I’m doing a rather foolish thing (for me to do) at the moment, I’m struggling through two books at once.
It tends to mean I read slower and take less in – that’s why it’s foolish for me to read this way. Anyway I’m nearing the end of both books, which is a good job as one is due back to the library and the other is part of our Reading Roundabout at church so the pressure is always on with those books to get them passed on.
I’m reading one of John MacArthur’s earlier books First Love which was written to “help restore the fire and conviction of your first love for Christ by helping develop a clearer understanding of His character, His glory, and His love for you”.
It’s an encouraging book even if my reading of it has been prolonged, I’m at chapter nine now which is entitled “Love and Obedience”. Pastor MacArthur starts this chapter by quoting a famous lyric from the old, popular song that says “Love and marriage go together like a horse and carriage”, his point is in the spiritual realm, love and obedience also go together – one pulls the other. “If you love Me, you will keep My commandments” and “He who has My commandments and keeps them, he it is who loves Me” (John 14: 15,21).
The other book I’m reading is Barbara Hughes book entitled Disciplines of a Godly Woman where Mrs Hughes has a whole section on relationships.
“Love and marriage, go together like a horse and carriage”
I would thoroughly recommend both these books, the combination of reading them both together has got me thinking about love and about marriage.
It seems to me that the devil is working 24 hour shifts in the Christian marriage department.
While Christian husbands and wives sit comfortably in their bigger and better homes with their Que Sera Sera attitude towards building relationships the devil is finding his statistics for family breakdowns are most impressive. WE are making his job easy for him.
Dear readers if you are in a Christian marriage, don’t be complacent. If you aren’t putting measures in place to make sure your marriage works be sure that the devil is most certainly putting measures in place to ensure it doesn’t.
How would you define a good marriage? Beautiful wedding, decent jobs, enough to get by, a couple of children?
How does the Bible define a good marriage? “Wives submit to your own husband, as to the Lord Eph 5: 22/Eph 5:25 Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself for her”
As wives we shouldn’t be afraid of the word submission. We ARE the weaker vessel, God has made us that way, we ought to glorify God in why he made us.
Husbands do you love your wife with a sacrificial love? that’s how Christ loved the church.
How can we train up our children to shoot them out like arrows into this ungodly world if we can’t show them what God expects from our marriages.
In a day when we rarely see a horse with a carriage and we rarely see love resulting in marriage, we need to cling to Christ to help us to hold in high regard that covenant of love which He gave us.
Mummymac
We’ve just finished working our way through this book in our Adult Sunday School class at Church. Donald Whitney in his book Spiritual Disciplines within the Church opens up many questions Christians may have especially in the realm of searching out a church to attend.
Home but not Alone 
