10250 North Freeway @ West Road
Houston, Texas 77037
Tel: (281) 447-8484
10250 North Freeway @ West
Road
Houston, Texas 77037
Tel: (281) 447-8484
Christian
Family Principles
Written by Dr.
Lester Hutson
Copyright
- Lester Hutson - 1981
This material is copyrighted and may not be copied or reproduced
without the express written permission of Dr. Lester Hutson.
Strengthening
A Weak Marriage
Part II
Chapter Twenty Three
INTRODUCTION: Text * I Peter 3:1-12
Once you find that you have no real ties or no strong foundation in your marriage, start building some. Don’t throw up your hands and quit, which is the cheap, cowardly, weakly way out. The thing to do is to work on the spiritual part of your marriage, building a spiritual foundation, joining one spiritual link after another. The more these links you can fasten to each other, the stronger your marriage will become.
III. I WANT TO NOW SUGGEST TWELVE SPIRITUAL LINKS THAT YOU AS MARRIAGE PARTNERS SHOULD FASTEN TO EACH OTHER.
A. First, and most important, both of you should receive Jesus Christ as your personal Savior.
1. Now, if you are not serious about solving your problems and strengthening your marriage, then this, nor any other thing I recommend, will not sound like something you want to do. You can disregard right counsel and stay in your troubles. You can continue with the misery, guilt, anger, frustration, depression, and disappointments you know. You can keep on fighting, squabbling and living in strife with a heart that is hard and stubborn and not willing to see where the problems really are. You can say you are not going to change, that you don’t care, and that you don’t want it to work. You can continue as you are until the thing breaks wide open like a sore full of pus and corruption. You can harden yourself and set yourself up for the bitterness, regrets, guilts, worries, lack of confidence and trust, child support payments, high blood pressure and dozens of other problems that follow divorce. Like a hog that eats slop and wallows in mud, you can refuse to change your ways, and get mad at the people who try to help you by suggesting that you do. The result will be continued agony and misery for you and everybody around you, and you have nobody to blame except your own stubborn self.
2. I’m telling you that if you are truly interested in solving your problems and strengthening your marriage, then the very first thing you need to do is be sure you’ve been "born" again, and then seek by God’s grace to win your mate to Jesus Christ. This is exactly what verse 1 of I Peter 3 is teaching. The apostle is talking to saved wives, and they are being exhorted to win their husbands. He says to wives regarding their husbands, "if any obey not the word, they also may without the word be won by the conversation of the wives."
3. Folks, here is the best marriage counselling you will ever receive. If you are not a child of God, become one. If your mate is not a child of God, do your best to win him. No marriage will ever be strong and happy if both parties in it are not children of God. The best possible home is a Christian home. Though the foundation structure for a strong marriage is "spiritual" followed by "emo- tional" and "physical," the bedrock or basic foundation upon which this structure is to be built is Jesus Christ. Paul plainly says so in I Corinthians 3:11, "other foundation can no man lay than that is laid, which is Jesus Christ." If your marriage is weak and you are not a Christian, I can tell you that you are a big percentage of the problem. If you are saved, and your mate is not, you shouldn’t have married that person, II Corinthians 6:14, but now that you are married, your best bet is to win him to Jesus.
4. Becoming a child of God is not all you need to do to solve your marriage problems, but it is the place to start, and all the other things you do will not ever work very well until you get this part done. You’re at a natural variance if one is saved and the other isn’t. A lost person will never have the same ideals and values of a saved person, and the result will always be constant conflict.
5. If both of you marriage partners will put your faith in Jesus, it will put you in the same family, Galatians 3:26, give you citizenship in the same eternal country, Ephesians 2:19, and insure a common ground of fellowship, for I John 1:7 says, "If we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another."
B. The second spiritual link you two should establish is a common acceptance of Jesus Christ as your "Lord".
1. In our text, which is discussing ways to strengthen a marriage, verse 12 says, "the eyes of the Lord are over the righteous, and his ears are open unto their prayers: but the face of the Lord is against them that do evil," I Peter 3. Twice in one verse the apostle mentions the Lord. God knows that you will never have a really good marriage until you make Jesus your Lord. Many make Him Saviour and that is all, but Christ is Lord. That’s the reason that Peter spoke on the day of Pentecost and said, "Therefore, let all the house of Israel know assuredly, that God hath made that same Jesus, whom ye have crucified, both Lord and Christ," Acts 2:36. His word tells what He wants of you; make it final: don’t say, "Leave God and the Bible out of this".
2. "Lord" means master, boss, or supreme authority. Too many couples have never made Jesus their boss. Like those of Luke 19:14, they "will not have this man to reign" over them. They do not honestly pray to God, "Thy Kingdom come, thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven," Matthew 6:10. No. They don’t want God’s will to be done; they want their own self-will to be done. The result is that the husband’s self-will is always clashing with the wife’s self-will, and both are at odds with God’s will. Another way to put it is "a bad marriage."
