Title: Making Our Marriages Great
Text: Multi-texted Topical
1. Make A Commitment:
a. “Till death do us part” in our country has become;
1. “Till I get angry or hurt.”
i. I read of a father with great wisdom. His daughter called him from her new home after a fight with her newlywed husband crying. She said, “Daddy I want to come home.” His reply? “You are home.”
2. “Till I get tired of you.”
i. In our society of looking out for number one, we see the fruits of that.
1. Selfishness
2. Greed
3. Pride
3. “Till I find someone else.”
i. A WORD OF WARNING Be very careful who you date for in these times of selfishness it takes two to make a marriage, but only one to break it up.
4. And any other excuse to get out of the relationship.
b. From the beginning of time God set forth the institution of marriage And he set forth this relationship as one of commitment.
1. (Genesis 2:20-25 NCV) "The man gave names to all the tame animals, to the birds in the sky, and to all the wild animals. But Adam did not find a helper that was right for him. {21} So the LORD God caused the man to sleep very deeply, and while he was asleep, God removed one of the man’s ribs. Then God closed up the man’s skin at the place where he took the rib. {22} The LORD God used the rib from the man to make a woman, and then he brought the woman to the man. {23} And the man said, "Now, this is someone whose bones came from my bones, whose body came from my body. I will call her ’woman,’ because she was taken out of man." {24} So a man will leave his father and mother and be united with his wife, and the two will become one body. {25} The man and his wife were naked, but they were not ashamed."
2. One man one woman, one body, for life!
c. As if God’s sanction of marriage were not enough reason to be committed, listen to these stats.
1. The Case for Marriage In October 2000, two researchers appeared on Good Morning America to promote their book, “The Case For Marriage”
i. Married people have higher incomes than single people almost to the degree that college graduates exceed high school graduates in income.
ii. Greater sexual satisfaction comes from security and opportunity that marriage affords.
iii. The success of our marriage brings satisfaction.
1. The researchers said that in a group of individuals reported dissatisfaction with their marriage. When they remained in the marriage for five years, 86% of them then reported satisfaction with their marriage.
iv. In other words, they found ways to solve their problems.
2. Commitment lets us work through problems. Long term commitment to marriage allows us to face and work through the problems in marriage.
i. Marriage is a marathon not a sprint!
ii. Don’t just commit to “stay in a marriage” making marriage all that it can be!
Transition: Not only do we make marriage a commitment, we...
2. Make Marriage A Priority: Someone said, “Marriage is like twirling a baton, turning hand springs or eating with chopsticks. It looks easy until you try it.” It takes making it a priority!
a. The only thing to put in front of your relationship with your spouse is the one with God! And I suggest that if your both are seeking God, then your relationship will only get stronger and closer.
b. Your marriage is to come first. Here are some things that take a back seat to your marriage.
1. Your parents: God said to leave mother and father and cleave unto your wife, and I might ad to weave that relationship.
2. Your children: You might say, “Wait a minute, my children are first in my life. Loving your children is good and of course, important and right, , but the greatest thing you can do for your children is to love your spouse. Kids watch and react to the love you have for one another. They learn how to love their mates one day!
3. Your friends: Godly friendships are awesome, important, needed, but they have ruined many marriages because of a miss match in priority.
4. Your church: The church of God is extremely important and necessary to your walk with Him. Walk it together as a married couple.
5. Your job: The Bible says that “if a man does not work he ought not eat.” In our country people make having stuff a mark of happiness in our marriages. It is a fight to keep up with the times and the Jones’s. Stop what you are doing and look at how it is affecting your marriage. Better to live in a rented house with a happy family than to be in a mansion where you don’t know one another.
6. Your recreation: In America we spend billions of dollars a year trying to entertain ourselves. Husbands go away from family to have fun. Wives spend the living shopping and wanting things. These things are not wrong in and of themselves. We make them wrong when we begin to spend more time in these and not on our relationships.
7. You fill in the blank with whatever else you want to.
i. There’s just not much you can put in front of your marriage and survive and really enjoy being with one another.
c. In order to work on marriage and make it a priority, learn as much as you can about your spouse.
1. Men, don’t be afraid to read a book about how women think and what is important to them.
2. Women don’t be afraid to do the same.
d. Making marriage a priority must happen through all of the stages of marriage.
1. “B.C. Times” Before Children
2. After they get here.
i. In these first two stages time has to be balanced to be able to spend time together.
3. When they are gone.
i. If time is not balanced in the first two of these stages, when you get to this one, you will be sitting across the table from a stranger.
4. There are other stages that marriage goes through, but suffice it to say that we must take and make the time for our marriages to be great!
Transition: Make marriage a commitment, Make Marriage a Priority, and ...
3. Make Marriage Fun:
a. Men tend to fail at this more than women I think. I think this because men are conquerors.
1. When we were dating.
i. There were flowers
ii. Movies
iii. Love notes
iv. Opening the door for her
v. We would say nice things.
vi. All of this was in order to bag the kill!
1. We were hunting.
2. On the prowl.
vii. Once you said “Yes, I will marry you.” We had you in the bag.
viii. Men, we must repent and do the “former things.”
1. Wives still like the romantic things.
2. Guys don’t be like to guy in the following story
1. His wife relates the story to us. Soon after our last child left home for college, my husband was resting next to me on the couch with his head in my lap. I carefully removed his glasses. "You know, honey," I said sweetly, "without your glasses you look like the same handsome young man I married." "Honey," he replied with a grin, "without my glasses, you still look pretty good too!"
b. On the women ‘s side of things.
1. When we were dating.
i. There was make-up and smell pretty stuff. Not curlers and house coat.
ii. There was words like.
1. “Wow your so strong.”
2. “Did you make that.”
1. Men like to be bragged on. Even husbands.
c. I read the following quote this week. “When we are dating, it is all movies and dinner. When we get married, it turns into bills and repairing the appliances. Some of the middle age crisis is because all the fun has gone out of marriage, It is all work and no play.” And folks that makes marriage a dull thing.
d. Ecclesiastes 9:9 says, “enjoy the wife of our youth.” Marriage is a time of joy!
1. Solomon wrote another book called the Song of Solomon. It is a beautiful story of married love
i. There was joy in the physical sexual relationship.
e. Learn to have fun inexpensively.
1. Pop some popcorn and curl up on the couch together and watch TV.
2. Better yet, turn off the TV and talk.
3. Go for a walk in the park.
4. JUST DON’T FORSAKE TIME TOGETHER.
Transition: Make Marriage a Commitment, Make Marriage a Priority, Make it Fun, and finally...
4. Have God At The Center Of Your Marriage And Your Life:
a. Perhaps the most important tip today about marriage is to have God at the center of your life.
1. From God we learn the marriage skills of kindness, forgiveness, unconditional love and faithfulness.
2. God is our model for love.
3. Best of all, when we place God at the center of our lives, he will help us through times of difficulty.
i. Paul said in a context of submission in (Ephesians 5:21 NIV) "Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ."
Conclusion: We really have only touched the hem of the garment on marriage. There are so many more things to say. I just want us to think about the awesome responsibility we have in dealing with one another in marriage.
I want to end with reading a familiar passage to you from 1 Corinthians 13. Each time I come to the word love, substitute your name. See how you measure up in the love department.
(1 Corinthians 13:4-8 NIV) "Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. {5} It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. {6} Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. {7} It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. {8} Love never fails.”
