Tag: marraige

Posted in Creation, Fathers Love, Marraige, spiritual warfare, worship

Bone of My Bone–Genesis 2 Part 3

Posted on by Michael Smith
God knew from the beginning that people needed people to be complete.  Marriage was a critical part of life from the beginning of man’s rule of the Garden.  Interestingly enough, however, God took special care to make men and women.  Unlike the filling the earth with fish, birds, lizards and bears…God took special care in his creation of Man–and Woman. 
 
It was never God’s idea to make one superior over the other; instead, his desire was for the couple to complete each other and as a pair–be a strong representative of him.  One of the coolest pictures of God is a couple–in love with him and each other.  While not naked, they tend to be very transparent and open–they show selflessness and peace.  It is a beautiful picture of how, when done well, God’s plan always works.  Thanks, Lord, for taking your time to create men and women. Thanks also that you made us better together and equal than apart and in competition!
 
God Bless You
The Lord God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it. 16 And the Lord God commanded the man, “You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; 17 but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat from it you will certainly die.”18 The Lord God said, “It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper suitable for him.”

19 Now the Lord God had formed out of the ground all the wild animals and all the birds in the sky. He brought them to the man to see what he would name them; and whatever the man called each living creature, that was its name. 20 So the man gave names to all the livestock, the birds in the sky and all the wild animals.

But for Adam[f] no suitable helper was found. 21 So the Lord God caused the man to fall into a deep sleep; and while he was sleeping, he took one of the man’s ribs[g] and then closed up the place with flesh. 22 Then the Lord God made a woman from the rib[h] he had taken out of the man, and he brought her to the man.

23 The man said,

“This is now bone of my bones
    and flesh of my flesh;
she shall be called ‘woman,’
    for she was taken out of man.”

24 That is why a man leaves his father and mother and is united to his wife, and they become one flesh.

25 Adam and his wife were both naked, and they felt no shame.

Posted in A Father's Love, Creation, Devotions, Holiness, Marraige

We All Need Someone–Genesis 2 Final

Posted on by Michael Smith

God quickly saw the need for fellowship in our lives.  As God created the animals and had the man name them, He saw that man needed a helper like everyone else.  He had hoped that fellowship with God would be sufficient, but saw quickly that man needed a person to love and to do life with.  WOW-MAN, (the loose translation) was everything that the man could have ever hoped or dreamed for!!! God knew what he was doing.  He made man a partner that would fill in all the gaps.

We, as husbands, often forget how amazing our wives really are.  God created them to come along side and complete us.  They sharpen us when we are blindly dull.  They make us presentable in public–when we would attack the world mismatched and stained.  They raise our kids, feed our faces, keep our family together and put the woman’s touch on our lives to make life bearable.  In exchange, we leave our clothes on the floor, our food on the table and our manners at the door.  What a fair exchange :(.  As husbands, we need to treat our wives with the love and devotion they deserve, but , never receive!

I love my wife–I am the most fortunate person on the planet; and, when I see that WOW-MAN he gave me–I really know how loving and great God is to give me such a treasure!!!

God Bless You

Then the Lord God said, “It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper who is just right for him.” 19 So the Lord God formed from the ground all the wild animals and all the birds of the sky. He brought them to the man[c] to see what he would call them, and the man chose a name for each one. 20 He gave names to all the livestock, all the birds of the sky, and all the wild animals. But still there was no helper just right for him.

21 So the Lord God caused the man to fall into a deep sleep. While the man slept, the Lord God took out one of the man’s ribs[d] and closed up the opening. 22 Then the Lord God made a woman from the rib, and he brought her to the man.

23 “At last!” the man exclaimed.

“This one is bone from my bone,
    and flesh from my flesh!
She will be called ‘woman,’
    because she was taken from ‘man.’”

24 This explains why a man leaves his father and mother and is joined to his wife, and the two are united into one.

25 Now the man and his wife were both naked, but they felt no shame.

Posted in Devotions

Marraige–Ephesians 5 part 2

Posted on by Michael Smith

Having officiated at several weddings, I have realized there are few verses more helpful to couples than the passage in Ephesians 5.  The bottom line–Submit to God and to one another.  Marriage is an amazing and mystical covenant that transforms 2 perfectly good human beings into one.  But, to accomplish such a miracle, both need to submit to God and each other. The world would have it go the other way–no submission.  Equal rights and self-protection are pillars of  the current world view.

That is why God calls us to be different.  If we continue to live differently according to God’s will, then we replace the world’s illusion of independence with God’s gift of freedom.  Marriage is God’s picture of his desire for the covenant he has with us. In every relationship based upon love, the desire is to see the one we love freed from anything that would entrap or entangle them.  God says–to be free in marriage, don’t take the throne, take the knee.  Be great–by submitting and sacrificing for each other.  As you seek to promote one another, two perfectly good human beings transform into one awesome married couple.  One awesome married couple is the best picture of all the attributes of God wrapped into one. That is why when you are with a couple that lives a life of mutual submission, you never want to leave.

God Bless You

21 Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ.

22 Wives, submit yourselves to your own husbands as you do to the Lord. 23 For the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church, his body, of which he is the Savior. 24 Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit to their husbands in everything.

25 Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her 26 to make her holy, cleansing[b] her by the washing with water through the word, 27 and to present her to himself as a radiant church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless. 28 In this same way, husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself.

Posted in Devotions

Matthew 19 part 1–The Pain of Divorce

Posted on by Michael Smith

The more things change, the more they remain the same.  The Pharisees were trying to trap Jesus with one of those real controversial issues of then and now—Divorce. Since Adam and Eve–marriage has remained under attack.  The enemy used sin to divide husband and wife at the beginning and continues to do so today.  The enemy has used strife, sexual immorality, social relativism and “tolerance” to so skew the lines that today as in Sodom and Gomorra, Greece and Rome the world has scrapped what a family is and replaced it with what people wish it to be.

Divorce inside and outside the church has broken many great people.  Praise God that he can restore the broken hearts.  He can bless new families that are committed to following him. As in Moses time, God allowed divorce then and does so now—but he hates it.  It is devastating and life altering.  He would rather see us cling to the covenant in all circumstance. He does continue to love his kids even after they have been broken.

As husbands, we need to love our wives and be the servant leader called for in Ephesians 5.  We need to be faithful in both word and deed. Our kids need to say of us—My dad loved my Mom and he loved us! Dads must be centered on God and his word and in prayer daily for wives and kids.  Wives must hold the family together as the chief of operations.  They have to turn the unruly group into a family and the house into a home. Most importantly, couples have to think and act as one. They are a united front against the world, its culture and the trials of parenting, finances and health.

Thank You, Lord for my wife—help her to remain secure in your love, my devotion and the plan you have prepared for us.

God Bless You

When Jesus had finished saying these things, he left Galilee and went down to the region of Judea east of the Jordan River. 2 Large crowds followed him there, and he healed their sick.

3 Some Pharisees came and tried to trap him with this question: “Should a man be allowed to divorce his wife for just any reason?”

4 “Haven’t you read the Scriptures?” Jesus replied. “They record that from the beginning ‘God made them male and female.’[a]” 5 And he said, “‘This explains why a man leaves his father and mother and is joined to his wife, and the two are united into one.’[b] 6 Since they are no longer two but one, let no one split apart what God has joined together.”

7 “Then why did Moses say in the law that a man could give his wife a written notice of divorce and send her away?”[c] they asked.

8 Jesus replied, “Moses permitted divorce only as a concession to your hard hearts, but it was not what God had originally intended. 9 And I tell you this, whoever divorces his wife and marries someone else commits adultery—unless his wife has been unfaithful