Devil, You Can't Have My Marriage!

“Devil, You Can’t Have My Marriage!”

Ephesians 5: 25-33

INTRO: 1. There are certain things in our life that will never change, nor improve until we take a stand.

a. There are certain things in life that will never be secure until we take a stand.

b. It’s time to take a Holy Ghost stand against the forces that are targeting our marriages.

c. Time to stand against a world that is increasingly anti-marriage.

d. Time to stand against a devil that is working to infect and destroy your home from the inside out.

e. Time to stand against modern philosophies that flies in the face of what God says.

2. Here in Ephesians our marriage is likened to the relationship Jesus Christ has with his bride… the church.

a. Calvary marks the place where Jesus took a stand against Satan, Sin and the World… a stand for his bride, the church.

b. Paul was saying here, like Jesus, you’ve got be be willing to fight for our marriages.

3. There are two subtle extremes that the enemy of marriage uses to destroy our marriage relationships right under our own noses.

a. There is Criticism… most often used by the wife, because she feels she has more invested in the marriage.

b. Let me tell you this morning, criticism never changed a marriage, but it has been used to plant hopelessness and division in millions.

c. There is Passivity… most often used by the husband that believes that the marriage relationship will magically take care of itself.

d. Men it’s time to wake up and smell the coffee…A Happy Marriage is NO Accident!

4. Before we can make a stand for anything we must see what in fact we’re standing on.

a. Your marriage can’t stand on feeling or emotion…fluctuate with the seasons.

b. Your marriage can’t stand on physical attraction…time can be cruel to our appearance.

ILL. Soon after our last child left home for college, a man and his wife were resting on the couch. She resting next to him with her head in his lap. He carefully removed her glasses. "You know, honey," he said sweetly, "without your glasses you look like the same beautiful young woman I married." "Honey," she replied with a grin, "without my glasses, you still look pretty good too!"

c. Your marriage can’t stand on mutual agreement…they’ll be some ’hum-dinger’ fights.

d. But your Marriage can stand on the Word of God.

e. Come to realize that only God can make my marriage what He intended it to be.

5. How can I let the Devil know that I won’t stand by and let him destroy my marriage?

a. How can I let the devil know I’m standing on the Word and relying on the power of the Holy Ghost?

b. It’s time to make a few declarations this morning and mean it.

DEVIL, YOU CAN’T HAVE MY MARRIAGE…

I. BECAUSE I MADE A VOW.

a. It may not mean anything to Hollywood, but it means something to me!

b. It may not mean anything to the society we live in, but it means something to God!

b. Although, I may live in a generation of vow-breakers, I’m committed to the vow I made.

c. A vow is more than a promise it is a covenant ratified by God himself.

A. IT’S A VOW BEFORE GOD

1. A vow that God takes more seriously than we do.

2. God’s people where surprised to find that their tears on the alter and offerings no longer stirred God and they were very surprised to find out why.

Mal. 2:14 "Yet ye say, Wherefore? Because the LORD hath been witness between thee and the wife of thy youth, against whom thou hast dealt treacherously: yet is she thy companion, and the wife of thy covenant."

3. I’ve heard people say “I don’t need a piece of paper or a ring to be married.” But I say you need that vow.

4. God recognizes nothing else as acceptable.

5. I understand that this is not popular preaching this morning, but this is God’s word.

B. IT’S A VOW THAT COUNTS ON DIFFICULTY

1. The basic greek word for “marry’ or “marriage” is the word gameo from which we derive our english word for gem.

2. The root word means literally to “fuse together.”

3. The same minerals in a chunk of coal are in a diamond, but there are two other elements that exist in the diamond.

4. They are time and pressure.

5. If you want a marriage that is precious, rare and shines—it will take time and enduring the pressures of life together.

6. Some people act surprised when they discover that Marriage has difficulties… it’s the rule not the exception.

7. There are seasons of marriage you don’t want to miss.