LOVE YOUR SPOUSE

LIFE’S TOUGH SPOTS IN MARRIAGE

When you were a kid do you remember how tempting it was to touch anything that had a sign on it that read: Don’t touch!  Wet paint!

I was raised with five brothers and I always remember that my mom would go to do the wash and start asking them where they had been to get paint all over their clothes.

Just like paint is very tempting for kids, as adults, we each have areas in our life that is tempting.

“And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.”  Matt.6:13

We all need God in our life to lead us out of life’s tough spots in our marriage.

Praying this prayer is confessing that God is your leader including in your marriage.

This is where you and I tell God that we have felt the hurt of destruction from sin in our lives.

We are telling God that we don’t want to go there again in our marriage so we need him to lead us in the right direction.

Life is a test of choices.

When God designed us in his image, he made us higher than the angels.

We have the freedom as moral creatures to make our own choices and decisions but the angels do not.

Are you asking God not to let you get off track in your marriage from where God is leading you?

It is like a wife who navigates her husband while he is driving so he doesn’t make a wrong turn.

CASE AND POINT:  One of the funniest things that happened to my husband and me when we were missionaries in England, happened in the city of Birmingham.  We were there to scout the land to plant a new church there.  I had the map and was telling my husband which way to turn.  In England they have round-abouts instead of stop signs.  You get on and go in circles till you get to the street you want to turn in.  I kept asking him what street we were coming up to as my eyes were on the map.  He would tell me the name of the street as we passed it.  I would tell him to turn off on the next street as we passed it.  He would tell me we passed it.  As we kept going in circles, our voices started getting louder at each other.  Pretty soon we were shouting at each other going in circles.   By the time we got off the round-about, we were ready for a divorce.  After that every time we wanted to have a good laugh we would say, “Hey lets go to Birmingham, and have a nice time.”

This is exactly what the devil does in our marriage!

He has us blaming each other and chasing our tails.

Many times we blame God for not helping us with our marriage but we have choices to make and continue to make bad choices.

God will never tempt us.   NEVER!!

James 1:13-14  “Let no man say when he is tempted, I am tempted of God: for God cannot be tempted with evil, neither tempteth he any man: But every man is tempted, when he is drawn away of his own lust and enticed.”

Awwww!  We are drawn away by our own lust!!

Satan tempts us and sets traps for us.

The evil one knows which buttons to push to get you to react.

He entices us with the world: The lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes and the pride of life.

Let Jesus be your guide.

Get off the round about!

It’s your choice!

NOTE:  Daily there is a new post to help your marriage succeed.

CHOOSE THE HONEYCOMB

HUSBAND, ARE YOU LOOKING for a good way to connect emotionally with your wife?  If so, Proverbs offers this pointer, “Pleasant words are like a honeycomb, sweetness to the soul and health to the bones” (Prov.16:24).

How often do you praise your wife?  Consider a few compliments to brighten her day:

*  “Dinner was great!  Thank you for always making creative meals, even when you’re tired of cooking.”

*  “I love the way you read books to our kids.  That’s so much better for them than watching TV.”

*  “I’m grateful that you carefully budget our paycheck each month.”

*  “I admire the way you handled yourself with that rude salesman—you have such a winsome approach.”

*  “The flowers you planted make our home so much more inviting.  I appreciate your hard work.”

Speaking pleasant words to your spouse helps to establish and strengthen emotional connections.  As you work to make a genuine connection with your words, go below the surface to the real issues of life.  Share with her, for example, what goes on at work.  Most women love hearing all of the details.  You’ll also discover that she can provide wise counsel on the issues you face.

NOTE:  This article is from Family Life and Marriage Bible by Dennis and Barbara Rainey.

NOTE:  Daily there is a new post to help your marriage succeed.

WILL YOU BUILD UP or PULL DOWN

EVERY WIFE HAS THE POWER to create or destroy her relationship with her husband “The wise woman builds her house, but the foolish pulls it down with her hands” (Prov.14:1).

