What do you think people in our community ask me to pray for most? More than health concerns or job opportunities, the overwhelming and often teary-eyed response when I ask to pray for them is for their struggling marriages. Relationships are where we overwhelmingly need the most help and where the enemy is wounding us most deeply.
The need for relationship is in our very nature. God is love and – as Father, Son, and Spirit – is relationship. He uniquely created humanity to be “in our image, after our likeness”, even declaring, “It is not good that the man should be alone” (Genesis 1:26, 2:18). Relationship is at the heart of what it means to be human.
No wonder Satan attacks our relationships so relentlessly. The first sin not only brought curse and death, but it broke relationship. It separated husband, wife, and God. They hid their bodies from one another and themselves from God’s presence. They blamed each other and God for their own willful choices and the painful consequences of them.
Our need for relationship is so core and the joining of two people is so vulnerable that the church must actively bring God’s light and love directly into our brokenness. If our only word about marriage is when two people are permitted to separate, we have waited too late. Division is the enemy’s work, and great harm has already been done by that point. All the while, God knows love and relationship. If we will be vulnerable and humble, there is so much He can teach us through His word.
From Friday October 18 through Sunday October 20, our church family will have a series of opportunities to enrich our marriages as God equips us for relationship. Whether you are just now imagining your future together or have been joined together for many years, see how His Holy Word can equip you for relationship. God can heal what Satan seeks to break, and He can make what is good even better.
As you resolve to participate, invite your friends and family to come, too. Odds are, they need this more than you realize. Your invitation to find hope in a healing word from the Lord might just be the answer to their prayers.