The following was composed by Andy Naselli from chapter 12 of Paul David Tripp’s What Did You Expect?: Redeeming the Realities of Marriage
What is love?
Love is willing self-sacrifice for the good of another that does not require reciprocation or that the person being loved is deserving.
What does love look like in marriage?
- Love is being willing to have your life complicated by the needs and struggles of your husband or wife without impatience or anger.
- Love is actively fighting the temptation to be critical and judgmental toward your spouse, while looking for ways to encourage and praise.
- Love is the daily commitment to resist the needless moments of conflict that come from pointing out and responding to minor offenses.
- Love is being lovingly honest and humbly approachable in times of misunderstanding, and being more committed to unity and love than you are to winning, accusing, or being right.
- Love is a daily commitment to admit your sin, weakness, and failure and to resist the temptation to offer an excuse or shift the blame.
- Love means being willing, when confronted by your spouse, to examine your heart rather than rising to your defense or shifting the focus.
- Love is a daily commitment to grow in love so that the love you offer to your husband or wife is increasingly selfless, mature, and patient.
- Love is being unwilling to do what is wrong when you have been wronged but to look for concrete and specific ways to overcome evil with good.
- Love is being a good student of your spouse, looking for his physical, emotional, and spiritual needs so that in some way you can remove the burden, support him as he carries it, or encourage him along the way.
- Love means being willing to invest the time necessary to discuss, examine, and understand the problems that you face as a couple, staying on task until the problem is removed or you have agreed upon a strategy of response.
- Love is always being willing to ask for forgiveness and always being committed to grant forgiveness when it is requested.
- Love is recognizing the high value of trust in a marriage and being faithful to your promises and true to your word.
- Love is speaking kindly and gently, even in moments of disagreement, refusing to attack your spouse’s character or assault his or her intelligence.
- Love is being unwilling to flatter, lie, manipulate, or deceive in any way in order to co-opt your spouse into giving you what you want or doing something your way.
- Love is being unwilling to ask your spouse to be the source of your identity, meaning and purpose, or inner sense of well-being, while refusing to be the source of his or hers.
- Love is the willingness to have less free time, less sleep, and a busier schedule in order to be faithful to what God has called you to be and to do as a husband or a wife.
- Love is a commitment to say “no” to selfish instincts and to do everything that is within your ability to promote real unity, functional understanding, and active love in your marriage.
- Love is staying faithful to your commitment to treat your spouse with appreciation, respect, and grace, even in moments when he or she doesn’t seem to deserve it or is unwilling to reciprocate.
- Love is the willingness to make regular and costly sacrifices for the sake of your marriage without asking anything in return or using your sacrifices to place your spouse in your debt.
- Love is being unwilling to make any personal decision or choice that would harm your marriage, hurt your husband or wife, or weaken the bond of trust between you.
- Love is refusing to be self-focused or demanding but instead looking for specific ways to serve, support, and encourage, even when you are busy or tired.
- Love is daily admitting to yourself, your spouse, and God that you are not able to love this way without God’s protecting, providing, forgiving, rescuing, and delivering grace.
- Love is a specific commitment of the heart to a specific person that causes you to give yourself to a specific lifestyle of care that requires you to be willing to make sacrifices that have that person’s good in view.
What should this description of love do to us?
This realization should give you pause and then spur you to action: it is impossible for any of us to love as has been described. The bar is simply too high. The requirements are simply too great. None of us has what it takes to reach this standard. This description of love in action has left me humbled and grieved. It has faced me once again with my tendency to name as love things that are not love. It has forced me to admit how self-focused and self-absorbed I actually am. It has reminded me that when it comes to love, I am not an expert. No, I am poor, weak, and needy.
Jesus died not only so that we would have forgiveness for not loving as we should, but also so that we would have the desire, wisdom, and power to love as we should.
Jesus suffered in love so that in your struggle to love you would never, ever be alone. As you give yourself to love, he showers you with his love, so that you would never be without what you need to love.
Living the Love Dare: A Year of Daily Reminders to Lead Your Heart
Day 83
You can tell a lot about the state of a couple’s relationship from the way they greet one another. You can see it in their expression and countenance, as well as how they speak to each other.
Day 84
A good greeting sets the stage for positive and healthy interaction. Like love, it puts wind in your sails.
Day 85
Think back to the story Jesus told of the prodigal son. Of all the scenarios this young man had played over in his mind, this was likely the last one he expected. But how do you think it made him feel to receive his father’s embrace and hear his thankful tone? He no doubt felt loved and treasured once again. What do you think it did in their relationship? What kind of greetings would make your mate feel like that?
