What Can You Do Alone?

Women often ask this question when they are discussing how to improve their marriages. They feel helpless against the seeming lack of cooperation and concern for their husbands. Perhaps he isn’t even aware that anything is wrong. But some things happen only when we are alone.

When I first committed my life to Christ, the most important decision I have ever made, I was alone. Soon after that I felt the urging of the Holy Spirit telling me to “work on” my marriage. I was not aware that my twenty-year-old marriage needed work, but, alone, I determined that I would obey God. I was not instructed to include my husband who seemed perfectly happy with his relationship with God and with me. This was my assignment, mine alone: Learn how to be a wife God's way.

I did not know the way but the Holy Spirit urged and encouraged me: “You have met the King of the Universe, have committed your life to serving Him, have read Matt. 22:36-38 and the other verses of scripture that tell you how God wants to be loved, and how he wants you to love others (including 1 Cor 13:1-8). Now you have to put away childish things (1 Cor 13:11). Alone you have to grow up. Let God make you a new creature: one who is willing to love His way, for His sake.” All this I must do alone – with my Master. Together, we are still working on my marriage.

Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone,

the new has come!

2 Corinthians 5:17(NIV)

Tina Green ©2010

Choosing to Stay

A new sport has invaded the American culture. We could call it Divorce Watch, or Marriage Destruction. No. It is not a video game, not played on your Nintendo. You play it by accessing televised or print news, collecting the latest story about marital infidelity, then weighing in on what the wife should do and when enough damning data has been uncovered to require that she abandon her marriage. The game players who are assembled in the national arena then issue the “THUMBS UP” or “THUMBS DOWN.” If she fails to appease the players by leaving her errant husband, her children’s father, and quickly filing for divorce, the angry scrutiny shifts from the unfaithful husband to the “foolish” wife. The Players begin to label her, ascribing to her all sorts of sinister motives and emotional inadequacies for not carrying out their mandate. She has let them down by refusing to play the game their way. She is then the loser.

This Game, I fear, may have invaded the sanctity of Christian marriage where only the word of God and the instruction of the Holy Spirit should guide the decisions of injured spouses. At such a dreadful time the wife or husband should not be influenced by the opinions of those who have nothing to lose, no commitment to the couple, and no moral guide for decision-making. The whims of popular culture are far too mindless and quixotic to be part of such a painful and consequential process.

If your marriage has experienced the tragedy of infidelity do not listen to those who encourage you to react out of hurt, anger, pride, or desire to retaliate. Take the time it takes to pray, seek wise counsel, and begin to heal. Separation or divorce may be the proper course for you. It may also be possible that your marriage can be restored and renewed. Just don’t be seduced into playing The Game!