Monthly Bible Study

Harmony.

Live in harmony with one another; do not be haughty (snobbish, high-minded, exclusive), but readily adjust yourself to [people, things] and give yourselves to humble tasks. Never overestimate yourself or be wise in your own conceits. Proverbs 3:7. When the bible speaks of harmony, it is different than the 1960s hippie version of harmony. This kind of harmony includes a lot of self-reflection. See how the bible tells us to give ourselves and adjust yourself. Yep, that’s all you making the changes, not forcing someone else to change to what you need them to be. There are times when our marriage can feel like a battleground with constant fighting and arguing. But that is not what our marriage is supposed to look or feel like. How would your attitude and behavior change if you were not snobbish, willing to humble yourself, and had no conceit? Believers and married couples should seek to love and encourage one another. Remember your marriage should be the kind of love that is self-sacrificing. Your needs before my own kind of thing. Are you putting your spouse first, caring for his needs above your own?

Rejoice.

Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse. Rejoice with those who rejoice; mourn with those who mourn. Live in harmony with one another. Do not be proud, but be willing to associate with people of low position. Do not be conceited. Romans 12:14-16. When was the last time you rejoiced? I know these have been a rough few years and sometimes it just feels like one blow after another. But when was the last time we rejoiced for just the general blessings of God in our lives? What about all the ways he has so tenderly cared for us and had a hedge of protection around us, even when we had no idea? When was the last time we shared our feelings with our spouses or rejoiced over all the blessings He has bestowed upon your family? No matter what you have had to walk through, God has always been right by your side. There is always something to praise Him for and rejoice over. Sometimes you just need to dig a little deeper but trust me, you will be so glad that you did.

One another.

The Bible is very clear about how to treat one another. Whether that is a relationship between husband and wife, the relationship between believers, or the relationship between believers and the fallen world. Even though these commands seem simple enough, they are extremely challenging to act out. We have seen however in our daily lives, how violence begets violence, and how anger and hatred only make problems worse. So when we start looking at the commands on how to treat one another, it all starts to make sense. Gently, patiently tolerate one another (Ep 4:2). Be kind, tender-hearted, and forgiving to one another (Ep 4:32). Bear with and forgive one another (Co 3:13). Seek good for one another, and don’t repay evil for evil (1 Th 5:15). Don’t complain against one another (Jas 4:11, 5:9). Love one another (Jn 13:34, 15:12, 17; Ro 13:8; 1 Th 3:12, 4:9; 1 Pe 1:22; 1 Jn 3:11, 4:7, 11; 2 Jn 5). Through love, serve one another (Ga 5:13). Tolerate one another in love (Ep 4:2). Speak the truth in love (Ephesians 4:15, 25). Pray for one another (James 5:16). We have a lot of commands about how we should be behaving. I know I say this all the time but look at the last “one another”. James tells us to pray for one another. Sometimes we do a really good job of praying for other people who have specific needs, but when was the last time you prayed for your spouse? Your husband needs your prayers just as much if not more than other people do. Pray for his leadership of your family, keep him tender-hearted, seeking God and wisdom for the family, physical and mental health. The list can go on and on. Just because men act tough, doesn’t mean they don’t need help, especially when that help comes from our heavenly father. So this week, pray for your husband each day and see if you notice a difference. I bet you will.

Your Marriage is a Picture of the Gospel to the World.

You and your spouse are not perfect people, we all make mistakes and we all need forgiveness. The way we live our lives as married partners shows the world how seriously we take God’s word about marriage. If we tell people it’s important to forgive but then hold grudges against our spouse, we do not honor God. For if you forgive other people when they sin against you, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive others their sins, your Father will not forgive your sins. Matthew 6:14-15.If we tell people we should be slow to speak and quick to listen, yet have shouting matches in our home every night, we do not honor God. It’s not enough to say the things that we believe, we have to act them out as well too. Of course, that’s all easier said than done. If it was easy to do, then we wouldn’t have needed Jesus to come and set the example for us. But here were are generation after generation falling flat on our faces, needing a savior. So how can we show the world that we aren’t a bunch of hypocrites as they all think? We can start by remembering that we are bought and paid for by the blood of Jesus. Do not offer any part of yourself to sin as an instrument of wickedness, but rather offer yourselves to God as those who have been brought from death to life; and offer every part of yourself to him as an instrument of righteousness. For sin shall no longer be your master, because you are not under the law, but under grace. Romans 6:13-14.

