Grace for My Home | Christian Women, Growing in Faith, Spirit-Led, Hearing from God, Sowing Truth
Are you a Christian woman who wants to grow in your faith? Do you long for a godly vision for your home that will inspire you to be faithful in your calling as a wife & mom, even through challenging times? Do you wish you had a better understanding of God’s plan for you and your family? If so, I have great news for you. These are God’s desires for you too! In fact, I believe He is the One who plants these desires deep in the hearts of His daughters. He wants to help you find the answers you need. Grace for My Home is a podcast dedicated to helping Christian women grow in their faith as they raise their families. Each week Audrey shares encouraging stories, messages, and insights to help you keep your eyes on the high calling of motherhood in the midst of messy every day life. For more mama encouragement visit: // graceformyhome.com.
Grace for My Home | Christian Women, Growing in Faith, Spirit-Led, Hearing from God, Sowing Truth
The Most Important Thing You Can Do for Your Marriage
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Hello friends, welcome back to Grace From my Home. My name is Audrey McCracken and I'm so glad to be back with you again this week. I hope that you're doing well. If you've been following along, you'll know that we're in the middle of a four-part series on marriage and I hope that this series is helpful and encouraging to you. It's something that's very near and dear to my heart and my heart. My desire is to help you, is to help you in your marriage and in your walk with the Lord. In honor of this series, I've put together a free resource for you. It's called Seven Powerful Prayers to Pray Over your Husband and I'll put the link to that in the show notes and I just want to encourage you to go and download that and pray these prayers for your husband.
Speaker 1:I have found in many times in my life when I prayed for my husband, god did something in me. Yes, he did something to my husband and he did something in our marriage. But prayer did something to my husband and he did something in our marriage. But prayer, a lot of times it's for us, because as we pray for other people, god does a work in our heart. As we're praying for our husband, god will help us to love him with his love. It's hard to pray for somebody and stay mad at them. It's hard to pray for somebody and be offended at them. You know, for long if we pray sincerely, god does a work in us, and so I want to encourage you to go get that free resource Seven Powerful Prayers to Pray Over your Husband you can find that in the show notes and enjoy that.
Speaker 1:This week, I want to talk with you about the most important issue in marriage. I want to talk with you about the most important issue in marriage, but before I start, I want to remind you, like I did last week, that what I'm sharing with you is the ideal. This is how I believe God intended marriage to work from the beginning, but he also created marriage in Eden, and in Eden everything's perfect. We don't live in Eden anymore. We live in the fallen place, we live in a broken world, and so sometimes marriage a lot of times marriage can be complicated. You know relationships. We're dealing with other people. We're dealing with other people. We're dealing with hard issues. It's hard, and a lot of people have been burned by marriage by someone they cared about deeply, and so I just put that out there to say that what I'm sharing with you. If it does not fit where you are, if it's not helpful where you find yourself, then that you know that's fine, we can still be friends, right. But what I'm sharing with you, if you're looking for help in your marriage, if you want to see things in a new way, if you need some hope, if you need some encouragement in your marriage, then I hope that you will find this useful. Now I want to get into the message today and I want to kind of set up the stage.
Speaker 1:We were created by God for relationship. We were the last thing he created in the garden and he made us with an amazing ability to love and to be loved and to be in relationship. And he made us to be in relationship with himself and with other people. You know, god made Adam to fellowship with him, placed him in a beautiful garden, came down in the cool of the day to spend time with him, but he saw it wasn't good for man to be alone. So he made him a partner and he made Eve and he brought them together and it says that they, the two, became one, that became one flesh, and they knew each other intimately. It says they were naked and not ashamed and they fellowshiped together. And that was the first marriage and it was right, and it was good and it was godly and it was perfect, until sin entered the picture.
Speaker 1:And, like I said last week, anything that sin touches, it destroys, it kills. And so when Adam disobeyed God, god had already told him if you disobey, you will die. Well, adam didn't die instantly, at least not in his body, but in his spirit. See, adam, god created Adam, created us with a body, with a soul and with a spirit. And so when Adam sinned, he did not die immediately in his body, but he did in his spirit. See, your spirit is where you commune with God. And when Adam sinned, his communion with God was broken and he was no longer able to have that close fellowship, that relationship with God. He was cut off from God, he was removed from Eden, and it wasn't until Jesus came that man was restored in fellowship with God by the Spirit of God. You know, when we're born again, we're born of the Spirit. The Spirit of God comes and he dwells in us and we can have that fellowship with God that God intended from the beginning. Well, why do I mention all this Because each part of us has needs.
