Hope for a Troubled Marriage

I had a neighbor once who worked with a mutual friend of ours. For the sake of her privacy, I’ll call our friend “Hannah.”

“I’m heartbroken,” she said, “Hannah is so pretty, but her husband doesn’t pay enough attention to her. She could get any guy that she wants. I told her that she deserves more than all this. She needs to get out and make herself happy.”

I was disappointed, but I wasn’t surprised to hear that. This mindset is rampant in our society. We live in a culture where people upgrade their smart phones, their computers, their homes, and in many cases—their spouse. Gone are the days when people held to the promise they made to endure till the end.

Shortly after that, Hannah stepped out of her marriage on a quest to make herself happy.

About two years, and two hundred bad choices later, Hannah was left feeling empty. A trail of broken relationships failed to quench the thirst that was burning inside her.

I know what some of you are thinking. Things would be better if she had stayed with her husband. She wouldn’t be feeling so empty if she stayed in that relationship. Her husband is the only one she should be chasing…

But here’s the thing–unless we’re chasing God we’ll always be thirsting for more. If we’re feeling empty we need to draw closer to Christ.

There’s a popular mindset both inside and outside of the church:

“God just wants us to be happy.” It needs to be replaced with “God just wants us to be holy.”

This watered-down, feel-good message does nothing but offer a temporal high. If you want to offer someone a long-lasting sense of peace, encourage them to seek the Lord. If you truly love your friend, introduce them to Christ. You don’t have to pound them over the head with your message, just love them enough to share your faith when you can. Love them enough to live your faith at all times.

“We need to love people,” they say.

We’re not loving people if we’re sending them farther from Christ. If we love people we’ll draw them toward Christ, even if the truth stings more than we want it to.

Marriage is tough. There’s stress and there’s strain, and some days there’s more heartache than we imagined there would be.

Before I go on, I just want to clarify that I’m not talking about physical and mental abuse here. If you are in an abusive relationship, please speak to someone who has the power to give you wise counsel and direction. I’m talking about the hardships that bring us down to our knees in prayer.

Trials are tough, they can tear a marriage apart, or we can grow by them and learn from them.

Here are just a few of many scriptures that encourage us to endure trials with patience and joy.

But we glory in tribulations also: knowing that tribulation worketh patience; and patience, experience; and experience, hope. – Romans 5:3-4

And he said unto me, My grace is sufficient for thee: for my strength is made perfect in weakness. Most gladly therefore will I rather glory in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me. Therefore I take pleasure in infirmities, in reproaches, in necessities, in persecutions, in distresses for Christ’s sake: for when I am weak, then am I strong. – 2 Corinthians 12:9-10

My brethren, count it all joy when ye fall into divers temptations; knowing this, that the trying of your faith worketh patience. But let patience have her perfect work, that ye may be perfect and entire, wanting nothing. – James 1:2-4

I’ll tell you what happened to Hannah. God didn’t leave her behind. She was challenged to dig into the Bible. At first she did little by little, but after a while she was soaking in all that she could. She had a new outlook on life with a heart that was abandoned to God.

She returned to her husband, they worked on building a Christ-centered relationship, and they’ve had a happy marriage with wonderful children for over twenty years now.

What’s really exciting about all this is that her faith spilled over into her marriage and into the lives of her children.

Faith is contagious. Don’t ever underestimate the power of a life abandoned to Christ.

These things I have spoken unto you, that in me ye might have peace. In the world ye shall have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world. – John 16:33

 

You are loved by an almighty God,

Darlene Schacht
The Time-Warp Wife

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