Refined

Woe to the rebellious children,’ says the LORD, Who take counsel, but not of Me, and who devise plans, but not of My Spirit, that they may add sin to sin; who walk to go down to Egypt, and have not asked My advice, to strengthen themselves in the strength of Pharaoh, and to trust in the shadow of Egypt!’ Isaiah 30:1-2

When you need advice, whom do you ask for help? When your marriage is in trouble, who is the first person you go to for counsel? When you have children and don’t know how to raise them, where do you go to learn?

I hope that your answer to these questions is God, that you ask God what He thinks about these things before you turn to anyone else. And that having turned to God, you have no need to ask anyone else, because God gives you everything you need for all the questions we face in life.

What I often find as a pastor, however, is that people come to me as a last resort to ask how God could help them. Or one spouse will come to me and tell me all the things their partner hears from their counselor, which usually, of course, has nothing to do with God.

All this makes no sense to me. I mean, as Christians we have a direct connection with the Holy Spirit who lives inside of us, the Spirit who searches the deep things of God and reveals them to us, the Spirit by whom we can say that we have the mind of Christ (1 Corinthians 2:7-16).

We also have the Word of God, His counsel written down for us from ages past that addresses every difficulty that we might face. In this Word, we have whole books dedicated entirely to wisdom, which teaches us what to do in every situation. This Word teaches us how to pray, and in so doing obtain help from God for our every need.

And all of this is from God Himself, the One who created the universe, the One who existed before all things, the One who is sovereign over all things, the One who holds the entire world together by the power of His word.

When I consider all this, I wonder why on earth Christians would turn to the counselors of the world or the worldly counsel of friends before they think to ask God His opinion.

God is our answer and our hope. He is our wisdom that meets our every need. Let’s forget the wisdom of this world and start asking God what He thinks.

Prayer Lord God,

I’m sorry for turning to worldly counselors for advice when I didn’t know what to do. Now I know that the first thing to do is ask You what You think. Please surround me with wise, godly counselors and help me to follow You in everything I do!

Amen

Going All the Way

An excellent wife is the crown of her husband, but she who causes shame is like rottenness in his bones. Proverbs 12:4

Did you read that verse? I want you to know that it goes both ways; an excellent husband is a crown to his wife just the same way.

I want you to look at your marriage today and ask yourself, What am I doing to be a crown for my spouse? Or maybe you can think if it this way, Am I a crown of glory or a crown of thorns?

This only goes one way or the other. You either become a crown or you become rottenness in the bones.

You can see the difference between the two very easily. A person who has become a cancer eating away their spouse’s bones is one who tears their spouse down with their words and actions. They neglect their spouse in the home, give their attention and affection to other hobbies and relationships, betray trust, bring shame, disappoint hope, and ultimately abandon ship.

Is this what you want your marriage to be? Or do you want your marriage to be filled with hope, affection, love, dreams, desires, and fulfilled passions for life and for one another?

If you want to be a crown on your spouse’s head, then capture your words before you say them. Capture your thoughts before you let them into your heart. Make sure your words and thoughts are honoring and loving toward your spouse. Don’t get so comfortable in the relationship that you forget to take it seriously that your spouse is a real person who matters.

Choose today which you are going to be-a crown, or a cancer. The choice is up to you.

Prayer Lord God, thank You for my spouse. I’m sorry for the times I have been more like a cancer than a crown, but I ask for Your help today to be an excellent partner for my spouse. Help me to be a blessing to my marriage.

Amen

Avoiding the Toll Road of Divorce

For the LORD God of Israel says that He hates divorce, for it covers one’s garment with violence,’ says the LORD of hosts. Malachi 2:16

Do you realize how seriously the Lord takes marriage and divorce?

People come into my office all the time with the most creative excuses you can imagine. It’s as though they think they get to be the exception to the rule. Let me be clear-

there are no exceptions. God makes His opinion of divorce very clear in His Word. He hates it. Hates! How is that for strong language?

God is so serious about marriage and divorce that He will not even listen to us while we go through the motions of godliness if we do not keep faith with our spouse (see Malachi 2:13-14). Why? Because He was a witness to our vows. He was there when we stood at the altar together, or the courtroom, and pledged, Till death do us part. He has seen whether or not we have been faithful.