Remember that God is in control and you can trust Him.  Also remember that you have to choose to obey God through honoring and respecting your husband.  Every man needs his wife’s respect; it’s one of his deepest needs.  He has others, but your respect—or lack thereof—impacts his whole life.

Respecting your husband includes really listening to him, not simply hearing the words that come out of his mouth.  Take seriously what he says!  When Barbara listens to me when I express something that I consider important for the family—and then acts on what I have said—she demonstrates respect.  On more than one occasion, her respect has empowered me to lead.  Not only does she benefit, but so does the entire family.  Some wives do not realize how powerful they can be in their husband’s life when they truly respect their man.

A husband should never try to force his wife to respect him.  Instead, he should seek to be a man worthy of respect by demonstrating godly character and sacrificial love.  And a wife should look for ways to affirm and respond to her husband’s leadership.  It starts by praising him for those areas in which he deserves genuine respect.

NOTE:  This article is from the book Family Life and Marriage Bible by Dennis and Barbara Rainey

NOTE:  Daily there is a new post to help your marriage be a success.

YOUR HEART FOLLOWS YOUR INVESTMENT

NOTE:  The following article comes from the book “The Love Dare – Day by Day written by Kendrick

“For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.” Matt.6:21

Your heart follows your investment.

Whatever you pour your time, money, and energy into will draw your heart.

This was certainly true before you were married.

You wrote letters, bought gifts, and spent time together as a couple…and your heart followed.

But if you stopped investing as much in the relationship and started pouring yourself into other things, your heart followed those.

If you are not in love with your spouse today it may be because you stopped investing in your spouse yesterday.

Ask yourself what has your heart right now.

What’s become important to you?

You can tell by looking at where your time, money, thoughts and energy have been spent recently.

Are you still putting these things into your mate?

How about the things of God?

As you draw closer to God, the Holy Spirit will act as your spiritual GPS.

When you veer off course, His still, small voice will redirect you—if you’ll listen—back toward your real treasure.

Prayer

“Lord, remind us to invest in our marriage whether our emotions are there or not.   Help us to love each other regardless of our feelings, but we ask you to renew our love for one another as we obey you.”

NOTE:  Daily there is a new post to help your marriage succeed.

PEACE STARTS WITH ME!

In the Lords Prayer one of the issues that was dealt with is the way we deal with other people and that includes our spouse.

Matt.6:14 “  If we forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you.”

This verse is telling us that there is a condition that has been established.

That condition is that your spouse must be forgiven for all offensives and it has to start with YOU!

You cannot make the excuse that you are waiting for your spouse to ask for forgiveness or an apology.

God is waiting for you to FORWARD MARCH!

You must FORGIVE first!

 I saw a cartoon of a man at a card shop.  He was buying a card for his wife.  He asked the salesperson,  “Do you have a card that stops short of saying, ‘I’m sorry’ yet vaguely hints of some wrongdoing?”

This is not showing forgiveness!

Forgiveness can’t change the past but it does broaden the future.

  Is forgiveness a choice or is it just a state of your emotions?

*  Forgiveness is a choice made by your will.

*  God commands that your obedience to him must produce forgiveness  to others.

If you are blaming your spouse because you cannot forgive them, remember that it is a choice of your will.

By dwelling on past hurts you take away quality to have  a satisfying marital life.

Corrie Ten Boom said, “Forgiveness is to set a prisoner free, and to realize the prisoner was you!”

CASE AND POINT:  Kris, one of our pastor’s wives on staff, joins me as we both go and speak into the Los Angeles County Jail for the women together.  The presence of God is so powerful in the jail for these women.  Even though it is the most fulfilling areas of ministry that we have, it is still heartbreaking to walk out and see that these precious women we just ministered to are still prisoners.

I can’t imagine how God must feel when he has ministered to us about our marriages and given us clear direction of what he expects of us as spouses then we turn around, and won’t forgive them.

God forgives us and sets us free and because we won’t forgive, we put ourselves back to live in our own prison.

WHAT A TRAGEDY!!!

What a blow to your marital life.

Let peace reign in your life, not bitterness.

FORWARD MARCH – spouses!!!!

NOTE:  Daily there is a new post to help your marriage succeed.