Day 86
Think of the opportunities you have to greet each other on a regular basis. When coming through the door. When meeting for lunch. When saying good-night. When talking on the phone.
Day 87
Your greeting and expressions of love don’t have to be bold and dramatic every time. But adding warmth and enthusiasm gives you the chance to touch your mate’s heart in subtle, unspoken ways.
Day 88
Love is a choice. Choose to love.
Day 89
Think about your greeting. Do you use it well? Does your spouse feel valued and appreciated? Do they feel loved? Even when you’re not getting along, you can lessen the tension and give them value by the way you greet them.
How about you? Could your greetings use some tweaking?
Looking for a way to jump-start a healthy discussion and honest evaluation of the state of your marriage? Rob Lister has compiled 15 questions to help you do just that.
Every 6 months, Rob and his wife ask each other these questions as a tool to promote constructive communication with each other. He’s even included an article filled with practical suggestions on how to initiate and maximize the conversation.
Download the full PDF file here.
Below are the 15 questions:
- On a scale of 1-10, give your overall assessment of our marriage in the past six months. To be sure, this is a very broad and subjective item, but I have found it helpful to open the conversation with an item of this kind of breadth, because it helps to prime the pump. Obviously, you won’t hit on a ton of specifics with this one—that’s what the rest of the questions are for—but I have been truly amazed at just how much discussion this assessment alone can generate, as various issues come to mind. From there, we’re off and running. Follow-up questions in the event that the conversation fails to gain traction initially: What have been the strengths of the past six months? What would make your assessment higher?
- How has the husband’s leadership been over the past six months? The wife’s support? Follow-up: How can I improve in fulfilling my respective role?
- How is your walk with God, both personally and as a couple?
- Where do you see ungodliness in my life?
- Do I have any unconfessed sin that needs to be shared with my spouse?
- Are we guarding meaningful time together? Prayer? Conversation? Date Night?
- How is our sex life?
- What could I do to make you feel more loved/secure/respected?
- How can I serve you better?
- What are the issues that we need to anticipate in the upcoming six months?
- What’s your greatest personal disappointment and your greatest satisfaction in the last six months?
- How can I best pray for you?
- What are our major upcoming mutual prayer concerns?
- Spend a few moments, in an encouraging fashion, sharing several of the things that each of you loves and appreciates about the other.
- Then close, by spending some concerted time in prayer for those concerns you just shared, as well as thanking God for his faithfulness to you as a couple over the past six months.
“You are the salt of the earth, but if salt has lost its taste, how shall its saltiness be restored? It is no longer good for anything except to be thrown out and trampled under people’s feet.” (Matthew 5:13)
To gain and maintain influence you must have moral authority. Moral authority is the critical, nonnegotiable, can’t-be-without ingredient of sustained influence. Without moral authority, your influence will be limited and short-lived.
Moral authority is the credibility you earn by walking your talk. It is the relationship other people see between what you say and what you do, between what you claim to be and what you are. A person with moral authority is beyond reproach. That is, when you look for a discrepancy between what he says he believes and what he does, you come up empty. There is alignment between conviction and action, belief and behavior.
Nothing compensates for a lack of moral authority. No amount of communication skills, wealth, accomplishment, education, talent, or position can make up for a lack of moral authority. We all know plenty of people who have those qualities but who exercise no influence over us whatsoever. Why? Because there is a contradiction between what they claim to be and what we perceive them to be.
We will not allow ourselves to be influenced by those who lack moral authority in our eyes. Inconsistency between what is said and what is done inflicts a mortal wound on a leader’s influence.
For this reason, moral authority is a fragile thing. It takes a lifetime to earn. But it can be lost in a moment. And once it is lost, it is almost impossible to restore.
If others are aware of a discrepancy between what you say you believe and what you do, or between what you do and what you want them to do, you will have little moral authority. If people recognize alignment between your beliefs, actions, and expectations, you will have moral authority. It is all about walking your talk.
As a visionary, the one thing you can control and must protect at all costs is your moral authority. Moral authority makes you a leader worth following. Moral authority positions you to influence people at the deepest level: heart, mind, and conscience.
Family is a realm in which the significance of moral authority is easily evaluated and understood. Think for a moment about your parents. Were they (or are they) leaders worth following? Do thoughts of Mom and Dad elicit feelings of respect?
If so, it is because you perceive consistency or alignment between what they say and what they do. Your respect for them is not determined by their financial, academic, or social accomplishments alone. In fact, you may hold them in high regard in spite of their financial, academic or social standing. They have moral authority.
