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Kirsten Strawn
The Faith Coach
Empowering You To Experience God's Power, Peace And Presence
Marriage Matters
Are you on the brink of divorce? Miserable in my marriage I questioned, why did I marry this man? Resentment gripped me as I began to evaluate the fourteen year foundation of our relationship.
We had met in college. Mark was my teacher and I was his student, which set up the unequal dynamics of our relationship. Then I became pregnant, but aborted the baby unsure that our relationship would continue and afraid my future career goals would be ruined.
A year later Mark popped the most important question of my life as we were driving in the car. He wanted to elope in two weeks for tax reasons. His romantic reasoning was that we could use the money, while he supported me through school.
Obligated, dependent, and amiable I married him. I rationalized, since we would keep the marriage a secret I could divorce him and no one would know. My unhealthy behavior and the start of our marriage on the wrong foundation lead to a catastrophic collision fourteen years later.
Like most couples opposites attract. Mark and I were no exception. I festered over our differences in the way we handled raising our children, the way he restricted my spending and the way he was more sexual.
As a new Christian I started voicing my opinion instead of living the lie of saying one thing but meaning another. For the first time in my marriage I had an opinion different than my husband. At an early age I learned to bury my feelings and avoid confrontation.
My new found boldness to express myself did not go over well with Mark. My poor husband had previously bragged about his perfect wife who let everything fall off her shoulders, but I was changing. And with change came struggles.
Over the course of several years I contemplated separation but I never wanted to be outside God’s will for my life or for our children. I had suffered the consequence of my parent’s divorce, so I never took dismantling my family lightly. I lived one day at a time, sometimes moment by moment feeling desperate for love, needing affirmation, and longing for adoration.
I cried out to God and searched the Bible expecting to hear from Him. And when I did, He spoke to me. He guided my path, He showed me my sin and unhealthy behavior, He comforted me, and gave me promises to cling to. God began to change me as I obeyed his Word, surrendered my life, and trusted in the power of Jesus to resurrect my marriage.
I discovered that I must do the following to find reconciliation: The foundation of our marriage was based on my insecurity, dishonesty, and my need to prove myself sexually. As I became healthy I discovered Jesus as my husband, my comforter, my provider, my strength, my healer, and the love of my life. I lowered my expectations of what my husband should be, ultimately releasing him of my underlying condemnation.
Slowly, God did a miracle in our hearts. First, God healed me and eventually He healed my marriage. The Bible promises that perseverance leads to character and character leads to hope. We all are a work in progress. With prayer and daily surrender we will eventually change and by our change our spouse will also change.
I believe marriage was never designed to make us happy, but to make us holy. I faced my difficult circumstances in preparation for eternity, to have compassion on others, to draw me close to Jesus, and to give others hope. This life is not about me, but sacrificing my own selfish agenda to serve others and glorify Him. Praise God I celebrate in December twenty-five years of marriage to my new best friend.
Psalm 139:23-24
Search me, O God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts. See if there is any offensive way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.
Malachi 2:15-17
"I hate divorce," says the LORD God of Israel,
Ephesians 5:15-20,
Be very careful, then, how you live—not as unwise but as wise, making the most of every opportunity, because the days are evil. Therefore do not be foolish, but understand what the Lord's will is. Do not get drunk on wine, which leads to debauchery. Instead, be filled with the Spirit. Speak to one another with psalms, hymns and spiritual songs. Sing and make music in your heart to the Lord, always giving thanks to God the Father for everything, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Ephesians 5:21-24
Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ. Wives, submit to your husbands as to the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church, his body, of which he is the Savior. Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit to their husbands in everything.
Ephesians 5:25-33
Husbands, love your wives, just as 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. In this same way, husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. After all, no one ever hated his own body, but he feeds and cares for it, just as Christ does the church— for we are members of his body.
Philippians 1:6
being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.
2 Corinthians 1:3-5
Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves have received from God.
