Tag: jesus

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Marriage Single Spiritual Intimacy

Three Treasures of a Spouse In Love With Jesus

Happy together. Young man kissing beautiful cheerful women while she hugging him and looking at the camera.

I walked into our church’s youth building fifteen years ago. I saw a blonde-haired girl sitting on the floor in a flannel shirt and rolled up jeans, practicing her guitar before the youth service began. She had her eyes closed and an angelic melody was coming out of her, like I had never heard before. When the youth pastor asked her to open the service, she kept her eyes closed and sang to the Lord from her very core. When she spoke, she didn’t speak like the other girls; her tone was different, her demeanor was different, and her focus was different.
I was delightfully baffled and wholly fascinated by this girl who spoke about Jesus as if He were a Friend. Fifteen years later, we are married and have three children. Her unique love and devotion to Christ continues to fascinate me. Proverbs 18:22 says, “He who finds a wife finds a good thing.” I would venture to say that he who finds a wife who loves Jesus finds a great thing.
Here are three treasures of a spouse who is in love with Jesus:

  1. Joy–As Nehemiah 8:10 says, “The joy of the Lord is your strength.” Joy doesn’t mean an unlimited supply of happiness, but it is a resting place of delight and satisfaction, which result in peace. When a person encounters Jesus, they encounter pure joy. It is a promised additive to Christ’s disciples.

Paul says that the Fruit of the Spirit (the by-product of the Holy Spirit) “is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control.” (Galatians 5:22-23) My wife doesn’t walk around with a glued-on, plastic smile, but she is a person who laughs even in darkness and waves the banner of God’s majesty and faithfulness, no matter how dark the storm clouds look. This is joy.

  1. Stability–Those storm clouds I mentioned above have no permanent foothold in a person who is in love with Jesus. The Apostle Paul speaks of a people who are steadfast in their faith: “…We will no longer be infants, tossed back and forth by the waves, and blown here and there by every wind of teaching and by the cunning and craftiness of people in their deceitful scheming.” (Eph. 4:14)

My wife may have moments of wavering in overwhelming opposition, but she has never been swept away into a lifestyle of deceit or been shipwrecked in her faith. No, my wife is sure-footed as a deer. (Psalm 18:33) Trust me, when those storm clouds choke out the last ray of sunlight, it sure is beautiful to see my wife staring into the storm with a resolute face that says, “I will not be shaken.”

  1. Wisdom—A person who loves Jesus has the mind of Christ. (1 Cor. 2:16) As a couple, we seek the Lord together on everything. We depend on Him. The beauty of a Godly marriage is that two people who have a unique, living, dynamic, friendship with God come together and have a friendship with God together in a way that is equally as unique as the individual relationship with the Lord. The Lord reveals things to Sarah that I haven’t seen yet, and vice versa. True wisdom comes from Him. Many times, the Lord has hidden the answer to a problem in the depths of my wife’s heart, and it is when I ask her what she sees in the situation that I actually can see the heart of God in the situation. I can trust God’s wisdom in her.

I cherish the treasures of Christ that He has deposited in my wife. What are other treasures you see in a person in love with Jesus?

