Category Archives: Guests

Children in the Kitchen: Teaching Doctrine to the Littles by Trisha Poff

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>One of the persons I want to meet in person one day on this side of heaven, is my dear friend Trisha Poff who blogs at A Multitude of Mercies. I am grateful for her life and for the providence of God who has brought us together in such a special way.

Thank you, my  dear friend for writing such a timely and important article for all the women in the kitchen.

A Multitude of Mercies
We don’t want to leave our children out of the kitchen, do we? It’s important as mothers to be nourishing our children’s souls with sound doctrine as diligently as we nourish their bodies with good food. Our husbands are the spiritual leaders of our homes, and yet, we have the wonderful privilege to speak His truths to our children all day long.
But what does this look like, especially as we mother our Littles? This season of parenting is known for it’s unpredictability as we try to keep up with the laundry and dirty dishes, preserve our sense of humor, and not fall asleep while having a conversation with our husbands or while sitting in church.
While I’m sharing some practical ways to teach your children doctrine throughout the day, please note it comes with a HUGE caveat.
The best way you can teach your children His truths is to live them out yourself right before their very eyes. Words that come from the mouth of a heart that’s not surrendered to the Word of God will fashion hypocrites and Pharisees. God help us to make sure the walk lines up with the talk. Let us not, by God’s grace, be stumbling blocks to these precious souls God has entrusted to our care.
When you sin against your children, ask for forgiveness. When you’ve slandered someone, repent and explain your sin. When the cashier forgot to charge you for something, and you’ve loaded everyone up into their car seats, and you’re frustrated with the hassle…..unbuckle and trudge back in, even while knowing the cashier will look at you as though you have 2 heads. “Because God sees all we do, my children, and though man may never notice, God does. We must honor and glorify Him when we’re being watched and when we’re not.”
And in the midst of all the practical application, faithfully remind your children that is it not right doctrine that saves us, but the very blood of Jesus Christ. Remind them that we are righteous because of His righteousness.
That said, here are just a few things I’ve learned in the 16 years I’ve been a mommy.
1) Feed yourself first. Cultivate daily time in the Word. What you learn overflows to your children. Even if it’s just 15 minutes, start with something. There are seasons of motherhood, so some years allow for more time in the Word than others. But, if we’re honest with ourselves about where we invest our time, are there are any of us who could truly say, “I don’t have time to read the Bible.”
2) Be enthusiastic. Ask your children to tell you what they think you’re passionate about. Is it cooking? Reading? Sewing? Should not our passion for His truths be just as strong? How is your voice when you’re reading the Bible? Do you share your tears with them when you’re overwhelmed by God’s goodness? Do you communicate that being in the Word is just another thing to do before getting to the “good stuff”?
3) Teach the catechism. What a wonderful tool this is for planting sound doctrine in the hearts and minds of our children. The word catechism simply means “question and answer.” Who made you? God made me. Our family starts with the Children’s catechism, and then moves to the Heidelberg around age 8.
4) Memorize Scripture. Teach your children early to hide the very word of God in their hearts. I use the My ABC Bible Verses by Susan Hunt in the early years, and then we memorize chapters of Scripture at a time.
5) Remember the power of music. Songs stay with us. How many of us have songs that we learned years ago still floating around in our memories? Learn hymns. What a rich treasury most of them are of truths founded on God’s Word. Listen to music by artists like Judy Rogers or Dana Dirkson as well as the Hide ’em In Your Heart CDs by Steve Green. All of these are full of sound doctrine.
6) Share how sound doctrine has affected your life. Our children love to hear us talk about ourselves, don’t they? When I tell my children I used to read Benny Hinn’s books or share other follies, I let them know the price of ignorance. False doctrine is an invitation to sin, and our own errors should make us that much more passionate about teaching our children well.
7) Make Scripture your standard. From the beginning, the question should be, “What does God’s Word say.” Measure your life by His truths and your children will learn to do the same.
8) Role play. Challenge your children with hypothetical situations and ask them to defend their response from Scripture.
9) Have your children keep a doctrine notebook. This idea is from Sonya Shafer. As your children come across Scriptures that teach certain doctrines, such as election, justification, sanctification, etc., have them note the Scriptures in their notebook.
10) Redeem the moments for His glory. When you see the butterfly, talk about how God made everything and how He makes us new creations in Christ. When you’re changing a diaper, recite the first questions of the catechism, sing a hymn, or quote Scripture. (Yes, I do this!) When you’re brushing hair, remind your child that the very hairs on our heads are numbered by God.
11) Pray for wisdom to speak His truths naturally and intentionally to your children, and pray that all in your family would have strong spiritual instincts that are sensitive to doctrinal error.
12) Remember God’s grace and the work of the Holy Spirit. If you haven’t been teaching your children sound doctrine, don’t despair! Start today. And if you have been faithfully imparting God’s truth to your children, guard against pride, remembering that it is all by His grace, and that we cannot do the work of the Holy Spirit in our children.
13) Remember the basics. Have you taught your children the names of the books of the Bible? The Ten Commandments? Psalm 23? The Nicene Creed? Sometimes it’s easy to focus on big accomplishments while rearing Biblically-illiterate children.
14) Don’t forget the Church. Model to your children the importance of being part of and accountable to a local church body. Teach them what a gift it is to be under sound teaching each week and part of a community of believers.
God bless you as you faithfully teach your children sound doctrine!
With love,
Trisha

