage seemed hopeless.
Bad marriages grow from bad roots. Bill’s parents had divorced when he was six, and he had always thought of himself as a hopeless victim. He began drinking heavily when he was only a teenager. He had been sober for a while when he married Denise, and he seemed pretty optimistic then.
Denise hardly knew her real father. Her mother married her step-dad when Denise was 11 years old. Her step-dad was always harsh with her and she treated him with disrespect. Her mother usually sided with her step-dad, and Denise kept as much distance from her parents as she could. She was only 16 when she met Bill, and barely 17 when he offered to marry her. She was so eager to get out of her house, marrying someone who said he loved her seemed like a dream.
Family members dressed up for the occasion and Bill and Denise had a nice little wedding. They found a pastor to do the service. They liked him and went to his church a few times after they were married.
But Bill and Denise had no idea how to be husband and wife. They didn’t have any good examples to follow, and they hadn’t learned how to be married from anyone else. As life got tough, Bill began to drink and things got worse from there.
One day, in their seventh year of marriage, Bill was drinking and driving and was pulled over and taken to jail. While he was in the county jail, a pastor stopped by and Bill got a chance to talk with him. The pastor reminded Bill a lot of the man who had done their wedding nearly seven years earlier. He explained to Bill that God could forgive everything he had done, because Jesus had paid for his sins when Jesus died on the cross. The pastor also explained what it means to give your life to the Lord. Bill prayed with the pastor and asked God to forgive him and take over his life.
Amazingly, while Bill was in jail, Denise called an old Christian friend she had known since high school. Denise poured out her whole story of Bill’s drinking and her own infidelity. Her friend urged Denise to ask Jesus to come into her heart and forgive her sins. She did.
Bill and Denise devoted themselves to learn what God wanted them to do with their lives and their marriage. They forgave each other for past sins, and developed a solid marriage. Bill and Denise have been happily married for many years now and have been able to help many other couples.
Talk About It – How do you each view your marriage right now? Is it what you expected when you married? Do you think your marriage is like God’s plan for marriage? In what areas would you like to see your marriage improve?
If you’ve ever wondered if you married the wrong person, we want to try to help you stop asking that question. This book is written for couples who are legally married. If you are married, God wants you to honor your vows. Frequently, we talk to couples whose marriages have gotten tough. Once you are married, though, it isn’t useful to ask if you married the wrong person. Once a ship has sailed, if you are on it, you need to stay on it.
Which of the following most accurately describes you?
· When you married, you were following God’s guidance. You were sure then and you are sure now that you married the person God wanted you to.
· When you married, you weren’t paying attention to God. You married the person you wanted, but you can see now that this really was God’s plan.
· You used to think you married the right person, but as marriage has gotten difficult, you began to think you may have married the wrong person.
· You weren’t following God when you got married and you don’t believe He would have told you to marry who you did if you had asked Him.
In any of these cases, we urge you to honor your vows. In this chapter and the next, there are three things we’d like you to see about God.
· He is a Redeemer who fixes things that are broken. If your marriage is a mess, God can fix it.
· He leads forward, finding the right path from wherever we may have gotten off track to where He wants to lead us.
· He expects us to keep our vows, even if they weren’t His will in the first place.
If you can see these three truths, our hope is that you will quit asking whether you married the right person and will give your whole heart to making your marriage all it can be.
God Fixes Things That Are Broken – The Bible shows us that God is a Redeemer and a Restorer. If your life is a mess, give it to Him to repair. Here is God speaking in the book of Isaiah.
I have seen his ways, but I will heal him; I will guide him and restore comfort to him. (Isaiah 57: 18)
There are many Christian couples who can tell you about great changes that happened in their marriages when they began to listen to God and obey Him.
Bill and Denise had a very rocky seven years at the beginning of their marriage. Bill was an alcoholic and could not be counted on for much of anything. He wouldn’t usually be home when he said he would and he had a hard time keeping a job. Denise mostly lived in pain, but at times sought comfort in an affair with another man. This marriage seemed hopeless.
