Marriage...
Answering Hard Questions
by pamela spurling
Dear sisters in Jesus---
"I thank my God upon every
remembrance of you, always in every prayer of mine for you all making request with joy,
for your fellowship in the gospel from the first day until now; being confident of this
very thing, the He which hath begun a good work in you will perform it until the day of
Jesus Christ." (Philippians 1.3-6)
And I do thank the LORD for you all and do remember you in prayer and am thankful. I'm writing
you today with a heavy heart---grieving over the plight of another marriage and its
demise. This is the first of another couple of messages I have written on marriage. I'm so
terribly saddened over all the stories which have come to my attention and so I pray to
continue with fervor writing and attempting to encourage sisters in marriage---perhaps
even reaching sisters whose marriages appear hopeless.
You know, quite some time ago I sought
the LORD and pled with Him that He would work in me to be a vessel He
could/would use and that my heart's desire was to be fully used of Him whatever His
choice, whatever the cost and no matter what others would think. I pray to always be of
such a mind---especially in difficult days. I pray to never retreat at opportunities or
reject situations because of nervous anxiety or fear. O, I pray to God that I would always
be a vessel He will use---I pray it for you, too. I pray that you, too, would be a ready
vessel and willing be to used of Him in what manner He chooses and that you will have
ample strength to handle whatever comes. I pray to be a wife that brings honour and glory
to the LORD by my behaviour, thoughts and responses to my
husband. We read in Colossians a portion of Paul's prayer: "Strengthened with all
might, according to his glorious power, unto all patience and longsuffering with
joyfulness." (1.11) And that's what I pray for you today... that whatever you are
facing, whatever your circumstances, whatever your need: that you would be strengthened
according to *His* glorious power. When you and I are tempted to doubt, tempted to fear,
we must get a hold of this truth and *rest* in it! And why? The verse before this answers
this question. "That ye might walk worthy of the LORD, unto
all pleasing, being fruitful in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of
God."
O, that we would be fruitful in every
good work... Now, what has this to do with all the sufferings and struggles of the
marriages around us? Everything. Everything, because as marriage is a picture of Christ
and the church, we must strive to live Christlike and in obedience to His Word. This is
where the "increasing in the knowledge of God" part comes in. I believe that the
more we know of God, of His Word, of His love, of His works, of His power... we will
*live* and be fruitful in every good work. When our chief aim is pleasing God, loving Him
and knowing Him more, then I believe our marriages and our homes will be a demonstration
of this. Now, am I saying that the sisters whose marriages are failing have not sought to
love and know the LORD increasingly? No. I cannot know the reasons for
the dissolve of the marriages. I can see some of the *symptoms* of the discontent or the
conflict, but, no, I cannot truly know the specific reasons these marriages are fractured.
But God knows and I personally believe that He will show a wife and He will show a husband
those areas in which work or change is needed in order that the love and marriage be
restored---even if there has been a breach of trust... even if there has been a breach of
the vows. This is where honest evaluation is necessary and the process of this evaluation
will likely produce pain on one or both parts. I further believe that God will reveal to
us the areas in which we need to change, correct our path, seek forgiveness or more
importantly offer it. I know that when there have been difficult days in our marriage, the
conflicts are always traceable to some area in which one or both of us were not right with
God, or where one or both of us was not willing to forgive and move on. O, God is
merciful...He will be found by you as you seek Him with the whole heart. I say assuredly,
if you can still remember an instance where you were wrong and you haven't confessed it,
then it's not too late to do so now and to seek forgiveness and perhaps more importantly,
resolve to finally and fully forgive your husband.
I share this with you today because as
part of the course of discussion with a precious friend enduring marriage difficulties,
some matters were brought up that bear additional consideration, and my hope here today is
to encourage you---encourage myself---to examine our ways, ask questions and reflect on
them in light of God's Word. Trouble in marriage is generally a symptom of something
amiss---perhaps many something's! For today, I would like to share with you a few
groupings of questions that may help in the process of repairing, restoring or
strengthening marriage. This is why I entitled this message: "Marriage... Answering
Hard Questions"
Have I left my first love?
Is my walk with the LORD as it should be? Am I daily in the Word, in prayer and meditation and am
I intent on obeying all known promptings of the LORD
immediately? Do I keep a short account of sins committed against God? I seek to answer
these questions and get right with God just now.
In my behavior...