 

 

The Love of God by Diane

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Our host today is Diane Bucknell- I am so grateful for her life and her passion for God’s Word. She has a wonderful laugh and a sweet voice (yes, I have heard her many times now!). She is a wise woman and I encourage you to read and follow her blog. You will be blessed indeed!

Shiloh Photography. Thank you, Rachel!

 

 

Thank you Becky for inviting me to join you and our sisters here for your “Doctrines In The Kitchen”. What a joy and privilege it is to share together some of the great truths God has been impressing upon us.
The Love of God is a doctrine that is so deep, so wide and so measureless, that attempting to consider it in such a tiny space seems will be a real challenge. Therefore, I’d like to express just a few of the thoughts that I shared recently with the women in our congregation.
“The love of God is greater far
Than tongue or pen can ever tell;
It goes beyond the highest star,
And reaches to the lowest hell;
The guilty pair, bowed down with care,
God gave His Son to win;
His erring child He reconciled,
And pardoned from his sin.”
 
Frederick M. Lehman
Love’s Circumscription 
The love of God is not only one of His many attributes but it’s also the very essence of His nature! God not only loves us and is a loving God, but his very nature IS love! There are three things Scripture reveals to us about God’s nature. I John 4:24 declares that God is Spirit. God is not “a” spirit but He IS Spirit which means that He exists equally everywhere in Heaven and earth and in even in Hell (Ps 139:7-8), and as R. A. Finlayson put it, “Hell is eternity in the presence of God without a mediator.”
God is Light (I Jn 1:5). “God is light, and in him is no darkness at all.” He is the total of all excellence and beauty and in Him there is nothing that is evil or sinful. And finally I John 4:8 reveals to us that God is Love!
When we speak of God’s love we are describing a type of love that is unlike any kind of love that the world expresses. This is a new kind of love that cannot be conjured up and can only be manifested through the Holy Spirit’s indwelling presence in the heart of the believer.
“and hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.” Romans 5:5
The Scriptures uses three Greek words that are all translated as the word love. The first is Agape love which is Divine love that comes from God and indwells the Christian. Unbelievers are not capable of expressing agape love because they do not have the Holy Spirit residing in them. Then there is Phileo or brotherly love which is the kind of love that people have for one another, whether it be the love between a husband and wife, parents and children, or friends and neighbors. Philadelphia, known as the city of brotherly love derives its name from this Greek word. And finally, the word Eros that is used to describe erotic love.
God’s love for us in not dependent upon us and it is a complete miracle that God should love us when there was nothing lovely in us! We had plenty within us to provoke His anger and His judgment and yet He chose to love us!!
“We love because he first loved us.” I John 4:19
“For we ourselves were once foolish, disobedient, led astray,
slaves to various passions and pleasures,
passing our days in malice and envy, hated by others and hating one another.
But when the goodness and loving kindness of God our Savior appeared,
he saved us, not because of works done by us in righteousness,
but according to his own mercy” Titus 3:4-5
God’s love is everlasting! The Lord said to His people in Jeremiah 31:3 “I have loved you with an everlasting love; therefore I have continued my faithfulness to you.” And in Psalm 136:3 we read, “Give thanks to the Lord of lords, for his steadfast love endures forever;” The Christian CANNOT be separated from His love even by our own doing! What comfort and refuge we can take in the magnificent promises in Romans 8!
“Who will separate us from the love of Christ?
Will tribulation, or distress, or persecution,
or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?
But in all these things we overwhelmingly
conquer through Him who loved us.
For I am convinced that neither death, nor life,
nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present,
nor things to come, nor powers, nor height,
nor depth, nor any other created thing,
will be able to separate us from the love of God,
which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. “
Love’s Purpose
When considering the magnitude of God’s love towards sinful beings we can’t help but ponder His reasons for loving us. Romans 9 explains that God has set His love upon us in order to display His mercy and to manifest His glory.
“What if God, desiring to show his wrath and to make known his power,
has endured with much patience vessels of wrath prepared for destruction,
in order to make known the riches of his glory for vessels of mercy,
which he has prepared beforehand for glory”. Romans 9:22-23
And in Ephesians we find that God also chose to love us in order to provide a Bride for His Son . John MacArthur made one of the most mind boggling statements I’ve ever heard when he said:
“The Great goal of creation was for God to provide a Bride for His Son”
“Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her to make her holy,
cleansing her by the washing with water through the word,
and to present her to himself as a radiant church,
without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish,
but holy and blameless.” Ephesians 5: 25-27
Love’s Manifestation 
“In this the love of God was made manifest among us,
that God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through him.
In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.” I Jn 4:9-10