If, on the other hand, you have little respect for Mom and/or Dad, your feelings probably stem from what you perceive to be an inconsistency between what they said and did, what they claimed to be and what they truly were. And all the financial, academic, and social accolades in the world cannot compensate for the inconsistency.
Think for a moment. Isn’t it true that as their inconsistencies became more and more apparent, you found yourself less and less open to their influence? As they lost their moral authority, they lost their influence. On the other hand, parents who maintain their moral authority are able to maintain their influence throughout their children’s lives. Such is the power and potential of moral authority.
This same dynamic is at work in every marriage. As a husband, my ability to influence Sandra hinges on my competency and my moral authority. And the same is true of her influence over me. By being competent in an area, she can trust I know what I am talking about. But my moral authority, the alignment between what I say and do, is what enables her to trust my motive. My moral authority determines whether or not she believes I have her best interests in mind.
All the ability, talent, and charisma in the world cannot take the place of moral authority.
- Visioneering: God’s Blueprint for Developing and Maintaining Vision
Some good, practical insight on repentance and confession from an unknown author:
Proverbs 28:13 reads,
Whoever conceals his transgressions will not prosper, but he who confesses and forsakes them will obtain mercy.
As God opens your eyes to see how you have sinned against others, he simultaneously offers you a way to find freedom from your past wrongs. It is called confession. Many people have never experienced this freedom because they have never learned how to confess their wrongs honestly and unconditionally. Instead, they use words like these:
- “I’m sorry if I hurt you.”
- “Let’s just forget the past.”
- “I suppose I could have done a better job.”
- “I guess it’s not all your fault.”
These token statements rarely trigger genuine forgiveness and reconciliation. If you really want to make peace, ask God to help you breathe grace by humbly and thoroughly admitting your wrongs. One way to do this is to use the Seven A’s.
- Address everyone involved (all those whom you affected)
- Avoid “if,” “but,” and “maybe” (do not try to excuse your wrongs)
- Admit specifically (both attitudes and actions)
- Acknowledge the hurt (express sorrow for the pain you have caused)
- Accept the consequences (what liberties have you forfeited? where can restitution be made?)
- Alter your behavior (transgression must be confessed and forsaken)
- Ask for forgiveness (from God and from those affected by your actions)
If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness (1 John 1:8-9).
I’ve noticed a disturbing trend. There are a few posts here at InGodsImage.com that encourage the careful and responsible use of websites like Facebook:
- Ten Facebook Rules for Married Couples
- Ten Facebook Rules for Kids
- Facebook and the Road to Divorce
- No Secrets in Marriage
- God Watches You Google
As a result, people run across these posts when they use a search engine like Google. The interesting thing is, we leave digital footprints everywhere we go online. Everywhere. We. Go. That includes this site. In the interest of research and curiosity, I’ll occasionally scan through the recent search engine terms that led people to InGodsImage.com. Here’s where the disturbing trend comes into play. Take a look at some of the recent search terms that have led people to one of the above posts:
husband hides facebook
facebook alone with someone of the opposite sex
can facebook come between couples?
should spouses be friends on facebook?
she won’t give me her facebook password
sharing facebook password marriage
spouse as facebook friend
has no pictures of spouse on facebook
facebook relationship wife
facebook friends with your spouse?
should you have your wifes facebook password?
facebook guidelines for couples
facebook rules for married people
is facebook healthy for married people?
should married people use facebook
husband facebook won’t say he’s married
couples and facebook issues
commenting on a married persons facebook
boundaries for couples on facebook
why does spouse on facebook bother me
husband spends too much time on facebook
uncomfortable with spouse’s facebook
can my wife hide facebook photos?
how to get a facebook password wife
wife on facebook for hours every night
facebook divorce
wife hiding conversations on facebook
hiding facebook from your partner
my wife not sharing facebook password
why does spouse chatting on facebook bother me
how to crack a spouse’s password in facebook
Those are real searches of real people struggling with what certainly appear to be real problems—problems of integrity, honesty, faithfulness, and character.
Husbands, your heavenly Father commands you to love your wife as you love yourself (Ephesians 5:33). That command applies to your actions online. Your Facebook profile isn’t worth a ruptured marriage. If you can’t love your wife as you love yourself and maintain a presence on Facebook, better to delete your Facebook account than to fail your Creator and your spouse. “Love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her” (Ephesians 5:25). “Live with your wives in an understanding way, showing honor to the woman as the weaker vessel, since they are heirs with you of the grace of life, so that your prayers may not be hindered” (1 Peter 3:7).