TWO MELTED HEARTS CAN BECOME ONE

NOTE:  The following article is from the book “The Love Dare –  Day by Day” by Kendrick

“Though the fig tree does not bud and there is no fruit on the vines…yet I will triumph in the LORD.”  HAB.3:17-18

Does your love  have a place it will not go beyond?

Even though you willingly promised to love your spouse forever in the soft glow of your wedding ceremony, were you just repeating the script?

Were you like many who, though promising for better or for worse, really only meant “for better”?

You may look from the outside in at other people’s marriages and suppose that many, if not most, have a much easier time than you do.

You may determine that your spouse has brought challenges into your marriage you can no longer tolerate–things you didn’t know or foresee, or perhaps overlooked.

Do not  give up on having true love for your spouse.

Even if much of the feeling and desire has been replaced by resentment and distrust, God is able to grow in you a love that will last.

Unconditional love will give the ability to rise up from the ashes of life’s worst, and be thankful for how the heat of battle has melted your hearts into one.

This Weeks Dare

Do something out of the ordinary for your spouse—

something that proves (to you and to them) that your love

is based on your choice and nothing else.

NOTE:  Daily there is a new post to help your marriage succeed.

  YOUR SPOUSE IS AN EXPERT

NOTE:  The following article is from the book The Love Dare Day by Day by Kendrick

“How can we thank God for you in return for all the joy we experience because of you before our God?”  1Thess.3:9

Whether from raw, natural ability or from hard work and training, your spouse is an expert at something, probably several things.

They may be good at building projects, or at handling people, or at calming a tense situation with their peaceful spirit.

They may have a knack for organizing work teams, handling finances,  or graciously hosting a dinner party.

And because you may have known this about them for a long time, it’s been easy letting them fill these roles in your marriage without truly noticing  how good they are at them.

People also tend to have one or more subjects they are very knowledgeable about.

But love never ceases to be amazed at what your spouse can do.

It doesn’t save its admiration only for those at work, at church, or outside the home who can accomplish noteworthy things.

This person you married is exceptional in ways you may have overlooked.

Don’t just utilize them for what they are able to do.

VALUE IT.

HONOR IT.

APPRECIATE IT.

Admire them for it.

This Weeks Dare

Prepare a special dinner at home, just for the two of you.

Focus this time on getting to know your spouse better, perhaps in areas you’ve rarely talked about.

Determine to make it an enjoyable evening for you and your mate.

NOTE:  Daily there is a new post to help your marriage succeed.

GOD SEES YOUR SHOPPING LIST

Everyone loves a buffet!

There are many REASONS for liking it but the most common ones are that you get a lot of choices, you can have as much of it as you want and no one will stop you.

This is great but thank God we don’t go to a buffet every day or I suspect we would pack the pounds on.

In the Lords prayer in Matt.6:11, Jesus said, “Give us this day our daily bread.”

“Bread” is a symbol word that stands for all our physical needs.

In Elmer Towns book, “Praying the Lord’s Prayer for spiritual breakthrough”, he has a list of five essential facts about our daily needs.

1. We have daily needs.
2. God supplies our needs.
3. We must ask God to supply our needs.
4. Our needs are supplied one day at a time.
5. We don’t have to pray for everything, but we have to pray about everything.

For our physical well-being, we eat, exercise and sleep.

God designed us to have needs in our lives so we would look to him to SUPPLY them.

He made those needs in us so when we stray away from Him, those needs make them turn back to HIM.

He did not create you to be self-sufficient.

Are you the type of person who EXPECTS your spouse to provide your every need?

I have spoke with Christian wives who have told me through the years that their husbands tell them to get a job that makes more money because he wants to buy more.

Mahatma Ghandi once said, “Earth provides enough to satisfy every man’s need, but not every man’s greed.”

We want to leave a financial legacy for our children thinking it’s our resources that they need the most.

Ask of God because he may use FINANCES to keep our children focused on him as they grow older.

In the United States, food is plentiful and you may not need to ask.

So why are we given this PATTERN to ask anyway?