God manifested His love towards us through the sacrifice of His Son, the atonement for our sin and by the adoption into His family. Prior to our adoption as sons and daughters we were children of wrath.
Because of Adam’s sin were all spiritually stillborn when we arrived on this earth and contrary to Western thinking; we are not the free agents we might like to imagine ourselves as being. Rather, we are all in servitude either to God or to Satan. There is simply no third alternative!
Jesus denounced the Pharisees saying: “If God were your Father, you would love me…You are of your father the devil, and your will is to do your father’s desires” John 8:42-44. And John proclaimed, “By this it is evident who are the children of God, and who are the children of the devil: whoever does not practice righteousness is not of God, nor is the one who does not love his brother. I Jn 3:10
Observe what great love the Father has manifested towards us as Paul states two of the most blessed words in all of Scripture — “But God…” !
“And you were dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience— among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind. But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved” Ephesians 2:1-5
Love’s Expression
Dr. Martyn-Lloyd Jones wrote in his commentary on 1st John,
“It is possible for a person to be absolutely correct and yet not be a Christian. …it is possible for them to be interested in theology and to say that one theology is superior to another… and yet to be utterly devoid of the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and of the love of God in their hearts ..”
An intellectual knowledge of the truth, no matter how accurate, is not sufficient in itself for salvation. The devils believe and tremble! Only by an outpouring of God’s love through His Spirit can one be truly converted. So then, how can we have a full assurance that we are genuine believers and how might we correctly express that love towards God? First and foremost we express our love for Christ by loving Him and by loving His people. We also express our love to Him by loving His Word and by obeying His commandments.
“Jesus said to him, “ ‘You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ This is the first and great commandment.” Matthew 22:37-38
“Oh how I love your law! It is my meditation all the day” . Ps. 119:97
“For this is the love of God, that we keep his commandments. And his commandments are not burdensome. For everyone who has been born of God overcomes the world. And this is the victory that has overcome the world—our faith.” I John 5:3-5
The great English preacher Abraham Booth (1734-1806) wrote in his work on the subject of divine grace, “The Reign of Grace, from Its Rise to Its Consummation”,
“The essence of true holiness consists in LOVE to God. This heavenly affection is the fruitful source of ALL OBEDIENCE to Him and of all delight in Him, both here and hereafter….because all acceptable duties naturally flow from love to God.”
Another way we can express our love towards Christ is by not loving the world, or feeding our flesh and our pride. Where do our deepest affections lie? Do our greatest sources of joy come from our homes, our appearances, or bank accounts? Are we worshipping the idea of having godly marriages and families, rather than the God who gives us these gifts? Or perhaps our delights are a little more devious when we find ourselves desiring recognition and praise. We all struggle with this and we must continually guard ourselves from this subtle form of idolatry.
“Do not love the world or the things in the world.
If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him.
For all that is in the world—
the desires of the flesh and the desires of the eyes and pride in possessions—
is not from the Father but is from the world.
I John 2:15-16
We also express our love to Christ by loving the Brethren because this is the ultimate display of our faith to the world. God has forgiven our sins while we were still dead in them and how much more should we be patient with one another. How easily offended we can be and how prone we are to obsess about what others may or may not be thinking about us. There’s no getting around the fact that consistently loving one another takes effort and often means saying no to our pride.
“By this all men will know that you are My disciples,
if you have love for one another.”  John 13:35
“Be kind to one another, tenderhearted,
forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you.”
Ephesians 4:32
It also means handling our differences Biblically. For the most part, we just need to pray about it and let it go when someone offends us. If a problem arises that just can’t be overlooked without causing bitterness, then we need to go to that brother or sister privately and talk to them in gentleness and humility rather than talking to our friends about it.
I Corinthians 13 provides us with a beautiful list behaviors that will solve most of our relationship problems before we even get to the point of being confrontational. Love is patient and kind, it isn’t envious or boastful and it is not arrogant or rude. It doesn’t insist on its own way and is not irritable or resentful. Love does not rejoice at wrongdoing but rejoices with the truth. These are all very practical applications for everyday living. And after all is said,
“Love is the most abiding grace.
This will stay with us when other graces take their farewell.
In heaven we shall need no repentance, because we shall have no sin.
In heaven we shall not need patience, because there will be no affliction.
In heaven we shall need no faith because faith looks at things unseen (Heb. 11:1).
But then we shall see God face to face; and where there is vision, there is no need of faith.
But when the other graces are out of date, love continues…”
~ Thomas Watson

