The Purpose of Your Marriage - God's Purpose

Genesis 1:27

"So God created man in his own image, in the image

of God he created him; male and female he created them."

Does that not just blow your mind? That the creator of the UNIVERSE created you and me from HIS image.  You were created to reflect His goodness and never failing love. You were thought out carefully and pieced together with only the best parts. You weren’t thrown together without thought, worthless and rusty parts. I don’t know about you, but that just fills my heart with pure joy knowing that the Almighty God would create someone like me as a representation, a representation of God.

A very important area of life is your marriage. And you know what? God created marriage. The joining of man and woman to become one flesh. To live life together. When man and woman come together it reflects the most amazing love story, God’s love story. A marriage should mirror the relationship between Jesus and His bride, the Church. Just as Jesus shows us His unselfish, unfailing love, we must imitate that same love toward our spouse. Marriage is an opportunity to glorify God in mirroring His love story. God’s purpose for your marriage is for you to be a continuing illustration of His love towards the church as well as to let your marriage to teach you to be more like Christ.

Here’s your challenge for day one:
Discuss with your spouse the purpose of your marriage.

 

Journaling:

Date: 06-17-14

What is God teaching you?

Questions:

1.       Why is it important to know God’s purpose for your marriage?

2.       How does the knowledge of this change the way you look at your marriage and/or life?

3.       What is one this you will do differently in your marriage to reflect God’s love story?

Prayer

Devotional - Wives after God

A couple months ago I ordered a devotional called "Wives After God". It is such a great devotional for wives or for any woman that is engaged or even thinking of getting married one day. It is definitely not just for married women. Over the next 30 days I will be going through this devotional and showing you scripture as well as prayers that will transform your marriage. I know it has mine.

I want to encourage you to spend the next 30 days with me on this journey and keep a journal near by when reading these devotionals. You may or may not be use to spending quality time with God, but with this devotional you will be spending time with Him by reading His Word, praying and if you choose, journaling.

You should already know that I like giving challenges and these devotionals aren't going to be any different. There will be a challenge each day. I pray that you will take on each challenge!

If you don't have a bible, I will be putting the scripture up for you. If you do have one, I encourage you to keep it close by and journaling is strongly encouraged. Here is an example of how you can do it or you can use your own method.

Date
1. What God is teaching you
2. Answer Questions
3. Prayer

Remeber: When you spend quality time with God, your relationship with Him changes dramatically. Your life will change.

So, will you join me on this 30 day journey?

Plastic Runway

At the beginning of the week, one of my co-workers tripped on the carpet here at work. Thankfully, she did not get hurt. The carpet is so old and is coming apart at the seams. So I emailed our maintenance department and asked if there was any way this could be fixed since it is a safety hazard.

This morning we all walk into work like normal and there is like a plastic runway type thing covering the part where the carpet is coming loose. This isn’t the sturdiest of plastics. This is an extremely flimsy piece of plastic stretched over some frayed carpet. The sides curl up and the plastic isn’t secured to the floor. It’s kinda just lying there. All day we have joked about the “runway” and how it is probably still or will be a safety hazard.

A couple of weeks ago, someone came in to take measurements of the building so we could get new flooring. I’m not exactly sure when we will be getting this new flooring but I am sure that this new plastic runway of ours is only a temporary fix until the new flooring will be installed.

2 Corinthians 4:18

So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen, since what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.

 

That’s how the life of following Christ looks. We only see what is going on now during our lives but we can’t see the big picture. Only God knows what the big picture looks like. When we struggle and go through battles we wonder why it’s happening to us. But the key to getting through those struggles is to fight through them and know that you are going through that situation for a reason. You will come out better and you will have something better in the future even though it is hard to see it now. Somehow, this situation is just a tiny piece of the big picture.

Just like our plastic runway.

Right now, we see the runway as being a temporary fix to our frayed carpet. We don’t know what type of flooring is going to be installed but we do know that a better version is in store

A Little Bit of Time

Monday I wrote about my trip to Georgia to visit my great grandma. If you missed it, you can view it here.

One of the reasons I absolutely love going to down to Georgia is that I get something that I normally don’t have when I am at home.

Time.

There, I had all the time in the world. Time to think, pray, ponder, dream, play with my daughter without worrying about housework. I had time to shop and time to just be with family.

With all of the crazy fastness of the world, we normally run out of time in the day to get done all that we want to get done. I know as a wife and mom I want to have the house clean, cook, play, do laundry, get on pinterest, facebook, Instagram, and spend time with my husband and child all within the few short hours that I get when I am off of work.

And doing all of those things is okay. We should want our house clean, cook supper, have clean clothes, and most importantly spend time with our family. Those things are all what we want to do. But it sometimes feels impossible to get it all done. But those things also consume us a good part of the time and we forget that we need to just stop occasionally and take it all in.

And that’s what I did in Georgia. I took it all in.

I spent time with family. Watched laughter, heard stories, and looked at old family pictures. Things that is just super hard to do with all the things that we have to do throughout the day. And you know what the best part was? It was so relaxing. A lot of times when we go on trips we feel like we need another day to relax from the trip but on this one was all relaxing. I didn’t have to worry about the house being clean, doing laundry, and since I couldn’t use the internet there was no facebook, Instagram and pinterest to take up my time.

Here’s my challenge to you today:
When you get home from work or church or whatever you’re doing today, go home. Just go, don’t turn the tv on, don’t get on your phone, don’t worry about the house. Just enjoy your little time that you have left of the day by yourself or with your family. Tell each other about your day, reminisce, dream. Just do it together. Don’t let this fast pace life take all of your time and you lose those moments with your family. We only have a little bit of time during the day, enjoy it while you can.

Dirty Glasses

Here lately I have been getting headaches almost every day. (If it’s not one thing wrong it’s another right?) It has been about a year since I had an eye exam so I figured it was getting close to time for another. I went this morning for my exam. I have been wearing glasses for the last year and I figured why not try contacts? I wouldn’t have to worry about them falling off, taking them off to clean them, and so on and so on. The exam went smoothly and quickly. I do have contacts now and can see more clearly than ever. I struggled to put them in at first but everyone says it gets easier.

Thought:

Sometimes we think we are seeing something so clearly but we aren’t really seeing clearly at all.

I thought my glasses were helping me to see well. When in reality, it wasn’t doing much good at all. One of my eyes sees far off and the other sees close up. Glasses do get dirty pretty easily and you do have to clean them probably daily. All the dirty and grittiness on the glasses can distort your vision. Causing you to see a tad blurry.

When you think you see something so clearly, the only way to know for sure is to turn to the One who can clear your obstructed views.
Maybe you have to make an important decision and you don’t know which way to go. Turn to God. Ask Him to remove anything that may cause you to see things that aren’t really there, to remove and dirt and grittiness that may hinder this decision.  And ask Him to make the way so clear that you know without a doubt which way to go in the decision making.