All Eyes are on our Marriages.

In case you haven’t felt the pressure, all eyes are on Christian marriages, just waiting for the day when we mess things up or get caught in sin. Just so they can have some argument against God and against our faith. Be careful what you think, because your thoughts run your life. Don’t use your mouth to tell lies; don’t ever say things that are not true. Keep your eyes focused on what is right, and look straight ahead to what is good. Be careful what you do, and always do what is right. Don’t turn off the road of goodness; keep away from evil paths. Proverbs 4:23-27. In this world, it is so difficult to keep our eyes focused on what’s right. Right now, no matter what direction you look, you see sin running rampant. How easy it is to lose our hope when the path to destruction is so broad and there are so many on that road. But if we keep our focus on God and not on the world, it will help us remember who it is we are aiming to please. We should be looking to please God, so walk down that narrow road with your eyes pointed towards the heavens.

Leave a Legacy for Future Generations.

Have you ever noticed that if one family has issues with drug abuse, teenage pregnancy and are physically violent towards one another, the future generations seem to just keep repeating themselves? Well, the same is true on the flip side. If you show your kids how to lovingly discipline them, and how to run your household focused on God, they will most likely follow in your footsteps. My dear brothers and sisters, take note of this: Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak, and slow to become angry, because human anger does not produce the righteousness that God desires. James 1:19-20. So teach your children and future generations to walk in the ways of Jesus and to always be reading his words, and it will pay off for generations to come. Always be humble and gentle. Be patient with each other, making allowance for each other’s faults because of your love. Ephesians 4:2

Intimacy

Marriage is much more than a civil contract with legal benefits. Marriage is an essential part of God’s plan. Marriage is a contract between husband, wife, and God. Marriage involves every aspect of intimacy, from our needs to spiritual, emotional, and physical closeness. In the Old Testament, we are taught, “Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh” (Genesis 2:24). Married couples are meant to be unified in every possible way.

He expects us to dedicate ourselves to the relationship. This is the one thing we are not allowed to give up on. We don’t just have a responsibility to our spouse and to God but we are under a contract with God to fulfill our marital duties. I know that sounds very overwhelming and challenging but God gave us an entire how-to book for life. So how do we fulfill our marital duties? Well, first we need to try some patience. Marriage can require hard work. But remembering that it’s founded on love gives us direction. “Above all things have fervent charity among yourselves,” counsels Peter in the New Testament, “for charity shall cover the multitude of sins” (1 Peter 4:8). None of us are perfect. Both you and your spouse will make mistakes, but a marriage won’t survive long without patience and forgiveness. Be considerate of each other and take on the hard times together. “with longsuffering, forbearing one another in love; endeavoring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace” (Ephesians 4:2–3).

Companionship

Companionship is the first purpose of marriage. In Genesis 2:18, the Lord said it wasn’t good for man to be alone. God designed marriage so that man and woman could have a close relationship. He knew from the beginning of time that for us to be alone is not healthy. We saw just how true that was with all the covid lockdowns. We are social people and we need one another. This relationship is based on love, trust, and communication and provides a picture of our relationship with the Lord. Marriage is where husband and wife can come together to share their lives and experiences. A healthy marriage should be a refuge from the world where couples can find comfort and support. If you aren’t finding refuge and support from your spouse, you will find it somewhere else, and that’s a very dangerous place to be.