 



My Eyes Were Lifted Up by Diana Lovegrove

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Today my beautiful friend, Diana Lovegrove who blogs at Waiting For Our Blessed Hope; shares her heart with us, and how the beautiful and powerful doctrine of Christ (Christology) changed her heart.
MY EYES WERE LIFTED UP
Tears in my eyes;
I can’t disguise
The emptiness I feel when I’m far from You;
How did I get this way?
When did I start to stray?
How did I lose that closeness I had with You?
I wrote these words to a song about 10 years ago, in the midst of clinical depression according to my doctor, but which I knew was spiritual depression. I’d been a Christian 7 or 8 years, yet I mourned over the continued presence of sin in my life. I found that as I grew closer to God, the greater my sin became. Yet surely if someone loved God they wouldn’t sin. And what kind of a person wouldn’t love God with all their heart after realising that Jesus laid down His life for them? I developed an eating disorder – punishing myself by withholding food for I didn’t deserve to eat.
Just trying to think back to how I felt then sends shivers down my spine. I was completely bent in on myself, and looking at me made me lose all hope. My mind was trapped in a fog of blackness. I was “stuck” as a Christian, feeling totally, utterly, completely condemned. I was desperate to live a life that would be pleasing to the One who loved me, who I loved dearly, yet my sin appeared to be an insurmountable barrier. The church I attended was sold out to “living the gospel”, which simply accentuated how much of a failure I felt. On the rare occasions that the gospel itself was actually preached in the church, I would look around, desperately hoping to see some unbelievers there, so that the preaching of the gospel wouldn’t be wasted on the Christians! My lowest point was when I ran out of the church mums & toddlers group that I led in tears, as I tried to prepare some food for the children whilst starving hungry, completely overwhelmed at the sense of letting God down as I tried to make God attractive to the non-Christian mums through “my transformed life”, when in reality they were all deeply concerned by my dramatic weight loss.
I recovered somewhat by turning to sport and took up rowing instead of going to church. Then God gave me and my husband the beautiful gift of our precious son, and I returned to church in thankfulness, whilst continuing to hold God at arms length, for fear of my depression returning. In the summer of 2007 I was asked to lead a house-group study on the woman at the well (John 4:1-26), using a Willow Creek resource. As I prepared at home, my husband made the comment that the study wasn’t focused on understanding what the passage told us about Jesus, but rather used the passage as a springboard to discuss ourselves. And something began to click inside – a sense that my focus was completely wrong. Then a verse in Hebrews sprang out at me: “Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of God” (Hebrews 12:2).
Let us fix our eyes on Jesus. I immediately realised the reason for my inability to move on in my Christian life. My eyes had been fixed on me and my response to Jesus. I had lost sight of Him. I had lost sight of the gospel. I had no understanding of what it meant to be “in Christ”.
So began a study in Christology, a study of the person of Christ. Reading the Word (asking myself in every passage what does this tell me about God? about Christ?), reading books and articles about Him, listening to sermons about Him, attracted to those ministers who preach Christ and Him crucified. And as my eyes have been lifted up to behold Him, the image of the invisible God, and as I have begun to see the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ, I am beginning to experience what it means to “soar on wings like eagles” (Isaiah 40:31). As I have feasted on the nourishing Bread of Life, my empty heart has been filled with hope. As I have drunk the living water that only Jesus can give, the thirst of my soul has been quenched. Eyes that were blinded by my sin have been given sight to see Him who has defeated sin, who has paid the penalty for sin, who has saved me from my sin, who has set me free from the law of sin and death, whose blood purifies me from all sin, and who is my Advocate if I sin. The crushing burden of trying to earn my acceptance before God by my good performance has been lifted, and in its place the easy yoke of Christ and trusting in His righteousness has been fitted, which has freed me to run in the path of His commands. And the more I start to grasp who Christ is, what He has accomplished, and what He is yet to do, the more amazed I become at the gospel, which, yes, has to be preached to the Christian daily.
I wrote this final verse to my song in the midst of depression, holding out some hope that one day it might be true. By God’s grace no words better sum up my relationship with Him now that my eyes are fixed on Jesus, the author and perfecter of my faith.
 