Bad marriages grow from bad roots. Bill’s parents had divorced when he was six, and he had always thought of himself as a hopeless victim. He began drinking heavily when he was only a teenager. He had been sober for a while when he married Denise, and he seemed pretty optimistic then.
Denise hardly knew her real father. Her mother married her step-dad when Denise was 11 years old. Her step-dad was always harsh with her and she treated him with disrespect. Her mother usually sided with her step-dad, and Denise kept as much distance from her parents as she could. She was only 16 when she met Bill, and barely 17 when he offered to marry her. She was so eager to get out of her house, marrying someone who said he loved her seemed like a dream.
Family members dressed up for the occasion and Bill and Denise had a nice little wedding. They found a pastor to do the service. They liked him and went to his church a few times after they were married.
But Bill and Denise had no idea how to be husband and wife. They didn’t have any good examples to follow, and they hadn’t learned how to be married from anyone else. As life got tough, Bill began to drink and things got worse from there.
One day, in their seventh year of marriage, Bill was drinking and driving and was pulled over and taken to jail. While he was in the county jail, a pastor stopped by and Bill got a chance to talk with him. The pastor reminded Bill a lot of the man who had done their wedding nearly seven years earlier. He explained to Bill that God could forgive everything he had done, because Jesus had paid for his sins when Jesus died on the cross. The pastor also explained what it means to give your life to the Lord. Bill prayed with the pastor and asked God to forgive him and take over his life.
Amazingly, while Bill was in jail, Denise called an old Christian friend she had known since high school. Denise poured out her whole story of Bill’s drinking and her own infidelity. Her friend urged Denise to ask Jesus to come into her heart and forgive her sins. She did.
Bill and Denise devoted themselves to learn what God wanted them to do with their lives and their marriage. They forgave each other for past sins, and developed a solid marriage. Bill and Denise have been happily married for many years now and have been able to help many other couples.
Talk About It – How do you each view your marriage right now? Is it what you expected when you married? Do you think your marriage is like God’s plan for marriage? In what areas would you like to see your marriage improve?
3 – Why Did I Get Married?
What was your reason for getting married? If you’re like many others, you may have had mostly selfish reasons for getting married and later discovered that you need to be unselfish to be successfully married. In fact, you need to be unselfish to enjoy life at all.
When you stood in front of family and friends and promised to love and cherish your spouse, you may not have realized it, but you were committing to an unselfish life. You can’t keep your promise to love and cherish another person while only being concerned about your own happiness. Furthermore, if you are only concerned with your own happiness, you will never be happy.
Men are commanded to love their wives in a Christ-like, sacrificial way.
Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her. (Ephesians 5:25)
Women also need to love their husbands in an unselfish way.
This unselfishness begins by thinking about what it important to your spouse, how they view things, and what makes them happy.
Two people living selfish lives may find some fulfillment in each other for a while. They may enjoy each other’s company and marry with great hopes and dreams. But if they continue to live selfishly while married, their wishes will collide and they will find hundreds of reasons for conflict. They will each be unfulfilled and they will never meet each other’s selfish expectations. Many couples encounter this conflict and start to drift apart. They develop more independence in their marriage as a way of reducing the conflict, but this falls short of what God meant when He said that the two would become one.
A selfish person will always be insecure because they are trying to base their life on a lie; that they are the most important person on earth. Selfish people may put unattainable expectations on themselves to try to justify the pedestal they have placed themselves on. The selfish person will never feel like they measure up, even to their own expectations.
The person who always thinks of themselves as better than others has a lot in common with the person who always thinks of themselves as inferior. They are both focusing on themselves and comparing themselves with others. We should, instead, view ourselves and every other person as unique and all worthy of love.
If you accept the truth that everyone has value, you realize that you are valuable and that your spouse is valuable. You realize that you don’t have to earn genuine love and you aren’t waiting for your spouse to earn it. Married life gets much simpler and more enjoyable when you accept and value each other unconditionally and you make your spouse’s happiness as important as your own.
We are all commanded to live unselfish lives:
Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others. (Philippians 2:4)
As a married couple, you will have many daily opportunities to practice this command.