Selflessness

Jesus taught us, “Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13). Married couples can learn a powerful lesson from this teaching. As a spouse, you are expected to essentially lay down your old life and sacrifice many of your personal desires for your closest friend—your husband. You have been joined together as one flesh, you are no longer two separate people. When you are able to keep your priorities in the right order, by putting God first, your husband next, and your family after that. Everything else will fall into place. Where we get ourselves into trouble is when our children take a higher priority than our spouse, or when our husband becomes our god. Remember you are here to do God’s will and if he called you into a life a being a wife, then he called you to love selflessly.

We are fallen people in a fallen world. Of course, we are going to get angry with each other and argue. So the goal is not to have a marriage without fighting or disagreements, but how to handle them from a biblical aspect when they do arise.

Anger. Anger can shatter communication and tear apart relationships. My dear brothers and sisters, take note of this: Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to become angry, because human anger does not produce the righteousness that God desires. James 1:19-20. Anger becomes a problem and sinful when it is allowed to boil over without restraint, causing even more hurt with raw emotions involved, leaving devastation in its wake. Often, the consequences of out-of-control anger are irreparable. Anger also becomes a sin when the angry one refuses to be pacified, holds a grudge, or keeps it all inside.

Confronting in Love. Everyone thinks that Christians are not supposed to be confrontational but that is actually only half true. We are called to confront our brothers or sisters in the Lord when they are sinning. Do not reprove a scoffer, or he will hate you, Reprove a wise man and he will love you. Proverbs 9:8.We do need to help keep one another accountable and follow the guidance of the Lord. Sometimes that means needing to reprove our spouses. That can be a very difficult yet delicate task. Sure none of us mind pointing out someone else’s sins, but the Lord told us to do it in love. My brothers and sisters, if one of you should wander from the truth and someone should bring that person back, remember this: Whoever turns a sinner from the error of their way will save them from death and cover over a multitude of sins. James 5: 19-20. Before confronting your spouse, however, you should be diligent in prayer and ask the Lord to guide your words and your thoughts. You should also never confront someone while you are still angry with them, this will only make things worse. But we as spouses have an obligation to lovingly confront our spouses when issues are affecting our relationships.

Forgiveness. What does it mean to forgive? It means setting your spouse free from the debt of their sin. Even though we may not be able to forget what happened or that it doesn’t still hurt. What it means is we don’t seek vengeance for our spouses wrongdoing. We don’t delight when we see them punished by God or by man for their sin. Bear with each other and forgive one another if any of you has a grievance against someone. Forgive as the Lord forgave you. Colossians 3:13. “But Lord you don’t understand, what they did really hurt me” Right, isn’t that what we say to God when asks us to forgive? But the Lord does understand, he forgave us for MURDERING his son. He not only forgave us but he welcomes us into heaven for those who repent and believe in his son. We hurt God tremendously when we sent Jesus to the cross but he still calls us his sons and daughters. If God can forgive us for such a grievous sin, we can certainly forgive our spouses for their sin against us. And unlike God, we most likely had some sort of guilt in their sin against us. We, however, sent the sinless son of God to the cross only because he didn’t fit the mold we had of the coming Messiah. This doesn’t mean we won’t need serious counseling and help from the Lord to forgive, but who better to help us with this than the one who knows the best?

Who’s Leading this Team? Someone has to lead the way, otherwise, we just walk in circles. Unfortunately, we live in a time where women are competing with men so much to be able to do everything they can do, that we miss that we have our own jobs and priorities to be focused on. Wives, submit yourselves to your own husbands as you do 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 5:22-24. On a football team, not everyone can be a coach, and there can only be one quarterback. We get ourselves and our marriages into trouble when we try to play roles that we weren’t intended to play.

