Sunday Reflections (November 18)

Today was the final sermon in our church's recent series on marriage. I have learned so much from our church since Dave and I started attending three years ago, but I would definitely say that this series has been my absolute favorite. The practical tips and the timing (yes, having a child completely throws your marriage for a loop) had me furiously writing notes and thinking of ways to apply what we were learning these last few weeks.

Today's message was given by Jim Burns, president of HomeWord and author of books for couples, ministry leaders, and teens. Today's topic was on protecting our marriages, and while everything the speaker said was encouraging and challenging, two things stood out to me.

The first thing was Jim's point on commitment. In an age with numerous attractive distractions, we need to schedule our priorities, not prioritize what's on our schedule. If you asked most Christians what their priorities were, they would likely list them as (1) God, (2) marriage, (3) children, and (4) vocation. But do we often live as if that were the order of our priorities? We need to proactively arrange our schedules so that they reflect the proper order of priorities instead of letting them get out of control.

The second thing was what Jim called The Closer Challenge: "I will commit to spending 20 minutes together a week to build spiritual intimacy with my spouse." Jim and his wife decided to implement this after they had tried and failed to have daily devotions together. (Oh, can I relate to that!) The point is that anyone can find 20 minutes each week to devote to building spiritual intimacy. What will fill this time? Reading a book on marriage or spiritual matters out loud to each other, praying, discussing spiritual things. Although this wasn't mentioned, listening to a podcast together and then discussing the topic would be another option. The main point, however, is to commit to spending time together each week.

I am sad to see this series come to a close, but I am so grateful for all that I learned from it. Our church is such a blessing, and I am so thankful that God led us there three years ago.