George Washington and the Continental Army spent six months camped at Valley Forge. There was no battle fought there, but historians regard those six months as the turning point of the war. An army of about 12,000 arrived poorly fed, ill-equipped, and weary from long marches. They built their own shelters and endured the winter together. The army included young teens and men in their 50s. They were white, black, and Native American. Maybe some of these soldiers had self centered dreams of glory when they joined General Washington’s army. But these men either became unselfish or they went home.
For a while, it looked as if they would all disband. They were poorly supplied and sometimes chanted, “No Meat!” or “No bread, no soldier!” While many soldiers at Valley Forge died of sickness and others deserted, the ones who endured the encampment were transformed into a disciplined, united army ready to do whatever it took to win the war. The winter at Valley Forge was a triumph of will. Washington’s army determined that they were soldiers, fighting for a cause greater than their own personal comfort. They were committed to the cause until the war was over.
Hopefully, your marriage will never be as challenging as the winter at Valley Forge, but we can guarantee that you will face challenges. Those challenges will force you to realize that you can’t succeed at marriage while being selfish. If you recognize that the success of your marriage means much more than your personal happiness, you will find the will to succeed.
Talk About It – What were your motives for getting married? What is the best example of your spouse showing you unselfish love?
When you stood in front of family and friends and promised to love and cherish your spouse, you may not have realized it, but you were committing to an unselfish life. You can’t keep your promise to love and cherish another person while only being concerned about your own happiness. Furthermore, if you are only concerned with your own happiness, you will never be happy.
Men are commanded to love their wives in a Christ-like, sacrificial way.
Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her. (Ephesians 5:25)
Women also need to love their husbands in an unselfish way.
This unselfishness begins by thinking about what it important to your spouse, how they view things, and what makes them happy.
Two people living selfish lives may find some fulfillment in each other for a while. They may enjoy each other’s company and marry with great hopes and dreams. But if they continue to live selfishly while married, their wishes will collide and they will find hundreds of reasons for conflict. They will each be unfulfilled and they will never meet each other’s selfish expectations. Many couples encounter this conflict and start to drift apart. They develop more independence in their marriage as a way of reducing the conflict, but this falls short of what God meant when He said that the two would become one.
A selfish person will always be insecure because they are trying to base their life on a lie; that they are the most important person on earth. Selfish people may put unattainable expectations on themselves to try to justify the pedestal they have placed themselves on. The selfish person will never feel like they measure up, even to their own expectations.
The person who always thinks of themselves as better than others has a lot in common with the person who always thinks of themselves as inferior. They are both focusing on themselves and comparing themselves with others. We should, instead, view ourselves and every other person as unique and all worthy of love.
If you accept the truth that everyone has value, you realize that you are valuable and that your spouse is valuable. You realize that you don’t have to earn genuine love and you aren’t waiting for your spouse to earn it. Married life gets much simpler and more enjoyable when you accept and value each other unconditionally and you make your spouse’s happiness as important as your own.
We are all commanded to live unselfish lives:
Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others. (Philippians 2:4)
As a married couple, you will have many daily opportunities to practice this command.
George Washington and the Continental Army spent six months camped at Valley Forge. There was no battle fought there, but historians regard those six months as the turning point of the war. An army of about 12,000 arrived poorly fed, ill-equipped, and weary from long marches. They built their own shelters and endured the winter together. The army included young teens and men in their 50s. They were white, black, and Native American. Maybe some of these soldiers had self centered dreams of glory when they joined General Washington’s army. But these men either became unselfish or they went home.
For a while, it looked as if they would all disband. They were poorly supplied and sometimes chanted, “No Meat!” or “No bread, no soldier!” While many soldiers at Valley Forge died of sickness and others deserted, the ones who endured the encampment were transformed into a disciplined, united army ready to do whatever it took to win the war. The winter at Valley Forge was a triumph of will. Washington’s army determined that they were soldiers, fighting for a cause greater than their own personal comfort. They were committed to the cause until the war was over.
Hopefully, your marriage will never be as challenging as the winter at Valley Forge, but we can guarantee that you will face challenges. Those challenges will force you to realize that you can’t succeed at marriage while being selfish. If you recognize that the success of your marriage means much more than your personal happiness, you will find the will to succeed.