Tears in my eyes;
I can’t disguise
The joy I feel now that I’m close to You;
Here’s where I want to stay,
Don’t ever want to fall away,
You’re the Only One can fill my emptiness.
Diana

 

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Talking About Doctrine by Norma

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>The table is set and today, my sister, my best friend,  my teacher, Norma, will be sharing with us on this banquet, a great entrée, an introduction to Doctrine.

I love you, sis!

Image Katie Lloyd Photography*
We know we are to study Biblical doctrine, but at the same time we hear how doctrine divides, so, what are we supposed to do? God called us to keep the doctrine and live in unity: do they contradict each other? By all means, the answer is no.
I think we first need to understand what doctrine is not. It is not a point of view, an interpretation of Scripture, a movement based on feelings or personal experiences, is not something for theologians only, and is not something that doesn’t really matter “as long as you have accepted Christ as your Saviour.”
What is Doctrine?
It is the basics of Christianity. It is, according to the Merriam Webster dictionary,a set of beliefs, a principle or position, or the body of principles in a branch of knowledge or system of belief.
Doctrine means to understand what the Bible teaches on different topics. It is the duty of every Christian to know what the Bible teaches,  and compare to see if what is being taught at church or the book we like to read agrees with the Bible’s teachings as a whole or not.
“False doctrine”, on the other hand, is what is taught that doesn’t agree with the whole counsel of God.
Doctrine is not only for those who want to be ministers, pastors or missionaries. The study of Doctrine is for new Christians and old, for children and adults, for men and women, for people in the East and the West, for rich and poor,  it is for all of us. And it is our responsibility to study it, and be careful to keep as it is taught in the Holy Scriptures.
How to study it?
First of all read the Bible. Read it all, read each verse in its context within each chapter, each book, and in the overall context of the whole Bible (O.T and N.T).
It is important, however, to point out that today there are so many books and teachers out there that have mixed truth with lies, that it has become hard to know which teachings are correct and which are not. To solve that problem, I recommend you to read commentaries of the founders of the faith. Read their biographies, their books, their teachings along with the Holy Word. Stay away from preachers that attract masses. Know who they are before you buy their materials or trust their teachings. Just because a book is sold at a Christian bookstore it does not mean it’s Christian. Or because many are reading it, doesn’t necessary mean that it is a good book that teaches sound doctrine.
Be jealous of the Biblical doctrine and defend it in your heart so that it may not bring shame to the Gospel of Christ. Self-help books are packing today’s Christian culture. Many churches are social gatherings and the basic doctrines of the Bible are seldom taught. Women, have respect for the Lord and fear Him. Fear Him enough to know why you believe what you say you believe! Practice having a quiet and gentle spirit, which is of great worth in God’s sight. And instead of living for the day, live for heaven, for eternity.
Does it matter?
Yes. The more you study it, the stronger you foundation will be and the harder will be to fall, although you will fall. You’ll have a greater understanding of His love, mercy, grace, patience, goodness. The more you dig deeper into the Word, the more you will love Him and the more you will want to live for Him. Your view of Christ, His sacrifice, His atonement, His life, His resurrection, His priesthood, His sovereignty, His glory, His holiness, my wretched condition without Him,  prayer, mortification of sin, my dependence on Him, the role of the woman in her house, at church, with her children, with other women, all these will come into place. It will be easier to spot lies from truth (no matter how sweet they may appear) because you will know the truth. The truth will be your daily bread, and the lie will quickly taste as food not prepared at home. You will identify it with God’s grace.
Does doctrine divide?
Yes. It will separate. It will bring light where light is not wanted, because darkness is much more comfortable and more palatable for many. There are no stands where they need to stand, there are neither blacks nor whites, every situation is assessed according to the circumstances or the person involved, with no base to judge right from wrong. (1 Cor. 5:12) Doctrine will bring you to an understanding of the Scripture as a whole, but many will not like it. Many will disagree and will not like “your” God, the God of the Bible. But those appointed for Salvation will hear and receive it.
Please, listen to Paul’s plea today,
“Work out your salvation with fear and trembling”
Norma