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Dating/Courting Single

How to Find and Date the Perfect Gentleman

Let’s face it, we all want to date the perfect gentleman! Most women would love a man who answers her calls, lifts her up when she’s down, recognizes her worth, pushes her towards her dreams and goals, and opens doors for her.
Often times, we as women settle for less then God’s best; some out of loneliness, some out of desperation and others out of a lack of understanding as to how they deserve to be treated! Me, I was the girl who simply didn’t understand just how much I was worth. But that’s the thing about dating a gentleman; he’ll never allow you to forget just how special you are.
I remember deciding I was tired of being mistreated by guys who spoke down on me, called me out of my name, and was just down right disrespectful. I remember sitting on my dorm room floor crying out to God regarding my feelings of hurt. It’s almost as if he said, “Well, date me”.
Now I’ve always thought people who “dated” Jesus were just weird and lonely (lbs). But it was after failed relationships with man, that I decided to make room for the ULTIMATE gentleman. So where did I find this gentleman? I found him in my quiet time, hidden in my word (the Bible)!
The more time I spent with Jesus, the more time he spent with me, the more I became acquainted with his voice, the more he shared his thoughts regarding me, the more he affirmed who I was created to be and the more doors he opened for me, among other things.
Though I once thought it was weird to “date” Jesus, it was in dating him that I realized what I really wanted and what I deserved in a man. I realized that a “thug” didn’t have the capacity to love the woman of God, God created me to be. I learned that a man who doesn’t have God’s own heart could never treat me as Jesus did! It was in dating Jesus that I realized EXACTLY what I deserved and wanted!
So you want to date a perfect gentleman, huh? Start with dating THEE perfect gentleman. When you get to know him, it’ll be easier to recognize his heartbeat in the heartbeat of others. It’ll be easier to turn away from those who don’t display his characteristics. Finally, it’ll be easier to be found by the one who will love you and treat you as Jesus did!
Much to my surprise, dating Jesus isn’t for the lonely and weird, it’s for the wise!
Be encouraged!
Shannon C Colar

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7 Ways to Survive a Hard Season

“I used to be so bold. I had dreams. Now I’m just a bench warmer.” Such were my thoughts after returning from the mission field. Though we had heard God’s instruction to return home, I carried a sense of failure. I felt like I had laid everything to rest that I had fought so hard for, but I couldn’t explain why. I was feeling tired, invisible, easily offended, discouraged, and extremely cynical.
I wish it weren’t so, but there are just some things we only learn in the wilderness. The wilderness (or some call it the valley) is that special little place where it seems like God is silent, everybody hates you, and everything that can go wrong, will.
All sarcasm aside, we have all experienced it.
When these season fall upon us, every corner of our lives is affected, not excluding marriage. The Bible, in Matthew 4, Mark 1, and Luke 4, tells us how Jesus dealt with the wilderness. Though Jesus’ wilderness experience demonstrated that Jesus is the Son of God, it also created a template for us to grasp in those dry times.
If you’re married, the wilderness will affect either you, your spouse, or both of you. In fact, in my experience, I haven’t been through one of these dry seasons in which my wife wasn’t right there with me, staving off death, right alongside me.
Here are seven facts about the wilderness, your “Spiritual Wilderness Survival Guide”:
1. It’s hard. No sugar-coating, here. If you’re in the wilderness, I know it hurts. The wilderness, either by God’s design, your own, or the enemy’s is very hard. (John 16:33)
2. It’s a season. Ecclesiastes 3 reminds us of the seasons of life for every person. God may have you in your season of the wilderness for a year, maybe two, or maybe just for a few months. Every season varies. We see examples of long seasons of the wilderness (Numbers 32:13) and shorter seasons (Matthew 4, Mark 1, Luke 4). The encouraging takeaway is this: it won’t last forever.
3. God is sovereign. The Gospel accounts of the Lord’s wilderness experience depict a God-ordained wilderness. Maybe you caused your wilderness. Maybe Hell’s assignment against you is ferocious. Or maybe the Lord is developing faith that won’t blow over in the wind on the mountains.
4. Discouragement is your worst enemy in this season. If you find yourself trekking through the lonely valley, discouragement is the enemy’s weapon of choice. He loves to dismantle the notion of divine destiny. He thrives when you heed phantom, irrational fears. Know this: if you’re in the wilderness and you’re discouraged, you are a target. (I Peter 4:12, Hebrews 4:15)
5. Prayer and worship will carry you vast distances. In Acts 16:25-34 Paul and Silas sang in their prison! In my own seasons of the wilderness, worship was not desirous at all. I didn’t want to fabricate love when I didn’t feel it. But this weapon of worship is a game-changer! Worship, even when you don’t feel it, speaks the language of faith, which God pursues! Don’t hold back your song. Pray together, couples! You just may be a song away from the valley to the mountain.
6. Your spouse is not the enemy. In the wilderness moments, when the tension and chaos of life relentlessly infringe on your peace, there’s a tendency for hardness of heart to turn spouses against one another. In our wilderness season, I interpreted my wife’s exhortations as criticism and pretension! Your spouse is not your enemy, that’s a mirage. Your journey in the wilderness is your spouse’s journey in the wilderness. Encourage one another in the Lord!
7. There is war in the wilderness. Jesus didn’t surrender. He knew His authority! With every “right-hook lie” of the enemy, Jesus countered with the Sword of the Spirit — God’s Word! In the wilderness seasons, it may seem like nothing is going right. Your car may break down, your health goes haywire, dissension rises in your family. Rise up, husbands. Don’t despair, wives. Don’t buckle, knuckle up! You’re not a victor, you’re more than a conqueror (Romans 8:37)!
Run to God, cling to your spouse, and fasten your eyes on hope. The wilderness is a season and God has a reason.
What have you learned in the wilderness?