Meet me in the Middle. A person who says I’ll meet you halfway is oftentimes a poor judge of distance. The problem with this 50/50 kind of relationship is that it is very transactional. This method put each spouse as the judge and jury against the other. One person’s actions are determined by how well the other performs at getting their half done. Well, you didn’t live up to your fair share, so why should I do mine, kind of mentality? This kind of mentality is neither good for us, nor is it good for our relationships. God reminds us that all good things come from him, not us. For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— not by works, so that no one can boast. For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do. Ephesians 2:8-10. If instead, we are focused on how to be God’s handymen and women, we won’t be so focused on what a great job we did, but rather look at what God helped us accomplish. After all, God is our ultimate boss, judge, and jury. He is the one to say whether we did a good job or not. Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for human masters. Colossians 3:23. The problem with trying to work to please our human masters is, they are sinful people too. Their approval can depend a lot on their emotions and how they are feeling that day. God will always judge our work as fair and balanced.

A Wife’s Role. Both husband and wife cannot be head of the household. So what does that make a wife’s role look like? The wife is supposed to be respectful of her husband. And the wife must respect her husband. Ephesians 5:33. A woman’s attitude towards her husband has huge power over the strength of their marriage. If she truly honors and respects him, he becomes a more confident and loyal leader. If she tears him down constantly, he feels little self-worth in his family. A wife must also be submissive to her husband’s leadership. God put your husband in charge of your family, let him bear that burden. Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ. Wives, submit yourselves to your own husbands as you do to the Lord. Ephesians 5: 21-22. Most people miss verse 21, but we all have someone we need to be submissive to. For a wife to be submissive doesn’t mean her husband should act like a dictator. A husband who respects his wife also values her opinions. God may be using the wife to further instill His word in the husband when making decisions. Submission for a wife means respecting your husband’s point of view. You should be humble when sharing your opinion with him and trusting his decision as a leader that God appointed to your family.

Shifting and Drifting. Most marriages start out with a good outlook toward the future. Plans that only look happy and bright, but for so many, things can get sideways pretty quickly. So let’s identify some of the ways marriages start to pull apart at the seams. Have you ever gotten two very different versions of a story from a couple? It’s like they aren’t even on the same page. How does that happen? It happens because we as flawed humans naturally drift towards isolating ourselves. The big problem with isolation is that we start to feel that we are the only ones who value something or behave a certain way. Isolation not only puts physical separation between people, but it quickly becomes an emotional separation too. When you aren’t sharing your deepest desires, hopes, and dreams with your spouse, you can feel that you guys aren’t on the same page. Nobody is exempt from this scheme of the devil. Even when Jesus was alone in the wilderness, the devil came and tried to tempt him. Then Jesus was led by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. After fasting forty days and forty nights, he was hungry. Matthew 4:1-2. When he gets you to a place where you feel alone and unsupported, all kinds of lies can take root in your heart. Without the edification and encouragement of truthful voices, the devil whispers to you that you are a victim, that you are being taken advantage of, and that nobody loves you. Isolation is a very dangerous place, so stay in the company of your spouse and other strong believers.

What about my happiness? Today we live in a culture that is focused on how happy we are at every waking second. We think, if we aren’t happy, then something needs to change. But if we look in the bible not once do we see, stay married and don’t get divorced unless you’re unhappy. We see quite the opposite. Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. 1 Corinthians 13:4-5. We see that our human flesh feels more not-so-glamorous emotions than happiness. So the next time someone tells you they aren’t happy in their marriage ask what happiness has to do with anything. “I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world, you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.” John 16:33.Not only does the bible not mention our happiness in marriage but Jesus promised us troubles in this world. So maybe we should look at them as troubles to work through, not give up on.