>Marriage: A Legacy of Faithfulness by Trisha Poff

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>February is too short, it has only 28 days! That’s why our Celebration of Marriage will go on, possible for one more week. There is just too much to share, and I am sure you are enjoying these posts.


Today, I am very grateful to my friend Trisha who blogs at A Multitude of Mercies for her willingness to share in this place about marriage.  May you enjoy her company very much as you read her words.

 

I waited for the laugh. When I told our oldest son that my friend Becky had asked me to write a guest post about marriage, I just knew that would be his reaction.

Instead, he offered the very thing that has preserved my marriage for so many years…the grace of God.

I’m not writing here because I have the perfect marriage.  I can’t offer you ten tips for the best relationship ever or clever tricks for getting your man to do things your way. Those self-centered goals increase discontent and keep you in bondage to a fairy tale notion of marriage.

Instead, I offer you lessons learned from a married life that has known conflict and pain and joy and celebration and love and, most of all, God’s grace.

Joni Eareckson Tada aptly observed that marriage is not about success but about faithfulness.  How true this is.  Marriage is about faithfulness in the big things and the little things.  So, how do we as wives demonstrate this faithfulness when it’s hard?    And how do we encourage our children towards godly marriages when we fall so far from what we want to model?  I encourage you to make your own list, but here are a few ideas to get you started…

1.  Remember the endless volumes of God’s grace.  Daily remind yourself of the volumes of grace God has poured out on you.  We know the supply is inexhaustible, and yet, all too quickly we treat our husbands as though all grace is gone.  We get annoyed with their habits and discouraged with their sins.  We must remember how kindly Christ has dealt with us and extend most generously that grace to our husbands.
    

“He who grows in grace remembers that he is but dust, and he therefore does not expect his fellow Christians to be anything more.  He overlooks ten thousand of their faults, because he knows his God overlooks twenty thousand in his own case. He does not expect perfection in the creature, and therefore, he is not disappointed when he does not find it.” ~Charles Spurgeon

       
2. Embrace God’s sovereignty.  Cast off those foolish thoughts that you were meant to marry another or that your life would be easier if you had married someone else.  It is God’s will for you to honor your vows, your husband, and honor Him. Every trial, every difficulty, every hardship in your marriage has a purpose in making you more like Christ.  Truly, He is working it all for your good.  Do you believe Him? Are you living out that belief?
    
4. Be honest with your children when you sin.  If you’ve disrespected your husband or sinned against him in some other way, don’t call it something other than what it is.  No excuses, please. Identify it as SIN.  Humbly ask for forgiveness and ask them to pray for God’s grace upon you to be an excellent wife.
   