He says to us, You made a covenant, and that covenant still stands. You cannot violate it and expect that I will be okay with that.

God is so serious about this because He desires godly offspring (Malachi 2:15). Divorce cuts off godly offspring because it creates orphans.

I still hang out with my kids, Bob; they aren’t orphans, you tell me. Yeah, you still hang out with them, at least when it’s your turn to have custody of them. But what your kids really need is two fulltime parents, not two part-time parents who divide their children between them like spoils of war.

We have a higher calling, saints. We need to take our marriages seriously, no exceptions.

Prayer Lord God, I repent for how I have let excuses creep into my heart. I choose now to take my marriage seriously. Please heal our hearts from all the hurts we’ve given each other and help me to make my marriage into everything you want it to be.

Amen

Going All the Way

And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God. Romans 12:2

What is marriage? Why is it so important?

I’m glad you asked, because I am going to tell you. If I could sum up marriage for you, I would define it by three important components that will help us all to go all the way in our marriages.

First, marriage is a spiritual covenant. It is a lie to think that marriage is just a piece of paper, something you can casually sign your name to and then rip it up the moment you wish it didn’t exist.

Too often, we want to continue walking down our own path, saying, God, bless me as I walk down this path. If we think of marriage as just a piece of paper then we need real repentance, repentance that gets off the path on which we are walking and gets on to the path that pleases God.

Second, marriage is a picture of the relationship between Jesus Christ and the Church. I think this is the reason that marriage comes under so much attack, because Satan wants to mar the God-ordained image of His relationship with man. If we act treacherously with our spouses, then how will the unsaved world see a picture of God’s faithfulness?

Third, marriage is the foundation of our society. If you mess with marriage, then you mess with mankind, because it is the fabric, the heart and soul of our entire society. Study after study shows us the truth we already knew-that divorce causes trauma to everyone involved, especially the children. This trauma lasts, leading to lower grades, less successful relationships, worse job performance, higher rates of depression, and much more. If we want our society to endure then we must leave a better legacy to our children than a nation torn and shattered by divorce!

These are the reasons why marriage is so important. If you are considering divorce, then realize that there is far more at stake here. Your divorce attacks all of these things. Do not put this off and think you can be the exception.

Instead, cry out for God’s mercy and grace to come and save your marriage, and in saving your marriage, save one more part of that covenant, that picture, and that foundation.

Prayer Lord Jesus,

Thank You that You can help my marriage! I know that my marriage could be more than it is now, but I need Your mercy and help to get there. Please have Your way in my marriage and family so that we can be everything You made us to be!

Amen

Rewarded

Love…does not seek its own. 1 Corinthians 13:4-5

I have good news and bad news.

The good news is that you are the best thing that could possibly happen to your marriage. The bad news is that you could also be the worst thing that could possibly happen to your marriage.

How can both of these be true? Well, it comes down to whether you will die to yourself for the sake of your spouse, or whether you will be selfish, insisting on taking care of yourself first.

Hands down, selfishness is the number one problem in marriage, the biggest reason for divorce. Selfish expectations, wanting things the way you want them, are marriage killers.

God designed us so that the blessings come when we die to ourselves, and this is especially true in our marriages. Yet for some reason, it’s easier to be unselfish with our children, friends, or even sometimes with strangers than with the one person who is our first responsibility. Somehow it suddenly becomes about the way we want things, expect things, or about what we need and want.

Selfishness is a black hole whose desires are never fulfilled. Selfishness is never happy, never satisfied, and never whole. It never stops making demands. The result of this is that, at best, one unselfish spouse works their tail off to satisfy their partner, but it’s impossible and they become increasingly frustrated as their efforts to love are met with ingratitude and an even longer list of entitlement-minded demands. At worst, two selfish people make continual demands of each other and become repeatedly offended with one another as these demands regularly go unmet.

Finally, the selfish person’s desires cannot be met and they decide to look for someone else to meet their needs. Since marriage was about them to begin with, of course, this is no great sacrifice to walk all over their spouse’s and children’s hearts, needs, or lives.

Love, on the other hand, does not seek its own. It seeks to benefit others. And when we actually embrace love in a marriage then not only are all our needs met, but trust and true intimacy are built over time that makes our marriage and our family a rock-solid pillar of love in our communities.