Wives, almighty God commands you to respect your husband (Ephesians 5:33). That command applies to your actions online. Your Facebook profile isn’t worth a broken marriage. If you can’t serve as “a helper fit for your husband” (Genesis 2:20) and maintain a presence on Facebook, better to delete your Facebook account than to fail your Creator and your spouse. “An excellent wife who can find? She is far more precious than jewels. The heart of her husband trusts in her, and he will have no lack of gain. She does him good, and not harm, all the days of her life” (Proverbs 31:10-12).
Meditate on those God-breathed words. Love. Understanding. Honor. Trust. Don’t let something as trivial as Facebook defile your integrity, discredit your character, destroy your marriage, demean your vows, and dishonor your Father who is in heaven.
It was a few days ago, but it has stuck with me.
I was walking through our kitchen. Chloe was telling Shelly about her day at school. She mentioned that a friend had cried off and on all day. On the playground, when asked what was wrong by some of her 3rd-grade classmates, this little girl revealed that the night before she had been told that her parents were “breaking up.” At that point, one of Chloe’s other classmates laughed, told the little girl it would be alright, and remarked, “Nobody stays together anymore.”
The accepted concept of marriage in the eyes of this 3rd-grade girl was summed up in that one statement. Undoubtedly she had heard it before. She could say it with a laugh. And, intentionally or not, her words are one more shaping influence in several other 3rd-grade minds. “Nobody stays together anymore.”
Parents, work to give “good gifts to your children” (Matthew 7:11). Do what you can to create an environment where the hearts of your children are cheerful. Enjoy watching as they learn to walk in the ways of their hearts and the sight of their eyes (Ecclesiastes 11:9). Just remember that one of the greatest gifts you can possibly pass on to your children is the security produced by a father and mother who genuinely and selflessly love each other to the glory of God.
Enough money can buy any toy, but there isn’t enough money in the world to buy a cheerful heart. Job promotions can open exciting doors of opportunity, but job promotions can’t produce fulfilling marriages. Recreation can recharge our physical batteries, but recreation alone can’t repair broken hearts. A bigger house can provide more space, but a bigger house doesn’t equal a happy home.
Those selfish demands you’re making? They are eroding the foundation of your marriage.
Those disrespectful judgments that have become a regular part of your vocabulary at home? Your children are listening.
Those angry outbursts you’ve grown accustomed to inflicting? Each one is weakening the stability of your family.
The dishonesty that is characterizing more and more of your decisions? It will eventually consume you like a cancer.
The hidden lusts of the flesh you continue to sinfully gratify? They are lying to you. They will eventually cost you everything that matters.
Husbands and fathers, take a moment to imagine your son on the playground. Wives and mothers, take a moment to imagine your daughter nonchalantly remarking, “Nobody stays together anymore,” and offering her own parents as proof. Let’s be humbled by the fact that today’s actions will impact tomorrow’s circumstances. Today’s choices will strengthen or weaken tomorrow’s marriage. Today’s decisions will shape tomorrow for our children.
Be on guard today, and say a prayer for those children whose future has been made more difficult and lonely by the selfishness of their parents. May they find peace and fulfillment in a submissive relationship with the only perfect Father in heaven (Matthew 7:11).
Good thoughts for men and women from Luke Gilkerson who regularly writes for Breaking Free: The Journey Towards Purity in a Sex-Saturated Internet.
Former swimsuit model Elin Nordegren has reportedly avoided the limelight, despite the fact that she is married to the Athlete of the Decade, Tiger Woods. But with recent discoveries of Tiger’s multiple affairs, Elin couldn’t be grabbing more media attention.
It is saddening when we hear of shattered marriages and shattered homes, but for some, the celebrity gossip brings to mind other questions. Elin Nordegren is, by our cultural standards, a beautiful woman. Some would ask Tiger why he would seek sexual satisfaction elsewhere having married a woman like her?
The very question shows our culture’s premium placed on physical beauty, or at least certain physical standards. We receive hundreds of emails and comments from men who confess their habitual use of pornography, how countless hours of staring at pixilated sex has molded their conception of beauty.
We’ve also heard from hundreds of women who wonder why they are not enough for their porn-viewing husbands. We hear, “I’ll never measure up to porn standards.” This drives some women to reach for physical standards only attainable by anorexia, breast-enhancement, and photographic airbrushing. For others, this only leads to despair and giving up on the hope of intimacy with their husbands.
But Elin’s sad story should be instructive to frustrated wives everywhere. Becoming a Swedish bikini model is not the solution to your husband’s porn problem.
Of course, it is commendable to take care of our bodies. It only makes sense that we want to be attractive to our spouses. It only makes sense that we should seek sexual satisfaction in marriage. But becoming your husband’s unrealistic dream girl does not cure a deeply-rooted fixation on pornography.