Sin has affected every marriage. So why do we think that our marriage is going to be the only one that will survive the attacks of the devil and that MY marriage will work out perfectly and we will live happily ever after? Every marriage has its weaknesses and is prone to breakdown. Some have mild weaknesses while others have huge problems. Because of Adam and Eve’s sin in the garden, God says to the woman,“I will make your pains in childbearing very severe; with painful labor you will give birth to children. Your desire will be for your husband, and he will rule over you.” Genesis 3:16. What does that mean, that the woman’s desire will be for her husband? Some people much smarter than me have said that this means she will desire to overpower or subdue the man. And because of sin, he will respond in like manner and with his strength subdue her, or rule over her. So you see as part of our punishment, God made it harder for us to get along. That’s why people say marriage is “work”. Because it is. Thankfully God gives us a huge how-to book on how to work out everything that goes on in our lives. We can read the bible and get a wonderful blueprint for how God wants us to behave in our marriages. I can do all this through him who gives me strength. Philippians 4:13.

We Laugh at God’s Plans: When we first meet Sarah and Abraham, they are known as Sarai and Abram. And old couple who was not able to conceive any children during their childbearing years. But God comes to Abram and tells him: “This man will not be your heir, but a son who is your own flesh and blood will be your heir.” He took him outside and said, “Look up at the sky and count the stars—if indeed you can count them.” Then he said to him, “So shall your offspring be.” Genesis 15:4-5. Wow, thats pretty cool right? I know I would be impressed if the Lord told me that. But wait a second, there’s just one problem here. Abram and Sarai never had kids, and now they are too old. So Abram was probably thinking, OK God if you say so but I just don’t see how. Isn’t that just like us though, to think of God’s plans for our life in only the normal human way? As if anything is too hard for God as if he can’t work miracles. Look at both of their responses to what God tells them.

Abraham fell face down; he laughed and said to himself, “Will a son be born to a man a hundred years old? Will Sarah bear a child at the age of ninety?” And Abraham said to God, “If only Ishmael might live under your blessing!” Genesis 17:17-18.

Then one of them said, “I will surely return to you about this time next year, and Sarah your wife will have a son.”Now Sarah was listening at the entrance to the tent, which was behind him. Abraham and Sarah were already very old, and Sarah was past the age of childbearing. So Sarah laughed to herself as she thought, “After I am worn out and my lord is old, will I now have this pleasure?” Genesis 18:10-12.

Both of them laughed in God’s face. Umm Lord apparently you haven’t seen how old we have gotten. I know time is different for you than for us, but you have missed your opportunity. You see the problem was that Abraham and Sarah saw their problems through human eyes. So that’s why Sarah comes up with her fantastic plan to have Abraham go into Hagar. And of course he’s all for this idea, I mean if your wife tells you to sleep with another women, not many men would argue with that. So he listens to his wife, and as we saw with Adam and Eve, that usually causes problems.

We See God’s Plans Before Our Very Eyes: After all the drama unfolds with Hagar and Ishmael. God tells Abraham about his plans for Sodom and Gomorrah. Abraham and Sarah get to see in real-time what God’s wrath looks like for those who don’t obey him. Did this have anything to do with Sarah’s genius idea to have her husband impregnate her slave so God could deliver his promise? We don’t know that for sure but we do know he continued to keep her womb shut until they arrived in Gerar because Abraham lied and told king Abimelek that Sarah was his sister. After God appears to Abimelek in a dream and tells him that Sarah is married, the king quickly returns Sarah to Abraham and sent them on their way.

Then Abraham prayed to God, and God healed Abimelek, his wife and his female slaves so they could have children again, for the Lord had kept all the women in Abimelek’s household from conceiving because of Abraham’s wife Sarah. Genesis 20:17-18.

After leaving Gerar, Sarah finally becomes pregnant and gives birth to Isaac. Did God have more spiritual growth and maturity for Sarah to go through before becoming a mother? Or did he want to show her that He alone has the power to open and close wombs as he did not only for her but for Abimeleks wives and female slaves? Or maybe he wanted to show Sarah, that it didn’t matter if she was 70, 80, or even 90 years old, he was the author of life. Whatever the reason, God’s timing is always perfect. So what can we learn from Sarah? If we try to rush God’s plans for our lives we will only end up making it into a huge mess. Your timing is not always God’s timing. Don’t laugh at what God says, get ready to see a huge miracle.