Speaker 1:God created us not to stand alone but to have needs we have. Our body has needs, our soul has needs and our spirit has needs. You know that your body has needs, right? I mean, you can't go so long without water and food and air. You have needs. You have needs for clothes, you have needs for shelter. Those are physical needs that your body has and those needs have to be met in order for you to survive and to thrive. Same thing with your soul. Your soul has needs and so does your spirit, and your spirit's need is for the Spirit of God. Our spirits need God. We cannot thrive spiritually without Him, god, we cannot thrive spiritually without him. We must spend time with him and that is how our spirits are fed.
Speaker 1:Now, some of our needs we can meet on our own. You know, babies, they can't meet any of their needs. But as a child matures and grows, they start being able, learning how to get their needs met. You know, I can cook a meal, my children they can make a hot dog. They might not can make a whole meal, but they're not going to starve if I'm not here. They learn how to meet some of their physical needs. So there are things that you know we can do to meet our own needs, but in the context of marriage, god puts a man and a woman together and each of them have needs and in a healthy relationship, each person meets each other's needs.
Speaker 1:Now, you know, as I meet my husband's needs and he meets my needs, there's goodwill in the relationship. You know there's love in the relationship, there's a trust that you know this person cares about me, this person's going to meet my needs, and so God puts us together to meet each other's needs. But there are needs, like I said, there are spiritual needs that my husband can't meet because he's not God. And when it gets confusing is when we start to put people in God's place or look to people, especially like to our husbands, to meet needs that they cannot meet, they are not designed to meet, that they could never meet. And I found this out early in marriage that when I was not growing closer to Jesus, when I was not fellowshipping with God, when I wasn't growing spiritually, I found myself looking to my husband to meet the needs that only Jesus can meet.
Speaker 1:See, jesus is the only one who can answer the important questions in our life. He is the only one that can satisfy us on a deep level, on the level of our spirit. See, jesus tells me who I am. He gives me my identity. Jesus tells me why I'm here. Jesus tells me why I'm here. Jesus loves me with an everlasting love. Jesus died for me. I am extremely important to Jesus and he wants to be number one in my life because he redeemed me, he created me, he knows me, he loves me.
Speaker 1:And so you know, even when Jesus was here on earth, he told his disciples in the Gospel of Luke Jesus, when he was here on earth, he told his disciples in Luke 14, luke 14, starting in verse 26. If any man come after me and not hate his father, his mother, his wife, his children, his brothers, his sisters, even his own life, he cannot be my disciple. Now, jesus, he didn't mean hate, as in despise your family. He wants us to love our family. But what he was saying is in comparison to me, there can be no close second. I want priority. I must be the main relationship in your life, and so when we put him as the main, as the most important relationship in our life, the other relationships fall into their proper perspective.
Speaker 1:But if I put someone in his place, everything is out of whack, everything's out of shape and there's confusion. See, when I look to my husband to validate me, when I look to him for my identity, or when I put on him an expectation of making me feel worthy or making me feel loved or, you know, making me feel like I have worth, self-worth, then what happens is I'm putting him in God's place. See, that's God's job. God made me, he knows what I'm worth. He gave me my worth. He's the one who tells me who I am, and you know. And so when Jesus is first, then I have a confidence, I can serve my husband and I can even give him grace when he messes up.
Speaker 1:See, because I'm not draining from him or I'm not sucking from him the life that I'm supposed to be getting from God. See, god has an endless supply of life. He has an endless supply of love. I cannot exhaust his resources. And so when I go to him to get my needs met, then I can meet my husband's needs and I can allow him to meet the needs that he's able to meet, that he's qualified to meet. So there's nothing wrong with wanting your husband to love you. He should love you. The Bible tells him to love you. You know that's a right relationship.
