Over the past few years my husband and I have watched marriage after marriage end. Lots of marriages that are still holding on are just holding on by a thread and full of adultery, deceit, discontentment, hatred, and bitterness. That small percent of marriages that are not on the verge of divorce, have somehow forgotten their purpose. These marriages I speak of are unions that proclaim Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior.
What's happening?
What's the problem?
Surely this isn't what God had in mind when he created the institution of marriage. Marriage is meant to be a beautiful representation of the love and commitment between Christ and his church. Do you see love and commitment in most marriages? More importantly, do you see a representation of Jesus and the church? If the answer to those questions are no, than I think it's safe to say, we have a problem!
There really aren't that many scriptures in the bible that pertain to the union between husband and wife. But if we can look at the entire bible, it's a love story of the ultimate husband and his bride. The love and commitment He has had from the very beginning of time to His bride...the church...His children...the believers. We think it's clear what God wants of us: to glorify Him.
In surveying many couples and the issues they have, the problems aren't necessarily marriage issues. The problems are really issues that pertain to their walks with Christ. Our observations weighed heavy in our hearts and we thought of how we can bring the focus of marriage back to real focus.
In one of our morning studies we read Genesis 2:24:
"Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh."
The first instructions for marriage was established with the first union created, Adam and Eve. We asked each other, "What does that REALLY mean?" One Flesh? We know the scripture, but have we really thought about it?! We started with defining "one" and defining "flesh". There's unity and there's a body. A single body. We have 2 bodies coming together to function as one. For what purpose? Glorifying God. We decided (being the science nerd that I am) to review the systems of the body. If we wanted to understand how flesh works, let's explore the flesh! We found that Jesus used a lot of a parables in his teachings that were about practical things the people would understand: gardening, fishing, etc. For the people to have an understanding of those things Jesus spoke of, he used things that they knew of. Can we understand the intent of the statement "one flesh" without understanding how flesh works?
In our study time, One Flesh the workbook was created. This workbook is a practical guide to use with scripture for both spouses to work together and growing in Christ for the purpose of edifying the entire body of Christ. What Chris and I have found is that the more we serve God together, the more enjoyable our relationship is and the closer we grow to one another - totally contrary to popular teaching these days.
So below is a link for a free download of the first couple of chapters of this book. Please sit down with your spouse, fiancé, good friend...whomever you are in a relationship with and are seeking growth together.
Leave comments! Can't wait to hear what you think about it. Most importantly, can't wait to hear about how you and your spouse will work together in edifying the kingdom of God!
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