Maybe you’re trying to stay close in tough circumstances. It could be romance novels, airbrushed magazines, and movies vaulting your expectations. Maybe it’s a lack of rest or white space on your calendar or resolution to the issue that keeps snacking on your reserves of patience. Song of Solomon speaks of chasing out the “foxes” in the lovers’ “vineyard” (2:15)-what’s gnawing at their sex life and general closeness. Your marriage is an act of worship, and thanking God is a way of giving Him the credit you’re tempted to ignore-stirring a few embers while you’re at it. The point: comb through your day to find the ways God’s handed you gifts small and large through your mate. Maybe it’s mentally responding to someone interviewing you about what you value in your spouse.
#Some fresh starts series#
It could be a series of small, grateful prayers throughout the day. Maybe this looks like keeping a running list of what you’re thankful for in your spouse, your marriage, and the life and journey you’ve made together.
In studies and brain scans, gratitude has been linked so closely to happiness, scientists find them hard to differentiate. I wish they would just take responsibility.) Am I seeking satisfaction in healthy ways?
In my reactions toward my spouse, to what internal conflicts and desires am I reacting? (e.g. is this person uncomplicated? Do they make you feel attractive or respected? Do they lack the depression your spouse is going through?) Has that desire become more important than finding my satisfaction in God, or than fulfilling the faithful love God asks of me toward my spouse? If I’m feeling attraction toward someone else, what inner need do I imagine that attraction fulfilling? (e.g. What thing have I decided that, if I don’t receive it from my spouse, I’m not going to move closer to them? Does Scripture back me up on this?. And He went so far as to lay down His life for us, pursuing us when enemies. Marital closeness and harmony are outworkings of how God’s loved us. James made a similar connection: “With we bless our Lord and Father, and with it we curse people who are made in the likeness of God … My brothers, these things ought not to be so” (James 3:9-10). Jesus said the second commandment-to love one’s neighbor as oneself-is like the first: to love God with all that we are (see Mark 12:28-34). No, my deeper problem is that I have not loved God as I should.” Paul David Tripp explains “relationships are first fixed vertically before they are ever fixed horizontally.” Tripp continues, “In my marriage … my problem isn’t first that I have failed to love Louella in the way that I should. First things first.Ī fresh start in our marriages requires a fresh start within us a realigning to how God loves us. If you’re wading through a down season? These hope-filled suggestions are for you. It involves more than a gift certificate, a massage, a night away from the kids. Despite what the world may tell you, a fresh start that lasts usually involves more than a few romantic moments. In fact, you might be wondering why some of these ideas aren’t easier-because perhaps you’re straight-up exhausted from trying to make things work. You want to kindle the romance a bit-and the affections that grease the wheels of everyday relationships. What these are: ideas for when fondness is waning, and you simply want to move toward your spouse rather than away. While these are healthy tips for any relationship, attempting a fresh start amidst deep problems can delay healing and create unrealistic expectations. (Try Happily Married? A 10-step Relationship Assessment if you’re concerned about deeper issues.) Glossing over deep-seated problems is the equivalent of slapping on a Band-Aid to a gushing wound. What the following suggestions aren’t: a cure-all for deeper issues. You could say marriage is a form of faith-even more in God than in your spouse. Lewis wrote, “Faith is the art of holding on to things your reason has once accepted, in spite of your changing moods.” It could be that season when work and schedules and teenager issues mean most of your conversations last about six minutes, four of which are about logistics and who’s picking up whom.īut as C.S. Or maybe the slumps are longer: that season when you’re drowning in sippy cups and Big Bird, and when the kids’ primary caregiver gets horizontal, it’s only to immediately hit a much-needed REM cycle. Or, Can you really have a headache for the fifth night this week? Maybe this past year has felt stuck on replay of a song you didn’t like in the first place.Īll of us encounter days where we’re thinking, If he throws his socks beside the hamper one more time, I am going to tell him exactly where he should put them. The idea of a fresh start might make some of us snort.
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