Category Archives: marriage

Marriage Monday- Week 1 The Foundation

30 Monday Sep 2019

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Thought for this week:

Let’s start our marriage journey today by reconnecting and reestablishing the foundation of our marriages.

You see, Marriage is meant to be a blessing from God. As we begin to reconnect in our marriage, it is also important to put our marriage back into God’s hands. By recommitting to God, we have given our marriage new life and new hope. Remember, apart from God we can do nothing, but with God all things are possible. If you have a great marriage today, that’s awesome, let’s make it even better, and if your marriage is struggling, that’s ok too; these weeks are designed to give you the tools you need to have the marriage you always wanted.

Photo Via Pixabay

How can we reconnect with God in our marriage?

Although we will be digging deeper into many of the topics we are about to mention- it’s important to start somewhere. Whether you are doing these weeks together (which is always best) or apart (gotta do what you gotta do)-

1. Start with prayer. Pray for God to become the center of your relationship again. Then pray for your spouse. Pray for healing in those places that have been damaged by life, by mistakes, misunderstandings, and challenges. Pray together and for each other.

2. Start doing a short devotion together. Maybe pick a book of the bible and read a verse or two in the evening and discuss it.  There are also some great apps out there that can do the hard work for you. In fact, this summer my husband and I used the “You Version Bible App”. Through this app there are short devotionals that are only a few days long up to many weeks. The topics they have for marriage are really awesome. At the end of each days devotion there is a question for you to answer that you both can see. For us it was awesome to be able to continue our devotional time together even while one of us was on the road somewhere. These devotions didn’t take a ton of time and really caused us to think about parts of our relationship we may have neglected (and that was a good thing!).

3. Finally and simply- just begin. This isn’t about being perfect, if you don’t pray or do a devotion every single day- it’s ok. The point is to begin somewhere. There are no “rules” to follow, only suggestions to get us back on the roadmap that God created for us.

Scripture reference:

Genesis 2:18 (NIV) The Lord God said, “It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper suitable for him.”

Genesis 2:23-24 (NIV) The man said, “This is now bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called ‘woman,’ for she was taken out of man.” That is why a man leaves his father and mother and is united to his wife, and they become one flesh.

Prayer:

Lord, we release our marriage to you today. We ask that you become the center of our marriage, our family and our lives. We commit today to allow you to change us, teach us, and mold us into the people you have called us to be and to allow you to work in this marriage to improve it. We know that you created marriage; and it was you who gave each of us our needs and desires within our marriage relationships to bring us balance. We are no longer going to look at our spouses differences as a negative, but as a complement to our own unique personalities. We thank you for this fresh start in our marriage Lord and we look forward to the days ahead with you as the center of it. In Jesus name, Amen.

My Marriage & Yours

25 Wednesday Sep 2019

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 “I love you. You annoy me more than I ever thought possible, but I want to spend every irritating minute with you.”

  This is the message that my husband sent me on a random Wednesday morning just a few weeks ago. 

It’s apparent that he could use some work on his skills with the ladies, but after all these years I already knew that. (jk) (well sorta).

Photo Via Pixabay

Today is our anniversary and I have to say this sums up our marriage pretty perfectly. And yes, I do plan to irritate him every single minute of the day for the rest of his life- especially now that I know how much he loves it. 

Photo Via Pixabay

Seriously though, marriage can be super annoying, and fun, and frustrating, and full of so many different challenges and joys in life. It’s a chance to laugh together, cry together, and work through some of the best and worst of ourselves.

I frequently tell my husband that at this point, whether he wants to or not, he has seen far to much of my “worst” so he can never leave.

As much as I hope you know that I’m joking, I also really mean it. Listen, we all have those moments we’d like to forget and being married often means there’s a witness to our crazy.

Photo Via Pixabay

I love posting about the great days and putting the biggest smiles on social media but as for the skeletons in my closet, those need to stay locked up tightly.

A few years ago my husband and I were asked to lead a marriage conference. It was some of the hardest work we have ever done. I personally had no idea how writing, speaking, and planning together would cause us to really re-evaluate our own relationship. Now, if you’ve read this blog for long, you fully realize that we are not experts. However, you also know that life and all its challenges often causes us to grow and learn and change in ways we never thought we could.

And that’s what we have to give.

The tidbits we have learned over the years have taken us from that immature, selfish, ridiculous young couple to having a much more content, happy, and most of the time skeleton free life.

So that being said and in honor of our anniversary we have decided to share some of those tidbits with you. Each week we will post a little excerpt from the teaching we did and hopefully you will gain some great grains of wisdom for your own relationship.

Photo Via Pixabay

So, Happy Anniversary sweetheart, here’s to helping other couples irritate each other in the happiest way possible for the rest of their lives too.

See ya next week.

The Gift of Encouragement

28 Wednesday Dec 2016

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1 Thessalonians 5:11 says “Therefore encourage one another and build each other up, just as in fact you are doing.”

