Tags
Advice, Anxiety, Battle, Broken Together, Brokenness, Cherish, Complacent, Darkness, Holy Spirit, Honor, Hope, Husband, Jesus, Light, Love Languages, Marriage, Real Struggles, Relationship, Respect, Rocky Road, Trials, Trust, WIfe
Marriage is not for the faint of heart. It takes hard work to make it work. After almost 10 years of marriage, I am still no expert on how to make marriage work perfectly, the way that God designed it to be. It seems like when you are in a dark valley in your marriage, you slowly start to turn your backs on one another and start picking at all the little things, and then the little things turn into massively huge big things. You end up forgetting that this person is supposed to be your partner. You end up forgetting that this person is who you can trust above anyone else. You might end up becoming complacent with one another, and start taking the other for granted and living as roommates. And once you get to that point you really need to take a huge step back and re-evaluate where you are going. You have to start making the choice right then and there to believe the best about them and why you are married to them. You have to do whatever it takes to get back on the same path and walking side by side.
If you don’t start working on yourself, your marriage, on the heart issue that has grown between the two of you… bitterness with grow where the fruit once did. Instead of being in a lush garden full of ripe fruit and soft green grass… you will find that you are living in a barren land. The grass has withered away, the fruit has dried up, and you look at your spouse wondering how you got there. In my opinion, a big reason is because you stopped working, you stopped winning and pursuing your spouse. You stopped trying, cherishing, honoring, supporting, sacrificing for each other. These are some of the most detrimental things that can happen in a marriage today. Because once you start living in complacency… Satan will come in and whisper those lies in your ears that “nothing will ever get better. You’re going to be stuck here forever… why don’t you start looking over here. I bet you will find what you are looking for over here.
When there is a major conflict in your marriage and you find yourself in this barren land… you have to come together and look up. You have to look to Jesus and realize that he is the only one that can get you through. I can just picture Jesus looking down from heaven and shaking his head as he sees you try to muddle your way through the valley on your own. We are not meant to go through this life without Jesus and his guidance over our life. When we start allowing other things to become more important than our marriage or our relationship with God that is when things go down hill quick. Kids, work, FaceBook, Pinterest, Blogging… all of this gets in the way and will cause conflict. All of these can become idols. Sometimes the conflict will be minor and you’ll be able to have a quick chat about it and move on. But sometimes it will be so major that you need to have outside help, and that’s OK! Either way, you have to re-evaluate your priorities and interests so that nothing gets in the way of your oneness in marriage.
So, how do we “fix” our marriages so they reflect what God wants them to be? I honestly have no idea. Everyone faces different challenges in their marriages. What feels like something minor to one couple might be something MAJOR to another. But here are a few things that I have been working on in my marriage and maybe it will give you a gentle push in the right direction…
1. READ THE BIBLE! I find that when my life is starting to fall apart it’s because I have neglected reading my Bible. I have neglected my relationship with my Heavenly Father so my earthly relationships are going to suffer because of that. Get back into the Word, and you will find the peace and guidance that you need to ride the waves.
2. Find a trusted friend that can help you organize your thoughts, your emotions. Because when you are in the middle of a rough patch you don’t always think clearly. And for me I tend to go overboard and just suffocate instead of stepping back and letting God back into the center of my life and my marriage. The Holy Spirit needs to fill your life again and the only way to do is by having someone breathing that back into you (at least for me).
3. Figure out what one another’s love languages are. There are some great resources out there that can help you figure these out. Either reading the book 5 Love Languages or taking the Love Languages quiz online. My hubby and I struggle filling one another’s love tanks on a daily basis. I am Words of Affirmation and he is Acts of Service. I tend to pour words into my hubby on a daily basis because that is what comes natural to me, but I need to pour other things into him. Like making his breakfast and lunch for the day… making sure the house is clean when he comes home (yeah this is on the “work on it” list)… keep up with the laundry (also on the “work on it” list)… make sure dinner is ready when he comes home.
4. Don’t be ashamed to go to counseling. Sometimes the hardest thing is taking that first step and admitting that maybe this conflict is bigger than what you can handle on your own. If you call your church, or a church in the area they should have great references for Christian Counselors.
5. Figure out an action plan that will help you no longer be complacent. For me, I have done a few things. I am in the middle of reading Lysa TerKeurst’s book Unglued and it has helped more than anything so far. I tend to come very “unglued” when things are out of my control and that I don’t have an easy solution. So when Lysa challenges me to make a procedure manual that will help me through my unglued weakness I am going to be all over that! I wrote down my 5 steps, and hung them in my kitchen to help me remember and speak truth into my soul.
6. Listen to worship music. This will immerse your mind on God’s truth instead of sitting in the anxiety of your situation.
Just because I am doing these 6 things doesn’t make the road smooth. It is still a battle daily to make your marriage the best that it can be! But they sure to help you keep perspective on what is true, and on what is important. And there is nothing in this world that is more important than my relationship with Christ, and with my husband. Once those two are where they should be all other things fall into place.