What One Thing?
We are about to start another series of A Marriage Made In Heaven courses which we’ll be facilitating locally and online. Last evening, I was pondering, “What is the one thing I could tell participants that would help them to get the very most out of the course?”
Even though marriage is a very complicated and complex relationship, I still think there is one issue that is so foundational that, without addressing it, we are doomed to fail in our marriages and, in fact, our lives. Once we recognize this vital personal issue and commit to change, huge doors open for us to move into a joyful, romantic, fruitful, and fulfilling marriage.
The Background:
In our modern culture we, to a great extent, consciously or unconsciously, have adopted the belief system not from God’s Word, but from a world view that is derived from our culture.
By the time I had arrived on the scene, my parents had experienced the Great Depression and were a part of America’s “greatest generation.” Like all Americans, they were playing their part in winning World War Two. Both of these tragic experiences required much sacrifice on the part of nearly every American. Not wanting their children to experience what they had gone through, many parents shielded their children from difficulty, responsibility, and discipline. Historically this was the “beginning of sorrows” for our nation and ultimately sowed the seeds that would undermine nearly every foundation stone that heretofore had existed since our country’s founding.
In the subsequent generations, which I call the ” Me Generations,” children began to be indoctrinated with the philosophies of Moral Relativism, Hedonism, and Humanism. Sayings like, “If it feels good, do it” began to be heard, as morality and even ethics were abandoned in our schools and in our lives. Many things that were abhorrent became acceptable, then they became “natural” and were then shielded from criticism. Those who continued to believe and express the need for morality and ethics were characterized as being intolerant.
Many churches, not only those called liberal, but even many identified as evangelical, charismatic, or reformed, were transformed almost “overnight” into cheerleading facilities that encouraged avoiding difficulties. They abandoned the cross for a savior dressed in a Santa Claus suit.
We had forgotten the “fellowship of suffering” and the martyrs that had gone before. We no longer appreciated the lives of our grandparents and great grandparents who clung to their Bibles and prayer and fellowshipped in the thousands of clapboard churches that still dot every corner of America. To a great extent, many of our churches’ lights were extinguished by abandoning the Gospel of the Suffering Savior.
The Answer:
So, what does all this have to do with participating in a Marriage class?
Marriage has become the victim of in-culturalism. In fact, marriage as an institution is in jeopardy of being abandoned and traded for “friends with benefits.” Unfortunately, many of our ideas about marriage are being formed by the exposure to a decadent culture, Hollywood fairy tales, and, to a troubling extent, the explosive proliferation of pornography.
God has provided us a route of escape from this tyranny of culture – the path that, once followed, opens a vista for your marriage so wonderful that it will take your breath away! Like so many truths of Christianity that on the surface look to be oxymorons, there are really vital truths that can bring joy, love, romance and a great future for every marriage.
Give, and it will be given to you: good measure, pressed down, shaken together, and running over will be put into your bosom….
Luke 6:38a, New King James Version ( NKJV)
For whoever desires to save his life will lose it….
Mark 8:35, NKJV
A successful marriage, as God sees it, is characterized by sacrifice – a giving of oneself for another’s benefit. Sounds like the Gospel, doesn’t it? In some ways, it is the “Gospel of Marriage,” the Good News. God has one overriding desire for us and that is that we become like His Son through sacrificial living.
I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I now live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.
Galatians 2:20, New International Version (NIV)
By far the most prominent thread throughout A Marriage Made In Heaven course is the call for sacrificial love. This is God’s kind of love, love needing the empowerment of the Holy Spirit. It is a love that is so costly, but oh so rewarding because it brings with it a smile from the Father and a warmth in our heart given to us by the Holy Spirit.
God will provide you all that is needed to bless your marriage and the wisdom and empowerment to fulfill your spouse’s God-given unique needs. All that is required is summed up in these two wonderful Scriptures:
Very truly I tell you, unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed. But if it dies, it produces many seeds.
John 12:24, NIV
Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her.
Ephesians 5:25, NIV
Blessings for you and yours,
Ted and Esther