Prov.30:9 “Lest I be full, and deny thee, and say who is the Lord? Or lest I be poor, and steal, and take the name of the Lord in vain.”

One good reason is that God wants you and your spouse to acknowledge that it is Him who is providing for you.

We are commanded to ask for our NEEDS according to Gods will.

The Bible calls the ants “Exceedingly wise” because they do not worry but they prepare.

Prov.30:24-25 “The ants are a people not strong, yet they prepare their meat in the summer.”

It is all right to prepare but it is sin to worry.

God wants your “shopping list” of needs so don’t rely on your credit cards.

Credit card usage is using up tomorrow’s bread.

Don’t use credit cards unless you are paying them off monthly.

YOU ARE USING TOMORROW’S BREAD AND THAT IS SIN!!

NOTE:  Daily there is a new post to help your marriage succeed.

GET UNDERSTANDING

The book of Proverbs is one of my favorites in the entire Bible because it contains such practical wisdom about everyday life.  One theme that constantly pops up is the tremendous value of becoming a person of understanding.  Take some time to read and consider the teaching of each of the following verses:

Apply your heart to understanding.  Prov.2:2

Understanding will watch over you.  Prov.2:11

Call understanding your nearest kin.  Prov.7:4

A man (or woman) of understanding walks upright.  Prov.15:21

Understanding is a wellspring of life to him (or her) who has it.  Prov.16:22

Understanding is never an end in itself; it is merely a vehicle to wisdom, direction, and to life.  A person of understanding views life and people from God’s own perspective.  Understanding enables you to feel for another person, to identify with his or her struggles and difficulties, and to know what to say and what not to say.

Oh, how we need understanding in our marriages!

In the husband-wife relationship, your level of understanding often determines your level of acceptance.  Having God’s perspective of your spouse and how He designed him to complement you is essential if you are truly going to love him.

At a FamilyLife Weekend to Remember marriage conference a few years ago, I talked to several women who described various problems in their marriages.  One women resented her husband’s schedule.  Another disagreed with her husband regarding how to discipline their children.  A third spoke about how jealous her husband was of the time she spent with her sister.

I gave essentially the same advice to all of these women: Seek to understand why your husband is feeling or acting this way.  Focus on better understanding him, not on the negative circumstances and how you are affected.  By his unwanted actions,  is he communicating some unmet need for affirmation, commitment or loyalty?

Even if you don’t totally understand your mate, give him or her your complete acceptance.  It may be necessary to ask God to help you accept your mate.  Many are living in circumstances that are very difficult and they need God’s guidance and power to be able to love their spouses well.

Why is understand so important?  Because without it, your spouse will feel that you are pressuring him or her to become something he or she is not.  With it, your spouse will sense that you love him or her for who he or she is today, and not for what you hope he or she will become tomorrow.

NOTE:  This article is from the book Family Life and Marriage Bible by Dennis and Barbara Rainey.

NOTE:  Daily there is a new post to help your marriage succeed.

SATURDAY – QUESTION & ANSWER 

Question #1.  How important is verbally complimenting my wife?

Answer #1  One important way to connect emotionally is to verbally complement your wife.  Proverbs offers this pointer:  “Pleasant words are like a honeycomb, sweetness to the soul and health to the bones”  (Psa.16:24).  How often do you praise your wife for what she does?  Consider a few of these compliments to brighten her day:

*  “Dinner was great!  Thank you for always making creative meals, even when you’re tired of cooking.”

*  “I love the way you read books to our kids.  That’s so much better for them than watching TV.”

*   “I’m grateful that you carefully budget our paycheck each month.”

* “I admire the way you handled yourself with that rude salesman–you have such a winsome approach.”

As you study your wife and learn how and when to build security, acceptance, and emotional connection into your relationship through well-chosen, affirming words, you will become an irresistible man.  And let me make one last practical suggestion:  When you come home from work, here are four of the most romantic words ever to say to your wife: “How can I help?”

Why not try it—and mean it–tonight?

NOTE:  This article was from the book Family Life and Marriage Bible by Dennis and Barbara Rainey.

NOTE:  Daily there is a new post to help your marriage succeed.