Talk About It – What were your motives for getting married? What is the best example of your spouse showing you unselfish love?
Sunday, March 22, 2009
2 - Commitment
Therefore what God has joined together, let man not separate. (Matthew 19:6)
Jesus made this statement to show that marriages are meant to be permanent, as long as the husband and wife are both living. When people marry, they usually have a mental picture of their future lives together. They have probably talked about short-term plans and long-term dreams. However, life is unpredictable. God knows the future, but He has chosen to only show some of it to us. We will experience things we never imagined and see things in our spouse we didn’t know were there. We may have to change our plans and delay some of the dreams we had.
Commitment is a key ingredient in a marriage that will keep it together when life gets tough. Commitment in marriage should be seen first as obedience to God. Lack of commitment comes from selfishly putting our own short-term happiness ahead of obedience.
If you are happily married, your commitment may seldom, if ever, be challenged. But many marriages go through rocky times that test the commitment of both the man and the woman.
Some marriages fail because of a big break in trust, such as one person cheating on the other. Usually, though, the cheating didn’t start overnight. People worked up to it by failing to nurture their marriages. In many cases couples failed at the little day to day things that make a marriage work. Usually it takes a bad marriage to make a stupid decision like cheating on your spouse look like a good idea.
Reasons for Ending a Marriage - The purpose of this book is to encourage people to nurture their marriages, not to end them. However, we have to acknowledge that the Bible does offer justification for ending a marriage in certain circumstances.
Jesus shows that a person who is the victim of unfaithfulness can divorce and remarry.
I tell you that anyone who divorces his wife, except for marital unfaithfulness, and marries another woman commits adultery. (Matthew 19:9)
If you are the victim of unfaithfulness, Jesus isn’t commanding you to divorce. Forgiveness and restoration is a better choice if you can do it and we’ll offer some help later on how to forgive and restore trust. But if your spouse refuses to honor their vows, you do have the right to divorce and remarry.
Paul also shows that the victim of abandonment is not bound by the marriage covenant.
But if the unbeliever leaves, let him do so. A believing man or woman is not bound in such circumstances; God has called us to live in peace. (1 Corinthians 7:15)
Also, there are apparently situations in which separation is justified when divorce is not. Paul doesn’t explain what circumstances he was thinking of when he wrote:
To the married I give this command (not I, but the Lord): A wife must not separate from her husband. But if she does, she must remain unmarried or else be reconciled to her husband. And a husband must not divorce his wife. (1 Corinthians 7:10-11)
Verse 11 provides for a separation, without remarrying someone else, leaving open the possibility of reconciliation. This is what we would recommend in situations of abuse, alcoholism, or addiction. A person can separate, without ending the marriage, and make clear (by writing it down) what needs to change for the marriage to be restored to normal.
Please don’t end your marriage because you are bored, unfulfilled, or tired of life the way it is. You will have far more success building the marriage you have than you will chasing something else.
Bob and Frances had been married for seven years and have two small children. They both worked and were both frequently exhausted. They had always struggled to make ends meet. This led to frequent arguments about money. The romance in their marriage had seemed to fizzle in recent years. They hadn’t had a date night in over a year and hadn’t had a vacation for three years. Like many couples in their shoes, they started to toy with the idea of divorce. They each thought that they might find new joy in the company of someone else.
Could you advise them on how to renew their marriage? Of course you could. Successful marriage isn’t complicated, but it does take effort. You can probably also recognize that their divorce would hurt a lot of people, particularly their children. Their marriage is worth saving and working for.
There is much more in the coming chapters to help you nurture your marriage or to see it healed if it is damaged.
Talk About It – How clear were you on the idea of commitment when you said, “I do?” Of the married couples you know, who is the best example of commitment?
Jesus made this statement to show that marriages are meant to be permanent, as long as the husband and wife are both living. When people marry, they usually have a mental picture of their future lives together. They have probably talked about short-term plans and long-term dreams. However, life is unpredictable. God knows the future, but He has chosen to only show some of it to us. We will experience things we never imagined and see things in our spouse we didn’t know were there. We may have to change our plans and delay some of the dreams we had.
