The best thing you can do for your marriage is to find your personal worth first in Christ. When your spouse doesn’t meet your expectation, which many times he or she will not, you will still feel fulfilled.
When your worth is held captive by an imperfect person, you will find yourself facing unmet expectations throughout your marriage. While I believe strongly that each spouse has a responsibility to develop him or herself personally (You can read some of my thoughts in the marriage category HERE), the fact remains that your spouse will never totally meet all your needs, regardless of how mature he or she becomes as a person.
Are you holding your spouse to a standard he or she can never meet?
What if you found your worth first in Christ, would it release some pressure from the marriage and the spouse that doesn’t measure up to expectations?
Just remember that although I am not challenging any of the statements here, a wife makes a covenant with God when she marries, and a husband makes a covenant with God when he marries. the vows are to God in all three parts, and God does in no way provide a flawed Holy Spirit, and The Holy Spirit does not need your help with conviction, because conviction is Godly sorrow, that leads to repentance. That said, study the responsibilities of the Holy Spirit, and do not dare to tread on His ground, as that is putting yourself in Gods place, and claiming the attributes that are only Gods, and thus puts you in a position of blasphemy, and idolatry. your spouses sin in marriage is a sin against God, not you, because they didn't make a covenant with you, they made one concerning you with God. The vows are simply said in front of your spouse concerning them, but not directly to them, but only to God.
Thanks.
So true! and I have had moments that I am emotionally complete in Christ, those are good days with extra love, and joy to share. But I can't seem to stay there for long! it is so very discouraging. I am learning that I measure my worth by the attentiveness of others. I "know" this is not a true measure, but truth and feelings are some days worlds apart.
Thanks for sharing your insight. It's helpful to others.
I haven't…but I've been held to one. Nothing discourages a spouse faster than not only putting the bar so high they can't reach it but letting them know about it.
You are right Jason. Thanks!
Holding my husband to an unrealistic standard (always putting him on a pedestal he said he wasn't worthy of) caused a problem. He didn't want me to think any less of him and hid things he didn't want me to know about.
Honest assessments (and reassessments) of each other are important. Who is in a better position to be used by God for our sanctification than our spouse?
If we fail to confront sin, we have neglected our job of keeping God first and our spouse second.
Lots of wives out there do not want to know what their husbands are doing. They will never ask about things like pornography or masturbation or "admiring the beauty of other women". Many wives go to bed night after night while their husbands stay up late on the computer or watching cable TV. Many wives don't dare to ask their husbands about their personal thought/emotional/physical/spiritual lives during business trips or deployments, and lots of husbands won't ask a wife about how she's doing in these specific areas when he's away from home.
Lots of wives and husbands think they have no reason to ask because they believe since their spouse is a CHRISTIAN he/she would never do anything like the bad things they hear other married folks do to one another. Some are afraid to ask, afraid that the spouse will be offended for not being trusted.
Is it not better to know truth than to enable possible ongoing destruction of habitual sin in the life of the person we love most, and in our marriages? Satan will enter the picture when we are unaware and off guard.
Who else will ask? In my opinion, asking one's spouse these kinds of questions is just as much our responsibility as Christians as talking about drugs with our teenagers.
Assuming a spouse is perfect and a marriage is perfect and "if only we were less selfish or more patient then we would have the kind of relationship we think we should have" can be a dangerous thing.
What if the spouse we thought was a Christian our entire marriage really isn't? My husband took us to church, read the Bible, prayed, and served the Lord for many years, and yet he was not a Christian and was living in habitual sin that I knew nothing about because I never thought I would have to ask a man like him those kinds of questions. It was only when I did that I realized how far he didn't measure up, how far I didn't measure up, and how far our marriage didn't measure up to God's standards.
We depend on one another to dare to be intrusive and be bold enough to speak into one another's lives because we are married for a sacred purpose and not just for our own happiness.
Wow, these are strong, valuable thoughts. Thanks so much for sharing in honesty and truth.