6. Pray diligently for your spouse and for yourself.   How different would your marriage be if for every second you’ve spent complaining about your husband, you instead prayed for him and prayed for yourself?  In the midst of conflict, don’t respond with anger.  Take a deep breath, give a kind word, and continue to pray.  Ask God to make that your first reaction.
       
7. Refuse to believe the lie that your sin disqualifies you from teaching your children the importance of a godly marriage.   Haven’t you heard this in some form before?  “Well, because I’ve struggled with sin in this area, I’m not qualified to teach my children otherwise.” I’m not speaking of a hypocrite here.  I’m speaking of those who sincerely know the battle between the flesh and the spirit, that never ending war within to mortify sin. Don’t waste those painful lessons learned from your sin by refusing to warn your children of the consequences.
    
For example, when I married my husband, he wasn’t a Christian.  It’s ridiculous to then say, “Well, I was unequally yoked.  Therefore, I can’t tell my children not to be.”  I emphasize to them the hardship and sin that comes when we don’t walk in God’s ways. I speak of the grace God has given in calling my husband to Himself and later saving him, not as license to sin but as a testimony of His kindness and mercy in spite of my disobedience.

8. Praise your husband loudly and constantly to your children. Make sure he hears, you, too!  Is this a struggle?  Ask for help!  The Holy Spirit will bring to mind those praiseworthy traits that too often get buried after years of marriage.
       
9. Remember that despite hardships and hard words and disappointments, there is a blessing unique to a lasting marriage. There is an intimacy, a “being known” that doesn’t come after just a couple years….it comes as a result of being faithful and diligent over lots of time and experiences together. As frustrating as my husband and I can still be to one another, we know each other like no one else knows us.  That is a gift from the LORD.  Be patient in your marriage for that kind of familiarity is priceless.
   
10. Soak up God’s Word daily.  You can’t get around this one, and you shouldn’t want to.   To respond faithfully in marriage especially when it’s hard requires being filled with His truths.  There are lots of voices coming your way each day, but few of them are speaking Truth.  You’ll hear how you shouldn’t put up with such and such, how you deserve the best, how it’s all about YOU.  What we need to hear is, “Die to self.  Put others first.  Don’t be easily provoked.  Love suffers long.  What God has joined together let no man put asunder,” etc.  What you fill your mind with is what will come to mind when the conflict starts.
     
11. Remember that faithfulness isn’t grounded in our feelings.  It’s great when we do FEEL like it, but when we’re experiencing trials in our marriage, the feelings are normally the first thing to go.  What a capricious wife I was in my first years of marriage because feelings were too often in the driving seat.  My poor husband didn’t know what to expect or what to think.  One day I’d be telling him how happy I was to be his bride, and the next I’d be calling the airlines threatening to leave him and fly home to my parents.  A mature and faithful love responds consistently in a God-honoring way, especially when it’s hard.
  
12. Be careful not to  play the martyr or the victim to your children.  We are to joyfully glorify God in all we do, so when we choose to be faithful in our marriages, especially when it’s just plain hard, we aren’t to do it with an eye to having our children feel sorry for us. “Yes, poor Mom or poor Dad suffered all those years.” Don’t be a glory-thief, trying to take away what should be God’s alone.  Get your children to fix their eyes on God and His faithfulness and mercy and grace to your family instead of any sacrifices you’ve made or hurts you’ve suffered.

In one of my favorite books, Marriage to a Difficult Man: The Uncommon Union of Jonathan and Sarah Edwards by Elisabeth D.Dodds, the author makes this observation about the beauty of mature love:

“Enough has not been said about the beauty of love in the middle years of life.  By such a time in a marriage, the trying habits of one’s partner have either been accepted or are no longer noticed, while the precious aspects of the other have become so much part of the consciousness that they are like leaf prints stamped in stone.  Memories, both of happy times and of sorrow endured together, are glued into the marriage.”

Let our marriages reflect such beauty. Let us be women who have a legacy of faithfulness.  Not resigned-to-a-hopeless-situation or woe-is-me women, but women who honor our marriage vows joyfully, knowing that we truly can be faithful because He is faithful.

May our children say of us, “Mom and Dad didn’t have the perfect marriage.  They battled their flesh daily and had to repent often. But they did model faithfulness and forgiveness.  They are a testimony to the goodness of God and what His grace can do when two sinners become one.”

