Marriage -- Love, Maps, and Admiration

John

John 13:34 ESV

34 A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another.

1 Corinthians 14:1 ESV

1 Pursue love, and earnestly desire the spiritual gifts, especially that you may prophesy.

Romans 12:9 ESV

9 Let love be genuine. Abhor what is evil; hold fast to what is good.

1 Timothy 1:5 ESV

5 The aim of our charge is love that issues from a pure heart and a good conscience and a sincere faith.

Jesus invites us to seeming Olympic levels of “love” in his statement found in the Sermon on the Mount:

Matthew 5:43–45 ESV

43 “You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ 44 But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, 45 so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven. For he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust.

Matthew 5:43–48 ESV

43 “You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ 44 But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, 45 so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven. For he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust. 46 For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have? Do not even the tax collectors do the same? 47 And if you greet only your brothers, what more are you doing than others? Do not even the Gentiles do the same? 48 You therefore must be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect.

While for some marriages in this room the passage doesn’t apply right now… for many others, it could be a reminder that:

While for some marriages in this room the passage doesn’t apply right now… for many others, it could be a reminder that:

Your spouse is not your enemy

If you are thinking your spouse is your enemy, an early step (or an eventual one) that awaits you — and which you may need to invite the Lord into right now — is his command to love your enemy… especially when that enemy feels like your spouse.

Love is not only many splendored… it is also profoundly misunderstood… and downright disappointing on its own!

Weddings tie love and happiness so closely together...

And when love doesn’t deliver… and it disappoints, we often give up on love — not on what it actually is, but on what we wish it to be.

Even the most eloquent and beautiful passage on love offers tell after tell on what love is… and we just over look its wisdom and windows into love.

1 Corinthians 13:4–8 ESV

4 Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant 5 or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; 6 it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. 7 Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. 8 Love never ends. As for prophecies, they will pass away; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will pass away.

1 Corinthians 13:13 ESV

13 So now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love.

Love isn’t long walks on the beach… a perfect body after giving birth to 3 kids… a full head of hair after working for an impossible boss for 10 years...

Much of the way the misery in many marriages begins is when “for better, for worse” tilts more powerfully in the “for worse” direction than the couple ever anticipated.

Why I stopped requiring pre-marital counseling — you ever try to offer any advice to a couple getting married?

What I require is marriage counseling after two years of marriage.

If you wait more than 5 years to invite someone into offering counsel into your marriage, you’ve waited too long.

WHY?

Because rough marriages are expensive. And so are divorces.

They increase your likelihood of getting sick and shorten your life…

Most marriages need a counseling, retreat, or class tune up...

Those in crisis need an intensive… which are expensive. But not nearly as expensive as a divorce.

Over the next 3 weeks I want to offer 7 items that I have come to believe are essential for marriages to work… and I see these things as the Bible describes the relationship Jesus shares with his bride — The Church.

Today I want to offer two of those items… and I’m drawing them out of:

1 Corinthians 13:1–3 ESV

1 If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. 2 And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. 3 If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing.

1. Open up and Invest in Love Maps

The context of the passage is the first century Church — NOT marriage.

The Corinthian Church had gotten so lost in: gifts, angels, gossip, sound systems, prophetic utterances, deep mysteries, words of knowledge… and the power of faith… and the joy of generosity… and the legacies of martyrdom… that they had lost where they are on the map of being a Jesus follower.

This isn’t a problem unique to the Corinthian church… all churches struggle with getting lost…

Revelation 2:4–5 ESV

4 But I have this against you, that you have abandoned the love you had at first. 5 Remember therefore from where you have fallen; repent, and do the works you did at first. If not, I will come to you and remove your lampstand from its place, unless you repent.

Jesus and His Bride, The Church:

In this 1 Corin 13 passage, Jesus is lifting up the eyes of the Corinthian church and saying to them as their husband — your red dot and my red dot are not in close on the map — “You don’t know where I am… and where you are needs a shift.”

Red Dot — Corinth had misplaced Jesus red dot… and they transported themselves away to a location of their dot where on THE MOST BASIC THINGS, they were disconnected and lost.

Our Marriages:

Item 1 for having a marriage that works — you have to know where each other are on the map of your lives.

Paying attention to the details of your spouse’s life… and on THE MOST BASIC THINGS:

Everything from the food you each like, to major life events, to the daily challenges you are facing, to the plans you have for the day… to things you are thinking and feeling that your spouse needs to know (or you need to share) about where you are.

Marla and the dish soap — “Here is where I am right now.”

Why are these maps important?

*When the storms come, a rich and detailed map is a major contributor to keeping marriages satisfied and together.” — Gottman

One of the major causes of marital dissatisfaction and divorce is: the onset of children… including the first child.

In one study, 67% Newlywed couples underwent significant satisfaction decline upon the arrival of baby #1.

The remaining 33% did not have that drop — and half of those 33% saw dramatic improvement in their marriage when baby #1 showed up! What was the difference?

The couples that thrived had a detailed, frequently updated, always available love maps with each other.

When the husband and wife were in frequent contact about their lives and updated regularly, it helped them to thrive when storms would come or rains would fall.

And don’t we see that same model in the relationship Jesus has with his bride, The Church?

This is why prayer, Bible reading, silence, memorization, meditation, study, worship, serving, being pure, being sober… all these things help our red dot and Jesus red dot be ever mindful of and informed about the other. And when our lives have a major jolt — from kids to cancer — our relationship with Jesus and our lives prevail. ()

Caring about maps… takes a soft heart… and slowing pace… and regular connection. (Set an alarm — Marla and Serah)

2. Nurture your fondness, admiration, and faith for each other.

Where your relationship has even a glimmer of the fondness, admiration, and faith system at work --- wherever your marriage is today, it is salvageable.

Our Marriages:

It may take a TON of work… and that work is worth doing — NOT primarily for your own.

Sometimes in the day to day grind, we can forget to be — or how to be — fond and admiring to our spouse through the eyes of faith in the Lord.

But, often, pausing to remember times of fondness, admiration, and faith can and do help

When Marla and I met… Elsbury, MO — in the toughest times I have held to that moment.

Jesus and His Bride, the Church:

And don’t you see the same kind of command to “remember” with the Lord as his Bride?

Psalm 103:1–5 ESV

1 Bless the Lord, O my soul, and all that is within me, bless his holy name! 2 Bless the Lord, O my soul, and forget not all his benefits, 3 who forgives all your iniquity, who heals all your diseases, 4 who redeems your life from the pit, who crowns you with steadfast love and mercy, 5 who satisfies you with good so that your youth is renewed like the eagle’s.

Jeremiah 31:31–34 ESV

31 “Behold, the days are coming, declares the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah, 32 not like the covenant that I made with their fathers on the day when I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt, my covenant that they broke, though I was their husband, declares the Lord. 33 For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, declares the Lord: I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts. And I will be their God, and they shall be my people. 34 And no longer shall each one teach his neighbor and each his brother, saying, ‘Know the Lord,’ for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest, declares the Lord. For I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more.”