Commitment is a key ingredient in a marriage that will keep it together when life gets tough. Commitment in marriage should be seen first as obedience to God. Lack of commitment comes from selfishly putting our own short-term happiness ahead of obedience.
If you are happily married, your commitment may seldom, if ever, be challenged. But many marriages go through rocky times that test the commitment of both the man and the woman.
Some marriages fail because of a big break in trust, such as one person cheating on the other. Usually, though, the cheating didn’t start overnight. People worked up to it by failing to nurture their marriages. In many cases couples failed at the little day to day things that make a marriage work. Usually it takes a bad marriage to make a stupid decision like cheating on your spouse look like a good idea.
Reasons for Ending a Marriage - The purpose of this book is to encourage people to nurture their marriages, not to end them. However, we have to acknowledge that the Bible does offer justification for ending a marriage in certain circumstances.
Jesus shows that a person who is the victim of unfaithfulness can divorce and remarry.
I tell you that anyone who divorces his wife, except for marital unfaithfulness, and marries another woman commits adultery. (Matthew 19:9)
If you are the victim of unfaithfulness, Jesus isn’t commanding you to divorce. Forgiveness and restoration is a better choice if you can do it and we’ll offer some help later on how to forgive and restore trust. But if your spouse refuses to honor their vows, you do have the right to divorce and remarry.
Paul also shows that the victim of abandonment is not bound by the marriage covenant.
But if the unbeliever leaves, let him do so. A believing man or woman is not bound in such circumstances; God has called us to live in peace. (1 Corinthians 7:15)
Also, there are apparently situations in which separation is justified when divorce is not. Paul doesn’t explain what circumstances he was thinking of when he wrote:
To the married I give this command (not I, but the Lord): A wife must not separate from her husband. But if she does, she must remain unmarried or else be reconciled to her husband. And a husband must not divorce his wife. (1 Corinthians 7:10-11)
Verse 11 provides for a separation, without remarrying someone else, leaving open the possibility of reconciliation. This is what we would recommend in situations of abuse, alcoholism, or addiction. A person can separate, without ending the marriage, and make clear (by writing it down) what needs to change for the marriage to be restored to normal.
Please don’t end your marriage because you are bored, unfulfilled, or tired of life the way it is. You will have far more success building the marriage you have than you will chasing something else.
Bob and Frances had been married for seven years and have two small children. They both worked and were both frequently exhausted. They had always struggled to make ends meet. This led to frequent arguments about money. The romance in their marriage had seemed to fizzle in recent years. They hadn’t had a date night in over a year and hadn’t had a vacation for three years. Like many couples in their shoes, they started to toy with the idea of divorce. They each thought that they might find new joy in the company of someone else.
Could you advise them on how to renew their marriage? Of course you could. Successful marriage isn’t complicated, but it does take effort. You can probably also recognize that their divorce would hurt a lot of people, particularly their children. Their marriage is worth saving and working for.
There is much more in the coming chapters to help you nurture your marriage or to see it healed if it is damaged.
Talk About It – How clear were you on the idea of commitment when you said, “I do?” Of the married couples you know, who is the best example of commitment?
Saturday, March 21, 2009
1 – Why God Invented Marriage
Just a few moments after Pastor Royal pronounced us man and wife, Shirley said, “I don’t feel married.” The pastor just laughed and said, “Don’t worry, you will.” That was 1971. When we married, we were young and didn’t know that much about what we were doing. We hadn’t read any books on the subject, but we had good examples in our parents. God helped us and we learned how to be a married couple. We have enjoyed a great marriage and value our relationship over any possession or position we have ever had.
Marriage is as old as mankind. God invented it and explained it in the book of Genesis. God made a man and then said the man needed help. When God looked at Adam’s situation, it was the first time the Bible records God saying something was not good.
The LORD God said, "It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper suitable for him." (Genesis 2:18)
Don’t imagine that God meant to make someone merely to pick up Adam’s dirty socks. The Hebrew word ‘ezer, translated above as “helper” is a powerful term. It is often used to describe the help we get from God when we need to be rescued.
