O how I marvel at the wisdom of God! Only a fool would ignore it. I would be completely lost without it, a miserable man I would be. I would know nothing of the marriage joy or stability God has brought me.
I have lived now for 63 years. I have read much, observed much, known thousands of people, and taught and advised thousands of people. 40 years of married life has taught me much but also proven much, and I give God all the credit for His wisdom, goodness, and grace to practice what I share with you today.
With all my heart, I cry out to God that you really grasp what I share with you, take it deeply to heart, and do these the rest of your days. If you take this seriously, you will enjoy great and lifelong benefits. You ignore it at your own peril.
APO – ATTITUDE, PERSPECTIVE, OBEDIENCE TO GOD!
The great wise man Solomon, inspired by God, wrote these truths:
Ecc. 6:9 (NLT), “Enjoy what you have rather than desiring what you don’t have. Just dreaming about nice things is meaningless; it is like chasing the wind.”
Ecc. 7:14 (NLT), “Enjoy prosperity while you can. But when hard times strike, realize that both come from God. That way you will realize that nothing is certain in this life.
Ecc. 12:13 (NLT), “Here is my final conclusion: Fear God, and obey his commands, for this is the duty of every person.“
I will be the first to admit that in the early stages of my marriage, I found myself doing the exact opposite of enjoying what I had. Instead, I was often dreaming about what I didn’t have in my spouse. I did not see it then, but I was being so foolish. I was infected with the same disease as the culture around me. I soon grew discontent in my heart to certain things about my wife. Before you knew it, I was making comparisons to others I knew, and inwardly bemoaning my lot in life. My attitude stunk.
I soon came to understand that my life and the quality of my marriage would be a series of choices I made over and over again. Regardless of what my wife did or did not do, my choices were mine alone to make. I would reap what I sowed. The attitudes, values, self-talk, habits, and perspectives that I choose would enhance my marriage and my joy in Kathy, or they would sabotage my love for her, and be toxic, corrosive and destroy my marriage relationship with her.
There was no neutral ground. These were not just nice things to consider doing or wonderful suggestions. These were make or break, do or die choices that would decide the fate of my marriage.
I embraced this fact with all my heart. I understood it was my responsibility to stay in love with Kathy, to treasure her, value her, enjoy what I have in her rather than spend my time allowing my emotions of disappointment, discontent, frustration, or anger to rob me of a wonderful marriage to her. It’s very hard to have an enjoyable marriage when you don’t like your spouse!!!!!
So I went to work on me and have not stopped. My heart, my thoughts, my attitude, my perspective, my obedience, and my habits are my responsibility.
I began by deliberate thoughtful, out loud prayers of gratitude and thanksgiving to God for the wonderful qualities Kathy did possess. For the wonderful body parts He did give to her, for the marvelous gift of her companionship, her devotion, her purity of heart, her tremendous kindness, her skillful mothering and her way with our children, her steadfast faith, and disciplined life, her gentle and quiet ways. I made myself fall in love with Kathy, over and over and over again, by intentionally appreciating the good in her life, the good in her person. I daily increased her value in my own mind and heart. I chose to cherish and treasure her for what she was. I chose to verbalize these things to her over and over again throughout the last 40 years.
Can I just say, I am a happy, contented man in love. Not perfectly so, but consistently so. I am incredibly grateful for the woman God uniquely made for me. The longer I live, the more I come to grasp she is just what I needed in my life. What a privilege to grow old with her.
I take nothing for granted. Seriously, nothing. It can all be gone in a moment, I know as I have experienced such loss.
Have you ever met someone and thought, “O my gosh, I could have been stuck with that!!”
Thank God He gave me the spouse He did! It is so good for you to realize how bad a spouse you could’ve been stuck with! I once flew to Honduras right after Hurricane Mitch devastated the country. It was a privilege to serve there at that time, but also very sobering. It gave me a unique perspective. “O God, thank you for snow! O God, thank you for fresh, clean water to drink, and thank you, Lord, I don’t live by the ocean!!” I still think that, by the way. I am so grateful for perspective. I have been through some good times in my life, but mostly I have been through really tough times. Kathy and I have faced together tremendous trials, adversity, sickness, hardships, pain, difficulties, loss, sorrows, deprivation, perplexities, and persecutions. My wife has difficult health problems that she, and we, have had to deal with all these years. It is easy to bemoan them or wish they would all just go away.
The truth is, I often feel like the most blessed man in the world. God gave us 4 healthy children who each grew up to genuinely love Jesus Christ. Each chose to walk God’s path and stayed away from a sinful lifestyle. God gave each of them a Christ-loving spouse. God has given each of them healthy, precious children.
