I am lucky to post 1 to 3 times a month these days. A far cry from what I am used to. Several reasons. The main being life is so busy right now. Work load is awful, father-in-law not doing well, mother-in-law driving everyone crazy. Wife struggling with her father's decline and mother's expectations (they live with us). Oldest son lives out of state, and we are not sure how he is really doing. The list goes on. And through it all, our church ignores us, treats us like outcasts or as non-existent, and just lives in a glory that isn't really there at all.
And yet, I believe in a sovereign God. So I can smile sometimes during the day. I can continue to praise Him, even though times are tougher than I would like. (Take that, Joel Osteen!) Like Job, I am sure that some would just advise me to curse God and die (or quit or leave or find another church). But my God allows me to stay, even in the midst of trials. Somehow, I should be glorifying Him through all of this, and I pray that I am. I do not seek to be a martyr, but I dare not run either.
Contrary to what I read in the Purpose Driven sequel called SHAPE, it is not my strengths and abilities that honor God, but it is my weaknesses and inabilities. It is the things that drop me to my knees that draw me to Him. Maybe I don't have the most read, coolest, most techno-savy blog. But maybe I touch a heart or two. Maybe I don't lead a platoon to Christ, but maybe I just fill the gaps that God desires I fill.
Just a little late night rambling from a man who is tired, but who clings to a faith that will not let me down, and a God who cannot fail.
Showing posts with label marriage. Show all posts
Showing posts with label marriage. Show all posts
Wednesday, December 21, 2011
Saturday, May 7, 2011
Mirror, mirror
Ephesians 5:22-33
22Wives, submit to your own husbands, as to the Lord. 23For the husband is the head of the wife even as Christ is the head of the church, his body, and is himself its Savior. 24Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit in everything to their husbands.
What is this picture all about? Is it about being the submissive wife, or is it about modeling God's grace? I have to go with the latter.
I know that people like to pick this verse apart, and then add, "What if the husband is abusive?" To which I think Paul would say, "Use your heads here, folks!" Or perhaps he would pull out the line, "To live is Christ, to die is gain."
Setting aside the extreme situations, lets just look at "the norm." By the norm, I just mean where one side is unhappy with the other. The marriage has grown lackluster. If you are in Christ, it is not about your happiness, it is about your joy. Not the joy you get from your mate, but the joy you get from honoring and serving God. If you don't have that joy, perhaps that is a problem surfacing in your lack of joy in your marriage.
25Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, 26that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, 27so that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish. 28In the same way husbands should love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. 29For no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ does the church, 30because we are members of his body. 31 "Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh." 32This mystery is profound, and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the church. 33However, let each one of you love his wife as himself, and let the wife see that she respects her husband.
Notice how many more verses we get, men? But the message is still the same. Love your wives as a mirror of your love for Christ. Perhaps that is a problem in our society today. We all want to be saved and so we wear the name Christian, but do we really love God and His Son?
Paul is not saying this is what you must do, he is saying, this is what real Christianity looks like. Real Christians, who love the Lord, honor one another even when there are differences. Real Christians live up to their covenants, even when their partner is not a believer.
22Wives, submit to your own husbands, as to the Lord. 23For the husband is the head of the wife even as Christ is the head of the church, his body, and is himself its Savior. 24Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit in everything to their husbands.
What is this picture all about? Is it about being the submissive wife, or is it about modeling God's grace? I have to go with the latter.
I know that people like to pick this verse apart, and then add, "What if the husband is abusive?" To which I think Paul would say, "Use your heads here, folks!" Or perhaps he would pull out the line, "To live is Christ, to die is gain."
Setting aside the extreme situations, lets just look at "the norm." By the norm, I just mean where one side is unhappy with the other. The marriage has grown lackluster. If you are in Christ, it is not about your happiness, it is about your joy. Not the joy you get from your mate, but the joy you get from honoring and serving God. If you don't have that joy, perhaps that is a problem surfacing in your lack of joy in your marriage.
25Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, 26that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, 27so that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish. 28In the same way husbands should love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. 29For no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ does the church, 30because we are members of his body. 31 "Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh." 32This mystery is profound, and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the church. 33However, let each one of you love his wife as himself, and let the wife see that she respects her husband.
Notice how many more verses we get, men? But the message is still the same. Love your wives as a mirror of your love for Christ. Perhaps that is a problem in our society today. We all want to be saved and so we wear the name Christian, but do we really love God and His Son?
Paul is not saying this is what you must do, he is saying, this is what real Christianity looks like. Real Christians, who love the Lord, honor one another even when there are differences. Real Christians live up to their covenants, even when their partner is not a believer.
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