Why did the man need help? Why do you need help? If Adam had needed help moving a table, God would have made another man just like him. But, that isn’t the kind of help he needed.
All of us have strengths, but all of us also have weaknesses. We can benefit in many ways from someone who looks at life a little differently than we do. When God made woman, He intentionally made her different from man in many ways, while making her enough like man for them to have a deep, heartfelt relationship.
You may have noticed that everyone is good at something and no one is good at everything. In any marriage, the man and woman will each have strengths and talents that are different each other. A normal man and a normal woman can help each other throughout their lives.
God decided to create someone to live with the man and enrich his life. After He had made the woman and presented her to Adam, the Bible says,
For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and they will become one flesh. (Genesis 2:24)
When Jesus quoted this passage from Genesis, He added:
So they are no longer two, but one. Therefore what God has joined together, let man not separate. (Matthew 19:6)
From these simple statements we learn some things about what God had in mind.
By saying “they are no longer two, but one,” Jesus shows that marriage is meant to be much deeper than any other human relationship. This is not merely a sexual union, or a business partnership, but a union that touches every area of our lives. God intends for my wife to be my closest friend. He made her capable of dreaming and hoping, just as I am. Somehow, we need to find a way for our dreams and hopes to link in a life that is better than either of us could have lived alone.
By saying, “what God has joined together,” Jesus shows that God is the author of marriage. We shouldn’t think of marriage as something we can redefine to fit our preferences, but something that God invented for our good. Many people like to take some of the parts of what marriage is supposed to be and leave out the parts they don’t like or that seem impossible. Examples of relationships that are only part of what they are supposed to be include,
· a man and wife who are far apart emotionally,
· a couple living together with no lifelong commitment,
· a marriage where there is unfaithfulness,
· a man and wife who don’t respect each other, or
· a marriage that leaves God out.
By saying, “let not man separate,” we can see that God intended for this to be a partnership to last the rest of our lives.
Successful marriage, then, involves:
· One man and one woman committing to help and honor each other
· Making marriage the deepest of our human relationships,
· Being committed to each other for life, and
· Having God at the center of the marriage.
Talk About It - Are you committed to marriage the way God planned it, or are there parts of His plan you’d prefer to leave out? How healthy is your marriage right now?
Marriage is as old as mankind. God invented it and explained it in the book of Genesis. God made a man and then said the man needed help. When God looked at Adam’s situation, it was the first time the Bible records God saying something was not good.
The LORD God said, "It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper suitable for him." (Genesis 2:18)
Don’t imagine that God meant to make someone merely to pick up Adam’s dirty socks. The Hebrew word ‘ezer, translated above as “helper” is a powerful term. It is often used to describe the help we get from God when we need to be rescued.
Why did the man need help? Why do you need help? If Adam had needed help moving a table, God would have made another man just like him. But, that isn’t the kind of help he needed.
All of us have strengths, but all of us also have weaknesses. We can benefit in many ways from someone who looks at life a little differently than we do. When God made woman, He intentionally made her different from man in many ways, while making her enough like man for them to have a deep, heartfelt relationship.
You may have noticed that everyone is good at something and no one is good at everything. In any marriage, the man and woman will each have strengths and talents that are different each other. A normal man and a normal woman can help each other throughout their lives.
God decided to create someone to live with the man and enrich his life. After He had made the woman and presented her to Adam, the Bible says,
For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and they will become one flesh. (Genesis 2:24)
When Jesus quoted this passage from Genesis, He added:
So they are no longer two, but one. Therefore what God has joined together, let man not separate. (Matthew 19:6)
From these simple statements we learn some things about what God had in mind.
By saying “they are no longer two, but one,” Jesus shows that marriage is meant to be much deeper than any other human relationship. This is not merely a sexual union, or a business partnership, but a union that touches every area of our lives. God intends for my wife to be my closest friend. He made her capable of dreaming and hoping, just as I am. Somehow, we need to find a way for our dreams and hopes to link in a life that is better than either of us could have lived alone.