As I wrote in Hard Core: Defeating Sexual Temptation with a Superior Satisfaction:
Pornography is a problem, but it is not the problem. Pornography is a sinful symptom of the problem. The adulterous affair is certainly a problem, but it is not the problem. The problem is treasuring other things, other people, and other pleasures more than we treasure God.
If we are going to help men and women of all ages win this battle, we must strike at the root of the problem. We must unashamedly examine God’s boundaries. We must call sin, sin. We must sound the call for righteous warfare. We must encourage our beloved brothers and sisters in Christ to be “steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that in the Lord your labor is not in vain” (1 Corinthians 15:58). We must dedicate ourselves to hard-core holiness.
Good, practical suggestions for the digital age from Trey Morgan below:
- Don’t spend more time on Facebook than you should. How much time is that? It depends on what your spouse says. Communicate with your spouse and ask them, “Am I spending too much time online?” You want to make sure your spouse is your #1 relationship, not your buddies on Facebook. Pursue your spouse more than you pursue online relationships. Don’t Facebook during “couple” time. (Husbands: when your wife asks you to watch a movie with her, do you Facebook through it? Wives: do you Facebook every night instead of going to bed with your husband?)
- NEVER hide things from your spouse on Facebook. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it 1,000 more times: openness and honestly is the glue of your marriage. When you start hiding friendships, conversations, chat sessions and comments from your spouse, that is unhealthy. If you’re not allowing your spouse to know what you’re doing on Facebook or online, that’s a sign that you’re doing something you shouldn’t be doing.
- Share your Facebook password with your spouse. I share every password with my wife … from my Facebook account to every e-mail address I have. Why would I want to do that? It’s called trust and accountability. Knowing my wife can open my laptop at anytime and read anything I’m doing, or see any place I’ve gone, keeps me accountable. Don’t hide things from your spouse. Make sure you regularly tell them, “You are welcome to see what I’m doing anytime.”
- NEVER befriend anyone of the opposite sex that your spouse is uncomfortable with. Think twice before befriending an old boyfriend or girlfriend. Simple communication with your spouse about this is best.
- Defriend anyone who crosses normal boundaries. If someone is saying things, doing things or asking questions online that make you uncomfortable OR would make you uncomfortable in person, then that’s not a good sign. Listen to the little voice in your head. If something tells you “this isn’t right,” then it’s probably not. Never be ashamed or afraid to defriend someone that may have ulterior motives.
- If you’re married, PROUDLY set your “Relationship Status” to married. I wish there was a “Happily Married” status or, for that matter, an “I’m madly in love with my incredibly gorgeous wife.” I’d change my status to that in a heartbeat.
- Post pictures of you and your spouse on your Facebook, or use a “couple” picture as your profile picture.
- Don’t be afraid to proclaim your love for your spouse on Facebook. Someone of the opposite sex won’t question your love for your spouse if you occasionally brag on your spouse on your Facebook status. It’s healthy to brag on your spouse, and occasionally doing it in public conveys your love for your spouse to the world. It doesn’t bother me one drop to tell the world just how much I love my wife. At the same time, I would NEVER use my status to complain about my spouse. Not smart!
- Think before you type. Don’t make comments on statuses and pictures of other people that come across as suggestive.
- No matter how many friends you have on Facebook, remember that your #1 friend should be your spouse. Strive to better that relationship on a daily basis. Work 1,000 times harder to grow in your marriage relationship than you do at finding friends on Facebook. NEVER take your relationship with your spouse for granted. The last thing you want is 1,000 Facebook friends, while the love between you and your best friend slowly dies out.
We can all grow and develop in our “I’m Sorry” ability. I recently read Ross Jones’ “Four Stages of I’m Sorry.”
Stage 1- I’m sorry, BUT…
I’m sorry BUT… is a non-apology. It’s a fake. It gives the appearance of apology but through the “But…” continues the argument, continues prosecuting the other.
Stage 2- I’m sorry, IF…
I’m sorry IF is not really saying I’m sorry. It’s cheating—giving the appearance of an apology without being an apology. “I’m sorry IF you’re offended.”
Stage 3- I’m sorry, PERIOD.
Finally, after the Stage 1 and Stage 2 fake apologies, Stage 3 is actually an apology. I’m sorry, PERIOD. No continuing the argument against the other person. No justification or explanation. Just…period.
Stage 4- I’m sorry, AND…
I’m sorry, AND I am moving towards you. I’m sorry AND I love you. I’m sorry AND let’s move forward.
Let’s determine to eliminate the BUTs and the IFs that stem from stubborn selfishness and supplement more of our apologies with ANDs.
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