I have friends whose child ended up in jail, died in a gang fight, addicted to drugs, became alcoholics, or just became terrible people that hate their parents and enjoy a very sinful lifestyle.
All the hardships that Kathy and I have endured have deepened our faith, have laid up for us in heaven an eternal weight of glory, treasure, and unending honor. We have gotten to know Jesus in this life in ways most others never do.
God has given us a wonderful little house to live in that a year ago some dear, precious friends and family worked for 3 weeks on to give it a complete interior home makeover, donating all their time, and money to make it happen. When I saw it all finished, I wept. Not a day goes by that I do not, out loud, thank God for it! I don’t deserve it, I did nothing to earn it. They were so good to us. Every day that the weather allows I go out to the new patio they made, sitting in the patio swing they gave us, and look out at God’s creation. I go out there many times to pray with my precious wife.
I get to live my life with Kathy as my companion, helper, lover, and friend. Not a day goes by that I don’t realize, I don’t deserve Kathy’s love and devotion. O my gosh, if Kathy kept track of all my faults and times I failed her, I would be exiled permanently to the garage! I just don’t deserve her as my wife. Kathy has been so good to me. So longsuffering, so accepting of my idiosyncrasies, like me wearing the same black mock turtlenecks every day, or wearing the same black leather jacket, in the house even. Almost every day, for the last 10 years, Kathy has given me a back massage with our power massager. Almost every day for 40 years she has made my dinner {that’s over 14,000 times}! Her food always tastes better than mine, even if I make the same thing she does, she just has a way, a touch, that extra special something that makes it taste so good. I am so grateful.
For 32 years, I preached messages and taught God’s word, Kathy was my biggest fan. She genuinely thought every message I gave was fantastic. She reads every one of my “Thoughts Provoking” articles and wishes that everyone in the world could read them. Every day with her is a gift that I realize could end in a moment when God calls her home.
I don’t deserve Jesus in my life. Seriously, O the mercy of God to me. He let me know Him, that He embraced me with His love, that He hasn’t thrown me away or cast me aside for the shortcomings of my life. How do I ever thank Him half enough for His incredible goodness to me, His amazing faithfulness? Literally, I thank him fervently, every single day for these many things. I am so unworthy, so undeserving, yet so richly blessed by God.
Nothing is more vital to my marriage, more important, more impacting, than my choice to obey God, and obey God’s Word to me, no matter how I feel on any given day, at any given moment in my marital life.
I have come to realize that nothing has a greater impact on the quality of my marriage than my personal choice each day to obey the Lord in thought, word, and deed. The quality of my inner life, my joy, my spirit, my emotional state, all of this is primarily impacted by my choice to obey God. Whether it’s casting all of my burdens, sorrows, misery, worries, concerns, hurts, and disappointments on God and allowing Him to bear them, and comfort my soul or asking Him for specific things we need. All of this depends, not on my wife, but on my decision to pray, to obey God’s command to pray to Him, dump on Him, and give Him the burdens of my life. Jesus said, “Come to me all of you who are weary and heavy burdened and I will give you rest.”
I determined early on in my married life that no matter what Kathy did or did not do, I was going to strive to obey God. To honor God, to trust God, and to do what He tells me to do in His Word, the Bible. Jesus was speaking to a large crowd when a woman cried out, “God bless your mother – the womb from which you came and the breasts that nursed you!” Jesus replied, “but even more blessed are all who hear the word of God and put it into practice!” You see that the blessed life is doing, practicing what God’s word says! Jesus said, the wise person, the person who builds their marriage on a strong, indestructible foundation, is the person who listens to what God’s word says and obeys what God tells them to do!
Here is a simple but profound illustration. Jesus said, “Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving each other, just as God in Christ has also forgiven you.” But what if I don’t feel like it? What if my spouse does not deserve it? What if I feel taken advantage of?
Ok, so then imagine instead of obeying these commands of God, for 40 years I decided to do this: be mean to one another, harsh, unkind and hardhearted towards the other, making sure you stay resentful and unforgiving for all the things they have done to wrong you and let you down! Do you grasp this? There is no middle ground, if you aren’t doing what Jesus said in that verse, then you are and will do the other. My commitment, my choice to obey Jesus’ word to me, no matter how I felt, or how my wife acts, is the secret to my 40-year marriage, and the strength of our foundation.
Never forget APO – ATTITUDE, PERSPECTIVE, OBEDIENCE TO GOD! YOUR MARRIAGE DEPENDS ON IT.
Please give these a listen as they will absolutely help your marriage.
https://strongdisciple.com/tag/habits-that-build-a-healthy-marriage