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The Power In Comparing Yourself to Jesus in Your Marriage

 
Husbands, don’t compare yourself to Ryan Gosling’s character in The Notebook. Don’t compare yourself to your father; and especially don’t compare yourself to Don Draper in Mad Men, because the one thing that this group, which includes myself, has in common is that we all fall short as husbands in comparison to the Bridegroom: Jesus Christ.
It doesn’t matter how good or how bad you look when comparing yourself to one of the aforementioned husbands, because when you look at how Jesus loves His bride, you realize that we are all equally unworthy of admiration.
In the book of Ephesians, Paul told the husbands in Ephesus to “love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her.”1
I believe that as husbands we love our wives, and I’m sure we would give up our lives for them. But as romantic as this pledge of laying down your life for your wife sounds, the act of giving yourself up for your bride begins much sooner.
You don’t just tell your wife that you’ll lay down your life for her during your wedding day, but you prove it to her the day after your wedding day, and until the last day you are together. But what does giving yourself up look like?
When wondering what it looks like to “give [yourselfup for her,” look to Christ. Jesus was someone who spoke of his love for people, but he also proved his love for them. We see this when we read that Jesus “came not to be served, but to serve.”2
Husbands, are you a servant? Or do you expect to be served? If the latter, may I suggest looking to the humbleness of Christ. He is God, but out of love for His people, he humbled himself and served them. He went as far as washing their feet! And this was at a time when sweat resistant socks and Nike’s were not available. And here I am, struggling to rub my wife’s feet. If you are honest with yourself, you will see how miserably you have failed. You may have done some good, and for that I encourage you to continue, but husbands, we are all a work in progress. We all fall short of Christ’s example.
So what do we do; do we sit around drowning in a sea of our own self-loathing because we failed as husbands? Of course not! The great thing about Jesus is that because he loves his bride, He gave Himself up for her, and He bought her back from her old master (Sin and Death).
Husbands, we are Christ’s bride, and we are seeing daily how Jesus is a greater husband than we are. In light of this freeing knowledge, the first thing we should do is repent. We repent before the Lord and before our spouse for failing to live up to the call of Ephesians 5:25. After a time of repentance, have a conversation with your spouse. Ask her how she would like to be served, and hopefully you will find ways to serve. It can be washing the dishes, or in my case, even rubbing her feet. Giving up your life for your spouse begins with the little things in life.
When we seek to compare ourselves to someone, that someone should always be Christ. Looking at his life will convict us, motivate us, and will compel us to change. Through that process, your marriage will see growth, Christ will be glorified, and the Gospel will be exemplified. May we continue running this race with endurance for the glory of God, and for the good of our marriages. Soli Deo Gloria.

About the Author:

Eddie Mercado is a Pre-Seminary student at Kuyper College. He serves his church as a worship director, where he leads the local church in worshiping the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost through song. Him and his wife, Hillary, are expecting a child this September. They reside in Grand Rapids, MI.