~Trisha Poff

©Trisha Poff. Please, if you wish to distribute or use these words contact Trisha at her blog



>Our Husband, Our Brother in Christ

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>Friday is a good day to visit friends or have friends over… today I am so happy to introduce you to a dear friend of mine who is visiting with us today, Anne. I still remember when I met her at a Veritas Press Teacher’s Training; since then I have admired her; she is a godly woman, who loves her family, Latin, reading books by the dozen and pencils. Anne has been a great encouragement to me this year as we are together in the Partnering to Remember Project memorizing Philippians.

Thank you, Anne…

By today’s standards, my husband and I married at a very young age. He was 22 and I was 21, and we’d finished college only the day before.We knew little about what was ahead, but we received solid, biblical counsel in those early days and ever since. We’ve now been married for 21 years, and I count it all grace from a merciful and good God.He has held our marriage together through many military deployments, and has allowed us to grow up together and raise two children. He has made sure we’ve had solid, biblical teaching and fellowship. I am only a recipient of His grace and certainly no expert.One thing I know for sure is that God put me and my husband together on a path toward heaven, and the way we live here matters for eternity.

As I consider the marriage relationship in light of what God’s Word tells us, I think there is a tendency to compartmentalize and forget that the marriage relationship isn’t the only relationship I have with my husband. Yes, Scripture is clear that when two believers marry each has certain responsibilities and roles:the husband is to love his wife like Christ loves the church (oh, how impossible this seems!), and the wife is to love and respect her husband and submit to him. Apart from the Lord, these are overwhelming and undoable tasks.

But as my husband and I have been recently memorizing Philippians together (memorizing Scripture together with my husband is something I really wish we’d started long ago!), I am reminded that all of the other exhortations in Scripture about relationships among believers apply to husbands and wives as well.Here are just a few of them from Philippians, as Paul wrote to the believers there who were partners with him:

“~Only let your manner of life be worthy of the gospel of Christ… that you are standing firm in one spirit, with one mind striving side by side for the faith of the gospel” (Philippians 1:27)

“~Do nothing from rivalry or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves.” (Philippians 2:3)

“~Let each of you look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others.” (Philippians 2:4)

And a few from elsewhere in God’s Word:

“~ And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works” (Hebrews 10:24)

“~I, therefore, a prisoner for the Lord, urge you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you have been called, with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love, eager to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.” (Ephesians 4:1-3)

“~Rather, speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in every way into him, who is the head, into Christ” (Ephesians 4:15)

“~Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you.” (Ephesians 4:32)

So, I am more than my husband’s wife, and he is more than my husband. We are fellow believers, brother and sister in Christ, partakers together of grace. We are being made ready for heaven as we live our lives together. We are to be partners in every way – physically, mentally, spiritually.We are to be “of the same mind”, “in full accord”, “striving together for the faith of the gospel.”We’re to speak the truth in love to each other, giving counsel and admonishing when necessary, strengthening each other’s weaknesses, and pointing each other to Christ. And we’re to remember that, as Paul Tripp has said,

“Christian marriage is one flawed person living with another flawed person in a fallen world with a faithful God.”

We wives tend to extremes.We nag our husbands when we want something to change or when we are offended, certainly speaking, but not in love. Or in silence we feed bitterness as we stew and brood over an offense whether that offense is real or only imagined.I think that if we more carefully considered our role as our husband’s partner, as a fellow believer and partaker of grace, we’d be more likely to avoid those extremes.Maybe that would help us to remember that our husbands are on the path to heaven, too.

Perhaps we wives would do well to take some time and consider our husbands as brothers in Christ.In light of this relationship, how can I encourage him in his walk? How can I strive together with him? What are some practical ways I can count him as more significant than myself? Am I lacking humility? How can I build him up, strengthening his weaknesses? How can I help make his job as my husband easier? How can I pray for him? In what ways can I show him grace? Is there an offense or sin that I can overlook? Or do I need to, as Paul says, speak the truth in love?

It’s a privilege to share my life with the man God gave me, and to grow old with him, holding his hand as we walk this life as partners in every way. God has truly been good to me. And it is at once both amazing and daunting to consider that our partnership has eternal implications. May we partner together for the faith of the gospel for His glory.

Anne

©Anne Malone; if you wish to use these lines contact Anne at  Europeanne