Doing family right is the ultimate witness for Christ, and it starts when we reject selfishness and choose love.

Prayer Father God,

Thank You for not being selfish with me! Please help me to be loving and unselfish like You are so that my family will not only survive, but so that it will become even better than I have ever imagined that it could be!

Amen

The Measure of Our Days

Many waters cannot quench love, nor can the floods drown it. If a man would give for love all the wealth of his house, it would be utterly despised. Song of Solomon 8:7

Till death do us part. That’s the promise we all make when we get married, that nothing will tarnish our faithfulness to our spouse until death forces our previously unsevered relationship to become severed.

But here’s the reality-only about half of us who make that promise keep it. And of those who keep that promise enough to not get divorced, many violate it with pornography, abuse, selfishness, sleeping together before making their vows, or heart-level unfaithfulness.

As we race toward the end times, we can be confident that marriage will come under increasing attack in our culture. It’s vital for us, then, to remember that no matter what our culture endorses, God’s commands never change.

No matter if our culture gasps when a young couple refuses to sleep together before they wed. No matter what filthy things or latest gossip comes out of our coworkers’ mouths. No matter who is disrespecting their spouse, dishonoring them when they talk to others. No matter how easy it is to access pornography. None of this matters, because God hasn’t changed and neither has His Word.

God hasn’t changed, and this gives us a very important word where our love is concerned, that we are to be faithful. And I mean that we are to be faithful not just to our spouse, but to our God.

I mean that above all else we hold on to the love that He has most faithfully given us, not letting it be cheapened or taken for granted. Don’t settle for what the world is living for. Don’t rent out your heart. Don’t play the field. Don’t treat your heart like a lounge chair that anybody walking by is invited to sit in. No!

Instead, keep your heart and your eyes and your affections fixed on the One who loves you the most and the best. Can any love you’ll find on earth compare to His? No! Never! Not in a million years! Then why on earth would you look for love anywhere else besides His embrace, in His heart for you?

Fix His love upon your heart today and do not let it forsake you. If you’ll do this, your marriage and your walk with God will be blessed off the charts.

Prayer Lord Jesus,

Thank You that You love me more than I can even imagine! I know that You love me, but I want to know it even more. And as You show me Your love, I choose to love You and none other, obeying Your commands to stay faithful now and forever to my spouse.

Amen

God’s Road to a Happy Marriage

Let the husband render to his wife the affection due her, and likewise also the wife to her husband. The wife does not have authority over her own body, but the husband does. And likewise the husband does not have authority over his own body, but the wife does. 1 Corinthians 7:3-4

You know that, if you are married, you are in debt, right?

I know there is a lot of debt going around these days-credit card debt, cars to pay off, and mortgages as well-but that’s not what I’m talking about. I am talking about a debt you owe to your spouse-a debt of affection.

In the context of what Paul is saying in our verses for today, we understand that this debt of affection is not a general sort of affection, some kind words or a bouquet of roses; rather, he is talking specifically about sex. We owe a debt of sex to our spouses, giving one another the affection that is due.

When I say this, I can almost hear the men who read these words cheering, running to their wives and saying, You gotta read what Pastor Bob wrote! But I want you to know this affection is not only due to husbands, but also to wives.

Listen men, if your wife is pregnant or aging, are you giving her the affection that is due to her? Or are you giving that affection to the pretty woman in your favorite television show, some paid prostitutes on your computer screen, or even letting your eyes wander after every pretty, young girl you see on the street? There is an affection due to your wife, and you have no business exciting your sex drive with other women and then fulfilling it with your wife.

The heart of this matter, for both husbands and wives, is generosity. Paul says that spouses do not have authority over their own bodies, but rather over their partner’s body. This only works in an atmosphere of generosity in which we give ourselves freely, granting permission and allowing our spouse to have authority over our bodies within the covenant of marriage.

The opposite of generosity is selfishness, and the moment selfishness enters a marriage then things begin to spiral downward. However, the moment we begin to be generous, things will begin to grow and continue growing until our marriage is more incredible than we ever imagined it could be.

Prayer Father God,

Thank You for my spouse! I want my marriage to be exactly what You designed marriage to be, and I know that a significant part of that is our sex life. I set myself apart for my spouse, giving them complete access to me as is right, and I ask You to help us guard one another within our atmosphere of generosity.

Amen