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Perseverance in Marriage
Dr. Chuck Betters
Knowing the right
thing to do is fairly easy. Doing the right thing is much
harder. Not long
ago God convicted a good friend of ours, Ellen, about her
hateful behavior
toward her husband. In spite of his claim to Christianity,
he was unloving,
impatient, and sometimes even cruel to her and to their
children. She had
begun screaming right back at him and using her own forms
of mental and
emotional attack to get him back.
Her husband had met an attractive woman
through work and an old boyfriend
had entered Ellen's life. Disaster loomed
over this Christian family,
struggling to raise children to love
Jesus.
Focus on Your Own Behavior
Desperate to save her
marriage, Ellen asked an older, wiser woman in the
church to teach her how to
love her husband in a way that would honor God.
In their very first meeting,
the two women agreed their discussions would
focus on the wife's behavior,
not her husband's sins. In each session Ellen
renewed her commitment to
respond to her husband in a godly manner. The
older woman warned Ellen that
obedience would require faith in God's love
and presence and the power to
obey would come through God's enabling grace.
Life would probably get
harder before it got better.
Ellen soon learned that making a commitment
to love her husband was far
easier than actually loving her husband, day in
and day out. Sometimes
loving him meant she had to suffer in silence. At
other times, loving him
meant praying and then speaking quietly, in courage
and strength, when she
needed to confront him about his ungodly behavior.
Ellen learned that her
life indeed did get much tougher for a while, but that
by faith she had to
stay the course of obedience and trust God to supply
grace for each moment.
Ellen committed herself to several crucial
elements:
Soaking in God's Word and acting on His
instructions
Learning from an older wiser woman how to revere and respect her
husband
Staying connected to a circle of friends who encouraged her to
godliness
Refusing to criticize her husband to others
Staying focused on
her own behavior
God's Sandpaper
She embraced her marriage as
God's sandpaper, designed to drive her to His
love and strength, designed to
round off the sharp corners of her heart so
that she reflected the very
characteristics she longed to see in her
husband. No matter how her husband
responded, she would grow in godliness.
This young woman wanted to honor
God in her marriage, but betrayal,
pettiness and downright hatred had turned
their home into a kind of prison,
one in which she, her husband, and her
children were all trapped. The only
way to break down those walls was
faithful obedience on her part. While
still not sure how ?the story will
end,? Ellen has committed herself to God,
His people, and His Word, trusting
Him to rescue her family from a situation
that seems - to everyone else - all
but hopeless. God will not fail her.
The Rest of the Story
Though
the journey has been hard and long for Ellen and her husband, they
now enjoy
a home that is more peaceful, respectful and gentle then it has
ever been. In
time her husband started meeting with a group of godly men who
challenged him
to genuinely love his wife as Christ loves the church. Both
Ellen and her
husband know that they must always stay connected to God's
Word and His
people in order to stay accountable for reflecting Christ in
their
marriage.
Your Prison
In what prison do you live? Is it time to
see those bars as God's invitation
to come to Him, to experience forgives and
redemption and to learn how to
extend His compassion to others? Let me know
if we can help you to meet the
Savior in a way that will give you hope and
strength for your pathway
of
faith.
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