1 Being Content Beyond our Circumstances

Our contentment does not come from our circumstances but from the unchanging nature of our God. As we know him more, we trust him more. Contentment makes our hearts quiet, confident, and steady because we know that God is always working for our good. Paul was an example of this type of contentment. He wrote to his beloved Philippians from inside a Roman jail. His outer circumstances were grim, but listen to what he tells them. “Not that I am speaking of being in need, for I have learned in whatever situation I am to be content. I know how to be brought low, and I know how to abound. In any and every circumstance, I have learned the secret of facing plenty and hunger, abundance and need. I can do all things through him who strengthens me.” Philippians 4: 11-13. Paul was facing certain death, so what kept him so hopeful and positive? For to me, to live is Christ and to die is gain. Philippians 1:21. Paul knew that even though death is a scary thing, he would not taste death, he would simply fall asleep and then wake up in the presence of the Lord. So you see, he should have been happy about his impending death, as we should be. I’m not saying go run out in front of traffic, but have you thought about what heaven will be like? Maybe that’s why Jesus didn’t tell us that much about heaven, he knew how much we would rather be there than here. Have you ever heard that for the believer, this earthly life will be the closest we get to seeing hell, but for the unbeliever, this earthly life will be the closest thing they see to heaven? Our contentment should be strong no matter what because we know how our story ends.

2. A Grateful Heart

Develop a thankful attitude. It is remarkable that in America we could ever think that God has failed us. He has blessed our nation so abundantly and yet, we find it so easy to complain. Don’t get me wrong, people walk through some truly awful valleys throughout their lifetime, but then why is it those people who seem to have the strongest faith? It often seems like the ones who have had the easier lives, are the first to complain when the seas of this life get a little rough. I was listening to one of my favorite songs by NF, when these lyrics hit me like a ton a brick. How true these words are.

It’s easy to blame God but harder to fix things

We look in the sky like, “why ain’t You listening?”

Watching the news in our living rooms on the big screens

And talking ’bout “if God’s really real, then where is He?”

You see the same God that you saying might not even exist

Becomes real to us, but only when we dying in bed

When ya healthy it’s like, we don’t really care for Him then

Leave me alone God, I’ll call you when I need you again

Which is funny, everyone will sleep in the pews

Then blame God for our problems like He sleeping on you

We turn our backs on Him, what do you expect Him to do?

It’s hard to answer prayers when nobody’s praying to you

Oh yeah, that one hurt. How many times have I found myself thinking and feeling those exact same things? Oh man, I am a horrible person. Wait, we already knew that and that’s why I have taken Jesus’ righteousness and put it on me, because my righteousness is a heap of smelly filthy rags. Lord forgive us for our ungrateful attitudes. Listen to the full song of “Oh Lord” by NF below.

3. Trust & Obey

Why trusting (and obeying) is hard? It’s hard because we are sinful people, living in a fallen world. But have no fear, Jesus is here. Jesus promised that it would be hard. But we need to obey because disobedience leads to sin and death. For as by the one man’s [Adam’s] disobedience the many were made sinners, so by the one man’s [Christ’s] obedience the many will be made righteous. (Romans 5:19).

And lastly, we need to trust and obey because that’s what Jesus did as our perfect example. He withdrew about a stone’s throw beyond them, knelt down and prayed, “Father, if you are willing, take this cup from me; yet not my will, but yours be done.” An angel from heaven appeared to him and strengthened him. And being in anguish, he prayed more earnestly, and his sweat was like drops of blood falling to the ground. Luke 22: 41-44. Jesus CHOSE to go to the cross for us, die an excruciating death, and rise again to save our souls. If he can choose death for us, we can choose obedience for him.

Here is a sneak peek at this weekend’s event.