Am I willing to confess and make amends
quickly? Do I keep a record of wrong? Do I have love that bears all things, believes all
things, hopes all things, endures all things? Does my love fail for my husband? Am I
childish in my dealing with my husband... am I petty? Do I seek my own way, am I easily
provoked and do I think ill or evil of my husband or react unkindly to him? Am I
hypocritical or double minded in my speech or actions? I seek to answer these questions
very honestly and make necessary corrections and get right with my family members and with
the LORD just now.
In my private life...
Am I daily striving to improve? Am I
seeking to eat and live in a more healthy manner? Am I endeavoring to be attentive to my
husband's interests? Do I seek to understand his world? Do I guard what I watch, what I
listen to, and what I read? Do I guard my thoughts? Do I lust after the things my friends
have? Do I look around at other husbands and their abilities? Do I compare them with my
own husband or use them as a measure of his shortcomings? Am I guarding against negative
or critical thinking? Am I remembering to hide God's Word in my heart and to be daily
renewed by the hearing of the Word?
In my walk...
Do I set about ordering our home in a
manner that is pleasing to him, or do I simply seek to please myself in the organization,
decorating, scheduling and tone of our home. Do I take into account his preference for how
my day is planned? Do I consider his suggestions when I have a problem, or do I make
excuses for my behavior and reject his help. Do I respect his ideas and demonstrate it in
my behavior? I pray to be honest and to correct the areas in which I have deceived or
defrauded myself or my husband. Am I secretly doing things my husband has expressly asked
me not to do?
In marital intimacy...
Do I desire to be attractive in my
appearance for my husband? Am I attempting to be desirable to him? Do I find ways to
complement him and demonstrate to him that he is desirable? Am I learning how to give him
pleasure and am I willing to learn to love him in ways that *he* needs to be loved---even
if I find it foreign to my personal idea of what's pleasurable? (I am *not*
talking about sinful behavior!*) Am I seeking to be pliable in my outlook. Do I
manipulate or use the marriage bed for personal gain? Do I play games with his emotions or
lead him on? Do I seek to know his "need quotient" and find ways to meet it?
In all the areas above, we can go before
the LORD and with a sincere heart seek to make wrongs right and to walk
in His ways, that we might make it our personal desire to "walk worthy of the LORD, unto all pleasing, being fruitful in every good work and increasing in
the knowledge of God."
Until recently, we had a van that had no
gas gauge, the speedometer hadn't worked for years, the dash lights were undependable and
the windows leaked. One would think that this was a very unreliable vehicle and would
likely think it was time to take that van to the wrecking yard---it still worked enough to
be useful and we had grown accustomed to its problems. Now we have a different van and not
only do the gauges work, but lights come on when something doesn't work but you know, at
first I was so accustomed to ignoring the lights that the new properly working lights
alarmed me and it became necessary for me to "relearn" to keep an eye on them
and to understand what they were signaling. I want to relate something to marriage and use
the van as an example. Sometimes we become so accustomed to a damaged or inferior
situation that we learn ways of coping or side stepping the problem. We may have ignored
warning systems so long that we are no longer sensitive to the serious adversity they're
indicating and when we ignore the signals long enough, they are no longer alarming to us
and we don't react to them with the intent to fix the problem, instead, we ignore them to
the point that they may no longer even get our attention---or if they do, we might bang on
the dash to get them to stop. Then when the car stops running or will not start, we
acknowledge the problem and struggle to find a way to repair it and generally the solution
is costly. Had we taken note of the needs of the vehicle in the very beginning and sought
the proper fluids and tools and kept the levels in check, and had we set up a maintenance
schedule, our vehicle would have been smooth running and dependable.
If we ignore the warning signals in
marriage, we may surely wake up one morning wondering how in the world did our marriage
slip away. When did we first begin ignoring the lights? Let's begin at this moment
evaluating and praying over the condition of our marriage, seeking God's guidance as to
trouble spots, our shortcomings or areas of sin and to begin making the necessary, perhaps
even painful repairs, confessions and adjustments.
Are the Dash Lights Flashing? I pray for
you this day in your home and especially in your marriage: "That ye might walk worthy
of the LORD, unto all pleasing, being fruitful in every good
work and increasing in the knowledge of God."
God bless you and may He joy over you
with singing.
In Him, pamela spurling © 2001
http://www.achristianhome.com