Spiritual Intimacy in Our Marriages-Part Two

Jesus described marriage on a very spiritual level: A man leaves his father and mother and is joined to his wife, and the two are united into one. Since they are no longer two but one, let no one separate them, for God has joined them together. (Matt. 19:5 NLT) Jim Burns speaks of Matt. 19:5 in his book “Road Blocks to Spiritual Intimacy in a Marriage”. He wrote: Jesus’ words “Let no one separate” expresses our desire for God’s presence to be in our relationship. But to want something and to have it are two different things. We may desire a spiritual connection as a couple, but sadly it is usually the least developed area of the relationship. It takes time, open communication, humility, grace, and a desire for spiritual growth for any couple to grow together spiritually. So lets look at a few roadblocks that can hinder our success for spiritual intimacy: 1. Excuses a. Everybody has busy lives. b. When the kids are grown we will be able to focus better. c. I don’t have any energy left over to deal with this. d. I think we are covering the bases just fine… -we go to church -we pray at meals or when needed -we go to Sunday School -we serve in the church It is so easy to look at our lives and come up with different reasons why this area of our marriage doesn't receive the attention it should. Some days we do well just to make it to bedtime and there may be other days when we look at our relationship and all seems well. But, no matter how you look at it, our desire for spiritual intimacy should drive us to look past our excuses and work towards all that Jesus has for our marriage. 2. Low-Level Anger The Bible says, “Do not let the sun go down while you are till angry” (Ephesians 4:26). When it concerns the big issues of our lives we usually get those settled within a descent period of time, but let’s talk about those “little” issues that we like to keep inside of ourselves. It’s those small ones that we tend to place on the back burner and just let them simmer away within us. There they sit, just building up steam and making us stew. Our husbands may not even know that we are stewing, but we do!! We walk around with that attitude that says, “You know what you did!!” And we get even madder when they don’t seem to notice the ATTITUDE! How dare they NOT even notice! But with all kidding aside, this is a real issue in our lives that is a major roadblock. It takes a lot of energy to keep steaming and stewing over something. We become so focused on our “little” issues that we completely neglect the real issues that God is calling us to deal with, within ourselves. We need to be taking those so-called “little simmers" to our Heavenly Father in prayer, dealing with them at the foot of the cross and then walking in obedience, bring it before our husbands to be dealt with in the open, calmly and respectfully. It is so much better to bring it out into the light than to let it keep stewing in the darkness, where we can easily blow it out of proportion and lose our wisdom and understanding. 3. Lack of Forgiveness When your spouse has done something against you and you are unable to forgive him, you are blocking spiritual intimacy. Forgiveness is a necessary ingredient for a right relationship with both God and your spouse. In Matthew 6:12 it says, "And forgive our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors." How can we withhold our forgiveness toward our husbands, or anyone for that matter, when God in His infinite mercy and love, forgave us. When we choose not to forgive someone, we are harboring a lack of mercy. That has got to be the bottom line for us. Having a true understanding of God’s forgiveness and where that came from helps us to forgive! Next week we will take a look at how a lack of respect for our husband can effect intimacy and how spiritual warfare takes its toll.