To find contentment in our lives, we must understand how God feels about our grumbling. Do you ever wonder why the Israelites wander in the desert for 40 years? Well, they were all a bunch of negative Nancy’s all the time. In Exodus 16 the whole community was grumbling against Aaron and Moses because they were afraid of starving to death so God gave them mana from heaven EVERY DAY.

Then they complained that they had no meat to eat, so God provided them with quail. Then they complained about not having water to drink, so God commanded Moses to strike the rock and water came out of it, and all the people drank. Let’s just think about that here for a second. Sure that sounds like no big deal until you realize holly cow, there were an estimated 2.4 million Israelite’s who fled Egypt. And none of them went hungry or thirsty?! It’s not like there was just a few families out there that God was caring for, no this was a huge group of people.

God was working overtime for his people and they continued to grumble against God until finally, God has had enough. In Numbers chapter 12 God was having no more of Miriam and Aaron grumbling against Moses so he turned Miriam leprous like snow. Then miracle after miracle, the Israelites STILL grumbled against Moses and Aaron and thought it would be better to return to a life of slavery rather than enter the promised land!? God is so angry he says to Moses “How long will these people treat me with contempt? How long will they refuse to believe in me, despite all the signs I have performed among them? I will strike them down with a plague and destroy them, but I will make you into a nation greater and stronger than they.” Numbers 14:11-12.

And even though God gets angry with our grumbling, he will still continue to care for us through all the changing circumstances of our fleeting lives. God still cares for me regardless of what is going on in my life. It doesn’t matter if God has given us a nice fat bank account or if we don’t know where our next meal will come from, God still loves us. What we must remember is that money is unreliable. Actually, most things of this world are unreliable because they are temporary. But in order to have a content heart we must realize how God feels when we are not content. Because lets be honest, we have nothing to be discontent about. God is good, all the time.

1. Unique gift. Ladies, have you ever thought of yourself as a unique gift from God to your husbands? If not you should. Because God created you just for him. God just didn’t want man to be alone but he meant all of man kind. He never wants any of us to be alone, we need fellowship with one another. That is the sole reason why God created women, men need us.

Now the Lord God had formed out of the ground all the wild animals and all the birds in the sky. He brought them to the man to see what he would name them; and whatever the man called each living creature, that was its name. So the man gave names to all the livestock, the birds in the sky, and all the wild animals.

But for Adam no suitable helper was found. So the Lord God caused the man to fall into a deep sleep; and while he was sleeping, he took one of the man’s ribs and then closed up the place with flesh. Then the Lord God made a woman from the rib he had taken out of the man, and he brought her to the man.

The man said,

“This is now bone of my bones

and flesh of my flesh;

she shall be called ‘woman,’

for she was taken out of man.”

The creation of Eve was drastically different than that of the animals. God made man and animals from the ground, but when he created Eve, he made her directly from Adam. Why was Eve the only one in creation to be made differently? These days women want to do everything to keep up with men, but I ask why? Why are we embracing our femininity? We are the only thing in creation that was made differently. Let’s celebrate being different.

2. Reflecting God’s image. Have you ever noticed that the entire bible looks a lot like a marriage?

“Not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day that I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt; which my covenant they broke, although I was a husband to them, said the LORD” Jeremiah 31:32.

God became jealous of us worshiping false gods and being adulterous in our relationship with him. Later, when Jesus comes to earth, we see that Jesus initiates the New Covenant with His disciples, like a marriage proposal. Then when Christ returns in Revelation 19:6-9 do we see the marriage of Christ to the Church.

3. Receiving your spouse. God made us all different and unique. Receiving your spouse doesn’t just mean tolerating his differences but embracing them.

For you created my inmost being;

you knit me together in my mother’s womb.

I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made;

your works are wonderful,

I know that full well.

Psalm 139:13-14

God made your spouse special, and it’s a choice every day to think of and treat him as the gift from God that he truly is. Remember your spouse is not your enemy, he is your partner.

Don’t forget to RSVP and click the pay button. I can’t wait to see you all there.