3. But anybody can see that if a husband will forget his will and desire God’s will, and a wife will forget her will and desire God’s will, then both will want the same will to be done, and that will resolve many a conflict. "God is not the author of confusion, but of peace," I Corinthians 14:33, and when He is controlling both your lives, there will be peace. A common acceptance of Jesus as Lord is a common bond between you, and it will hold like an anchor bolt against the wiles of the devil.
C. Work out a set or priorities common to both of you, and this will act as a third spiritual link.
1. I Peter 3:3 is a direct reference to this. It says of your "adorning, let it not be that outward adorning of plaiting the hair, and of wearing of gold, or of putting on of apparel." This is saying put your priorities in the spiritual, not the physical things of life. Don’t try to build a marriage on money, clothes, a home, automobiles, club memberships, and the accumulation of worldly goods. Some of these things are necessary to the sustaining of life, but they are not the end within themselves. Jesus said in Luke 12:15, "man’s life consisteth not in the abundance of the things which he possesseth." It is spiritual vision and activity, which gives real strength and value to life.
2. Now let me suggest some priorities that would each act as a separate link in strengthening your marriage.
a. Determine that the love and kindness that results in deeds and gifts to you are more important than the size and value of the gift itself.
b. Determine that an honest, hard working mate is more impor- tant to you than how much money he makes or how good looking he may be.
c. Determine that a faithful, virtuous mate is more important than having a new house, car, or some other material item. d. Determine that it is better to go to church than to go on a pleasure trip.
e. Determine that it is better to serve God through His church than to be involved in civic affairs or to be submerged in a job.
f. Determine that the spiritual education of your child is worth more than his secular education.
g. The Bible says, "Set your affection on things above, not on things on the earth," Colossians 3:2. So put your priorities on love, tenderness, goodness, patience, honesty, prudence, hu- mility, meekness, and other such godly traits: not on clothes, cars, houses, land, pleasure trips, flatter, and the like.
3. The more of these common priorities you can set, the stronger your marriage will be.
D. A fourth spiritual link is a good spirit in both mates.
1. I Peter 3 emphasizes this point. Verse 4 says of our adorning, "let it be the hidden man of the heart, in that which is not corruptible, even the ornament of a meek and quiet spirit, which is in the sight of God of great price." Folks there is something about a beautiful spirit that draws people together like loadstones. When your mate sees the spirit of Christ in you, he will not be able to resist respecting you, but when he sees a spirit of revenge, rebellion, belligerence, arrogance and pride in you, he will resent and scorn you for it and be repelled instead of drawn to you. Peter said Christ, "did no sin, neither was guile found in his mouth: who, when he was reviled, reviled not again; when he suffered, he threatened not; but committed himself to him that judgeth right- eously," in I Peter 2:22-23. That spirit in husbands and wives would help nearly any marriage, and its lack is the source of plenty of marriage conflict. Verse 8 of I Peter 3 continues this call for a good spirit in marriage when it says, "Finally, be ye all of one mind, having compassion one of another, love as brethren, be pitiful, be courteous." Verse 11 also continues the plea by saying, "Let him eschew evil, and do good; let him seek peace, and ensue it."
2. Couples, make your minds up that you are going to have good spirits. When your mate sees a good spirit in you, and you see a good spirit in him, it will link you in a spiritual way that is hard to separate. I Corinthians 13:4-8 will tell you that a good spirit is a sign of true love, and Solomon said, "love is strong as death...Many waters cannot quench love, neither can the floods drown it," in Song of Solomon 8:6,7.
E. Fifth, establish a common line of doctrinal positions. Each of these will be a spiritual link.
1. Just as God’s word will knit a church together, as in Ephesians 4:13-16, it will also knit a husband and wife together.
2. Here are a few specific doctrinal positions upon which you should establish doctrinal union or agreement.
a. Reach a common agreement upon the verbal inspiration of the scriptures.
b. Reach a common agreement on the eternal security of the believer.
c. Reach a common agreement on separated living.
d. Reach a common agreement on the independence of the church.
e. Reach a common agreement on a Christian relationship to political and church government.
f. This list could go on and on, and will as you study God’s word together.
3. The only way you can reach really firm doctrinal positions is by learning in church and studying God’s word, for "faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God," according to Romans 10:17, and II Timothy 2:15.
F. Sixth, link yourselves together by finding a church that teaches those things you know to be the truth.
1. This will solidify and strengthen your doctrinal stand and draw you closer together in the Lord.
2. A good church is the soil in which you can grow in grace. I Timothy 3:15 calls it "the pillar and ground of the truth." It will teach you the truths by which you can grow; it will deal with the issues of life, including marriage, and it will provide you the spiritual environment in which your marriage can flourish.
3. I can assure you that it is virtually impossible to keep a marriage strong and flourishing outside of the canopy of a good Bible preaching church. Love for and participation in the same church will weld you together in a great way.
G. My seventh suggestion is that you work out an agreement on authority or a chain of command in the family.
1. Determine that the husband is going to be the head of the home, and the wife is going to be subject to him. That’s the way God said it should be in Ephesians 5:22-23.