Speaker 1:But when it gets messed up is when we try to make his love or our husband's love replace or be as strong as God's love. He can't love us with that kind of love because he's not God. And so when we put that burden on him to make me feel secure, or when we put that expectation on him, on our husbands, to love us in the way only God can love us, then and that's not fair, because he can't do that. He's just a man, he's just a person. And so when we put God first, when we put Jesus first, then it flows better. See, when I go to Jesus and I spend time with him and I spend time in prayer, I spend time in worship, when I spend time in the word, then Jesus feeds my spirit, he teaches me who I am, he gives me strength, he sets my feet on the rock, he heals me and then I can be the wife that my husband needs. And I'm not putting my unmet needs on my husband and I'm not asking him to meet the needs that only God can meet.
Speaker 1:See, when I first got married, god had done a big work in my life. He had done a lot in my heart. He had healed me of many things and I was not the person I was when I first met Jesus. You know, when I got married, god had done a big work in my heart, but there was still a lot left to do and there was a part of me that though I know he couldn't there was a part of me that just thought you know, we love each other so much that this love is going to heal some of the areas in my life, and it didn't. There were still areas that were hurt, there were still things that were not healed, and I was looking to my husband to make those things right and it wasn't fair to him because he's just a man. And so the Lord started showing me bring these things to me, I'm still your God. Things to me. I'm still your God, I'm still your source and I will heal you.
Speaker 1:But don't get angry at your husband because he doesn't know how. He is not a healer. God is my healer. Michael is not. Michael is just a man and he has his own issues and his own places where he needs to be healed. See, it works both ways. I can't heal Michael. There's things I wish I could do for Michael, but I can't because I'm just a woman. You know. I can love him, I can provide the needs I can meet, the needs that God allows me to meet, but when it comes to spiritual things, when it comes to things of the heart, I can pray for him, but God has to do that work. And so it also taught me in this. You know, when I'm learning this.
Speaker 1:It also taught me not to put unrealistic expectations on my husband. You know, when we get married, we have in our mind, in our mind's eye, how it's going to be, what it's going to look like and how we want things to be. And it never looks that way. And sometimes we have expectations of how we want our husband to act, how we want him to treat us, the things we want him to do without being prodded or asked. We have in our mind the fairy tale, and I love fairy tales and I love love stories. There's a reason why people love love stories because there's something in us that that greatly desires that kind of love, and I think that's a God given thing.
Speaker 1:But think about it when we watch movies, love stories, it's usually leading up to the couple getting together, right? The fairy tale ends with and they lived happily ever after. And that's after, you know, they've struggled to get together and now they're together. Well, marriage is the after part and it's up to us if it's going to be happily ever after. See, we have very little examples of what true love, what good marriage looks like, because all of our stories end when they finally commit to each other. Well, what does that look like? What does it look when they finally commit to each other? It means that they get to see the ugly parts, and the vows that you make on your wedding day are the things that keep you together when you start seeing the ugly parts.
Speaker 1:And so a love story. There's a lot more to it than what we are normally exposed to. We get to write our own love story and we get to decide how it ends. So it's not easy, it's never easy, but it's worth it. But when we put unrealistic expectations on our husband, on our marriage, then it sets us up for failure. Because if it's not realistic but we've got our heart set on, it's got to look this certain way or he's got to be this certain way, then we're not going to be happy with reality. I mean, we're just not going to be happy, we're going to be frustrated because it doesn't look like we think it should look.
Speaker 1:And so the question isn't you know how do I want it to look? But what is marriage supposed to look like? You know, lord, how is this supposed to work? God uses marriage to change us. He uses it to work in us to make us more like Jesus. And marriage is good. It's God's idea. He created it. It forces us to mature. It forces us to get real in some areas. It causes us to let go of some things that we've believed about love, about commitment that aren't necessarily true. And, you know, it teaches us a lot about us, teaches us a lot about God, definitely teaches us a lot about our spouse, and so I hope today that this has been helpful.
Speaker 1:I hope that something I've said today has encouraged you or at least helped you think about things in a different way. And, as always, if you have any questions or if you'd like to reach out and connect, please do so. I love getting fan mail from you guys. I love getting emails and messages on Facebook and Instagram, so please reach out and let me know. You're listening, and if there are any topics that you'd like me to talk about, I'd love to know, because I'm always struggling with you know, what should I speak on next? You know what would be helpful, so let me know and I will. I'll speak to that if I feel qualified, if I feel like that's something I could actually add value by speaking about. But God bless you. Have a great week. Talk to you soon.