By saying, “what God has joined together,” Jesus shows that God is the author of marriage. We shouldn’t think of marriage as something we can redefine to fit our preferences, but something that God invented for our good. Many people like to take some of the parts of what marriage is supposed to be and leave out the parts they don’t like or that seem impossible. Examples of relationships that are only part of what they are supposed to be include,
· a man and wife who are far apart emotionally,
· a couple living together with no lifelong commitment,
· a marriage where there is unfaithfulness,
· a man and wife who don’t respect each other, or
· a marriage that leaves God out.
By saying, “let not man separate,” we can see that God intended for this to be a partnership to last the rest of our lives.
Successful marriage, then, involves:
· One man and one woman committing to help and honor each other
· Making marriage the deepest of our human relationships,
· Being committed to each other for life, and
· Having God at the center of the marriage.
Talk About It - Are you committed to marriage the way God planned it, or are there parts of His plan you’d prefer to leave out? How healthy is your marriage right now?
40 Days to Strengthen Your Marriage and Impact the World - Introduction
Smile, lot’s of people are watching. Your marriage matters to a lot of people. If you have a healthy marriage, your children and many others will benefit from your example. You will leave a mark that will impact the world long after you’re gone. Unfortunately, successful marriages are on the decline in America. Statistics show that since 1960, the percentage of people in America who are married has steadily declined, the number of people who are divorced has increased, the number of people living together unmarried has increased sharply, and the number of married people who say they are very happy with their marriage has declined. (If you want to check out lots of statistics, visit http://marriage.rutgers.edu/) More troubling to us is the fact that less than 40% of high school seniors believe they will live fuller and happier lives if they choose legal marriage. We believe that just seeing one healthy marriage would change a young person’s mind.
But this book is not about statistics. It is about your marriage. It was written as a simple tool to help you succeed in marriage. It was written to help normal couples strengthen their marriage. It is written in plain language in short, readable chapters. It doesn’t ignore the tough challenges that some marriages face.
Marriage is not rocket science. Average people can succeed at it if they try.
This book was written for a man and wife to read together and to talk about together. How do you read a book together? Any of these approaches will work: take turns reading out loud, one reads out loud while the other listens (just make sure you’re both awake) or, read silently sitting side by side. Read it and then talk about it. Each chapter offers something to talk about at the end of the chapter.
This book was intended to be read, one chapter per day, for forty days. The chapters are all about the same length and will each take about 5 to 10 minutes to read. But the point is to strengthen your marriage, not just say you read the chapters. If you get off schedule, don’t panic, just pick up where you left off. You may come across something that sparks several days of discussion and you may choose to stay on that topic for a while until you get back into the book. If you take 40 weeks to get through the book, we don’t care. We just want you to succeed in your marriage.
We rely unapologetically on the Bible in this book. We believe that God invented marriage and the Bible shows us how to have a healthy one. Our hope and prayer is that your marriage will grow stronger and that you will be a blessing to everyone who knows you.
But this book is not about statistics. It is about your marriage. It was written as a simple tool to help you succeed in marriage. It was written to help normal couples strengthen their marriage. It is written in plain language in short, readable chapters. It doesn’t ignore the tough challenges that some marriages face.
Marriage is not rocket science. Average people can succeed at it if they try.
This book was written for a man and wife to read together and to talk about together. How do you read a book together? Any of these approaches will work: take turns reading out loud, one reads out loud while the other listens (just make sure you’re both awake) or, read silently sitting side by side. Read it and then talk about it. Each chapter offers something to talk about at the end of the chapter.
This book was intended to be read, one chapter per day, for forty days. The chapters are all about the same length and will each take about 5 to 10 minutes to read. But the point is to strengthen your marriage, not just say you read the chapters. If you get off schedule, don’t panic, just pick up where you left off. You may come across something that sparks several days of discussion and you may choose to stay on that topic for a while until you get back into the book. If you take 40 weeks to get through the book, we don’t care. We just want you to succeed in your marriage.
We rely unapologetically on the Bible in this book. We believe that God invented marriage and the Bible shows us how to have a healthy one. Our hope and prayer is that your marriage will grow stronger and that you will be a blessing to everyone who knows you.
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