I remember one year Ryan got me a gift I have never forgotten. He was trying to show me how much he cared and while Christmas shopping he came across a “love rock”. Don’t look into this too much, it was exactly as I described it. A rock, painted with the word love on it. He succeeded in the fact that I never forgot it; well at least not until we moved from one house to another and somehow it got left behind. (By accident I’m sure). nature-685176_640

We have laughed hard about that rock over the years, and no offense to Ryan but it was a horrendous gift.  A heavy big old rock to stub your toe on at 6am does not make for a day filled with love, yet he thought it was the best thing since sliced bread. (Photo via Pixabay)

What does this have to do with encouragement?

Well, encouragement comes in many forms. It’s laughing about thegifts little things, advice filled with sincerity when you just don’t know what to do, and knowing that your partner has your back no matter what. It’s found in the little gifts and the biggest smiles. It’s that note you left your spouse just to tell them you love them and yes, it’s found in a love rock that has unexpectedly made you smile many times throughout the years.

Today, as we get ready to celebrate the upcoming New Year, let’s try to find ways to encourage each other. Have fun with it; make it unexpected at times and sweet at others. Let’s challenge ourselves to find ways to make this New Year better for those around us. Let’s shake off the dust of the past and build each other up in the coming year. (Photo via Pixabay)

And just for the record, if you do buy a rock for someone this year- I recommend the clear kind that fits on a necklace or ring, but hey, to each their own.

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Peace over Perfection

17 Sunday Apr 2016

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My husband and I have many gifts – one of which is the ability to have some pretty heated discussions. Put two stubborn people with big ideas and strong opinions in a room together and watch the show.

I remember one day in particular, we were in what seemed to be a constant battle over everything, and nothing. I’d say the sky was blue, he’d say it wasn’t. He’d say the grass is green, I’d adamantly disagree.  Raised voices, angry stares, we had it all.argument

Then we ran into people we knew- so we smiled, laughed, and carried on a pretty good conversation with them; a conversation that ended with them telling us how much they hoped to have a marriage just like ours someday. (Photo from Pixabay)

Be careful what you wish for…

I’ve had to swallow more pride and say I’m sorry more in the last 20+ years than I want to admit, and my husband has learned that women are pretty emotional creatures that need to talk- a lot.  He’s had to learn that honesty is a huge deal breaker and even the smallest of discrepancies can put me right over the edge. I’ve had to learn to not take everything so personally and to quit analyzing everything he says and does.

We’ve plastered on fake smiles and hid raw emotions so the world around us wouldn’t have to see the truth.  We’ve shared our facebook posts and pictures of our perfect family. We act the part of perfection while underneath we are really looking to strangle each other.

And then everything changed.

My husband and I were in one of our most heated arguments and hope seemed to be dwindling. Finally, he looked at me and said “Ya know Nick, we don’t have to be like anyone else around us, it doesn’t matter what has happened in our friend’s marriages, our families’ marriages, or the strangers down the street- This is our marriage and it can be whatever we choose.”

Hmmm…

Enter Miracle #1.  I was speechless.

I had never thought of it like that. I had spent so many years watching others fall apart and in my heart I guess I believed that at some point every relationship ended there as well.

I honestly never even considered that what happened in our marriage was our choice.

plantRyan went on to say that he felt that every great relationship goes through the fires of life. We could either fight to stay together, or fight until we go our separate ways but either way there will be some battles in our future. (Photo by Pixabay)

Enter Miracle #2– I agreed with him.

Now I’m not going to say that everything immediately became perfect.

toilet paper rollNope, he still leaves the toilet paper roll completely empty and places the extra roll across the bathroom just out of reach.  The toothpaste is still squeezed from the middle of the tube, and his socks still sit on the floor beside the bed. (Photo by Pixabay)

I still steal all the covers, become completely unglued when the bedroom ceiling leaks, and leave all my makeup and hair supplies on his side of the sink.

The difference is that now these things don’t cause strife in our relationship. We’ve decided to choose peace over perfection and that has been the best decision we’ve made.

We’ve quit comparing ourselves to others, the good and the bad and decided to just be us. Isn’t that what we were supposed to be anyway?

Our marriages are built or torn down brick by brick, nail by nail.

Proverbs 18:22 says that he who has found a wife has found a good thing.marriage

Marriage is a good thing.

It was meant to be good. It’s time we quit trying to change each other and start becoming the team we were always meant to be. (Photo by Pixabay)

The minute I began to look at my husband through new eyes things did change. I realized that although he is very different from me, he is on my side and those differences are a gift to me. He is strong in places that I am weak.

Enter Miracle #3– My marriage. It’s not at all what I expected and once I let God get a hold of it, it became better than I could have imagined.

Miracle #4 is all yours.

Let God take your marriage and give it new life. Let hope begin to sink into the very crevasses. No matter how good or bad your marriage is today- this is your year to make it amazing.  Instead of criticizing our husbands for what they are not, how about we pray for them to be the best they can be this year. How about we lift up our marriages to God and let Him do the work in both of us.

Today, let’s stop fighting with our husbands and let’s fight for them.  It may just make all the difference.