Many Christian couples want to do the right thing. They try like crazy to have a Christian marriage. But they end up tired, discouraged and feeling like failures. Few of us are equipped to do the right job when it comes to creating the best relationship with our spouse. We se that there’s a big job to be done and we try to use the best relationship tools we know, but we end up getting off course in our Christian marriage.
Too often the work we try to do as Christian spouses is not the right job at all. We focus on “unspiritual” or wrong behavior then we set out to apply pressure, control behavior and do everything in our power to change our spouse. That’s the primary cause of exhaustion, depression and the hopeless sense of wanting to bail out of it all. When people spend their lives trying to transform their spouse the natural result is tiredness, discouragement and the desire to quit.
For that reason we need to see where we get off course in Christian marriage. We burn ourselves out doing a job we were never meant to do. We need to learn the difference between God’s job and ours. It’s God’s job to fix and change us as persons. It’s not our job to fix and change each other. We get off course in so many ways and we need to be able to isolate these. But first of all let’s examine:
I. God’s Original Plan For Christian Marriage
Genesis 1:26-28 tells of God’s creation of mankind in His own image and likeness. . . It took both male and female in order to truly represent the likeness of God. This is reiterated in Genesis 5:1-2. . . The “man” was in charge, but the man to whom responsibility was given to be fruitful, fill the earth, subdue it and rule over every living thing was both male and female. So this is the first aspect of God’s original plan for marriage: for males and females to be co-rulers, co-subduers.
Then God said, “It’s not good for the man to be alone; I will make him a helper suitable for him” (Genesis 2:18). It doesn’t say that God gave the man an assistant to order around. Beasts of the earth were to be ruled over, but this helper had to be ”suitable” for the man. She had to “correspond to” him, to be in partnership with him. So God caused Adam to fall asleep and then “fashioned” Eve (Genesis 2:22). God created Eve. The language conveys something carefully and intentionally arranged on the part of God. Adam was formed, but Eve was fashioned. No wonder women are so fashion minded!
Watch Adam’s response when he awoke and saw Eve. He took one look and said, “Whoa man!” He went on in verse 23 “This is bone of my bones . . . She shall be called Woman.” He didn’t say, “Great, now I have someone to go get me my stuff, do the chores I don’t feel like doing and cater to my every want.” No, in the Hebrew she was “a suitable helper,” a second self, a corresponding second self, a life saver, a completer, a compliment, one doing together with oneness, doing together what they couldn’t do separately. God’s purpose in Christian marriage is stated as the Word goes on in verse 24 “For this cause . . . and they shall become one flesh.”
This was God’s plan for marriage: entering into the process of becoming one flesh. It isn’t to “subdue” or to “rule over” each other, control each other or fix each other. Rather, God’s original plan for Christian marriage is a dependence upon God as we find our source of completion in Jesus Christ: two becoming one flesh, co-ruling, a relationship in the image of God. However, the reality is:
II. God’s Plan For Christian Marriage Gets Sidetracked
In one nightmarish moment everything for Adam, Eve and the rest of mankind changed. Once they were dependent upon God and in communion with God. Then came deception, rebellion, shame and hiding. What had been “one flesh” changed into disunity and blaming. Listen to how the story goes as we read Genesis 3:1-13.
Adam and Eve had lived in a relationship with God in which they were dependent upon Him as the only One who could give life and meet all their needs. Therefore, they needed to make no demands of each other. And looking only to Him they reflected His image, likeness and life. Then the serpent convinced them they could do a better job of being God than God. He convinced them to depend upon themselves instead of God as their source of life. That’s where God’s plan for them to be dependent upon Him got sidetracked. According to Satan’s thinking, control was better than dependence. Unfortunately, Adam and Eve cooperated with this plan and disobeyed God. They sinned in their attempt to be gods and meet their own needs. But oh how sad and unnecessary. They already had a God who was faithful, loving and eager to give them everything they could ever need, but they chose to sin.
In Genesis 3:14-19 we find what is called “the Curse.” In this passage, God said to the woman in verse 16b, “. . . Yet your desire shall be for your husband, And he shall rule over you.” First came the impulse to blame. Then God simply reveals the self-centered core that was beginning to motivate each of them. The woman would continue to try to draw life and nurturing from a man who was not capable of filling these deep needs – never was and never will be. And the man would be forever trying to rule over the woman, either aggressively or passively trying to keep her quiet about his inadequacy to meet her needs. Each would demand love, respect and nurturing from the other. But as each generation would pass we would forget that we were never supposed to draw our life from each other, but from God. And that’s how God’s plan for Christian marriage gets sidetracked. Thirdly let’s consider:
III. What Getting Off Course Looks Like In Life
The original curse resulted when Adam and Eve took their eyes off God who is our primary source of life. In a curse-full marriage one partner makes demands on the other as if he/she were the source rather than a resource. Our underlying tendency then is to usurp God’s role by trying in futile and powerless ways to control each other. If our sense of well-being and value come from the behavior of another person instead of God, we’ll always be giving off messages that say to others: you’d better perform right. The problem is, no human being is capable of performing well enough to establish another’s self-esteem. Your spouse’s behavior will always fall short at some point. Another way to put it is: empty people cannot fill other empty people. In fact, one definition of codependency is depending on each other’s performance for your sense of well-being and validity.
Getting off course is essentially when marriage doesn’t work. And what that looks like in life is, you will deny the presence of the problem. You do this to simply keep each other happy in a marriage. So you don’t confront an issue which in essence is an effort to control the behavior or feelings of your spouse. So the problem is perpetuated, denial continues and lying results. That’s refusing to do what Ephesians 4:25 says, “laying aside falsehood, speak the truth in love.” So you keep a façade of peace by taking the course of denying the presence of a problem.
Another way getting off course looks like in life is, you try to fix the behavior of your spouse. You see, if your peace and well-being depends on your spouse’s performance, then that person has become for you a false god. There are two situations that can occur when you depend on your spouse and feel the need to fix them. The first occurs when your spouse simply lacks those traits you desire which means they are inadequate or deficient, so that you exert some kind of pressure to fix your false god. Another dynamic that occurs is when you think your spouse’s behavior is harmful in some way. Your false god seems broken so you attempt to change their behavior by blaming, comparing, challenging or shaming to fix the behavior of your spouse.
One other way getting off course looks like in life is a person attempts to fix himself or herself in the hope of changing their spouse. We tell ourselves if I get myself straightened out then they will change. How many times have I convinced myself of this, but the key wrong course is, the motivation. This brings about a sense of false submission as you go along with something outwardly while inwardly you strongly disagree. This is not submission, it’s pretending. These things simply don’t work and are examples of what getting off course in Christian marriage looks like in life.
No person is powerful enough to provide life and value to their spouse, nor were we created by God to fix each other. Jesus was given to provide life and value to each of us as well as, to be the source to meet your every need. The only way your empty self can be filled so as to meet the need for love and acceptance of your spouse or another person is through being filled with the Spirit of Jesus, the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of Christ. then He can and will meet the needs of others through you and make your Christian marriage meaningful!
Much of the content of this message came from the study of the book “Families Where Grace is in Place” by Jeff Van Vonderen interventionist on the A&E Television Program “Intervention.”