2. Husbands, that means that you, in a Godly spirit, are going to shoulder your responsibilities. That you are going to be worthy of your wife’s trust and respect, that you are not going to be a military dictator, but a person having gentle strength, who is not afraid or timid to carry the reins of leadership. Wives, that means you are not going to nag, gripe, browbeat and pressure your husband and really run the family from behind the scenes. That means that you are not going to call him the head of the family, while in fact you are the back-seat driver who is really calling all the shots and getting your way one way or another.
3. You’ll never have a really strong marriage until you settle upon the chain of command that God has for the family. Our text passage establishes this point. I Peter 3:1 tells wives to be subject to their husbands. Verses 5-6 say this is the Godly method of old, and that a husband is a lord or master over his wife.
H. The eighth area of spiritual linking is the two of you determining what your responsibilities are.
1. You need to realize that your mate’s first responsibility is not to you. His first responsibility is to God. Matthew 6:33 says, "Seek ye first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness." If you will determine to first be responsible to God, you will be a much, much better mate.
2. Then you need to fix in your minds your responsibilities to your mate, for you do have many, and, bear in mind that these responsibilities don’t change with different mates. There are certain responsibilities all husbands have to all wives and vice versa. It is a spiritual linking process to settle on what these responsibilities are.
3. To be more specific, every husband is responsible to provide an economic living for his wife, to treat her with tenderness and compassion, to seek her well-being as diligently as he seeks his own and to honor and respect her as the weaker vessel. Our text I Peter 3:7 specifically mentions this by saying, "Likewise, ye husbands, dwell with them according to knowledge, giving honor unto the wife, as unto the weaker vessel and as being heirs together of the grace of life; that your prayers be not hindered." Husband, you are responsible to God to protect your wife from physical and moral dangers, and you are responsible to provide leadership for her, especially spiritual leadership.
4. And wives, you are responsible to keep the home. Your husband shouldn’t have to come in and wash clothes and dishes, cook and clean house. (There are times when the wife is sick or forced to public work, and the husband can do or share these responsibilities, but it should be the exception, and not the rule.) Wife, you also have the first line of responsibility over the children. You are responsible not to defraud your husband with sex, as in I Corinthians 7:5. Husbands, you also have this responsibility to your wife. Wife, you are responsible to be subject, in fact, not just in word, to your husband’s authority.
5. You both need to establish the fact that next to God, your first line of responsibility is to each other, not to your parents, your job, your neighbors or even your children. You are both responsible to be reasonable to see that nothing interferes with the proper execution of this responsibility.
I. The ninth area that I suggest to spiritually link you is for you to establish common attitudes on the facts of life.
1. Determine the place a job will have in your life. Will it be the main thing in life or merely a means to your main aim in life of serving God? Will you pray about and seek the right job for you? Will you determine to never let your job draw you away from God and your mate?
2. Determine how you will react to hardships in life. When loss, death, sickness and other tragedy come, will you view them with resentment, bitterness and panic? Will you become resentful and fight and condemn your mate for it? Will you let it destroy your joy, closeness to each other, or will you let it draw you closer to each other? Will you view it as "bad luck" or "accident," or view it the proper way as being the dealing of God in your life as Romans 8:28 teaches?
3. Furthermore, determine your attitudes on child-raising. View them as God’s children, not yours. They’re only in your custody for a few years. Determine to raise them up with fairness, consistency, according to the divine principles of God’s word, as Ephesians 6:4 teaches. Determine to treat them fairly and with understanding.
4. Also, determine what your attitude toward anger will be. Learn that anger provokes anger (evil for evil). James wrote, "the wrath of man worketh not the righteousness of God," in James 1:20. Solomon wrote, "He that hath no rule over his own spirit is like a city that is broken down, and without walls," in Proverbs 25:28. He also wrote, "He that is slow to anger is better than the mighty; and he that ruleth his spirit is better than he that taketh a city," in Proverbs 16:32. Husband, wife, determine to put anger out of your life and marriage, and if your mate slips up and lets anger prevail, don’t try to answer it. Determine that you will do nothing in anger.
5. There are many other facts of life about which you need to establish common attitudes, and the more of these common positions you reach, the more tightly you will be knit together.
J. The tenth area that will spiritually link you is the establishment of a definite line of communication.
1. I can assure you that once you lose communications, your marriage will deteriorate rapidly. You must be able to communicate your thoughts, feelings and the depths of your soul. To be close, you must be able to touch the very soul of your mate. You must communicate.
2. I believe that both verses 7 and 10 of I Peter 3 are dealing with keeping the communication lines open.
3. Bear in mind that all talk doesn’t constitute communication. Arguing, small talk, talk that avoids the real issues, etc., don’t really communicate. Couples, establish a joint agreement about what communication really is, and determine to practice what you propose.
K. An eleventh area that will link you together is parallel spiritual growth in common areas of your life.
1. In the first place, you need to be growing, for failure to grow is spiritual backsliding, and backsliding will always cause marriage deterioration. II Peter 3:18 says, "Grow in grace, and in the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ." You must do that to have a really strong marriage.
2. Now, you need not only to think about it, you need to take the initiative to get involved in serving. Become enlisted somewhere, and as much as possible, do it jointly. Service from a pure heart will honor God and draw you closer and closer together.
"It Does Make a Difference What You Believe"