Choosing the Way of Blessing for Your Marriage
Jeff and Rose Colon discuss with biblical counselor Brooks Popwell how couples should focus on seeking spiritual blessings in their marriage. They discuss how choosing the difficult path can also be the right path, because it will bear eternal fruit in their lives and in their marriages.
Jeff and Rose, we want to think now about how to choose the way of blessing in a marriage. I want to start by asking you what kinds of blessings do you have in mind that a couple should want for their marriage?
Jeff: A lot of times, especially in our American church culture, we equate blessings with money, a large house, nobody getting sick, and everything going our way. But that's not what I'm talking about and that's not really what God meant when He talked about blessings. In God's realm it's more of a spiritual blessing where God prospers us spiritually. God is eternally minded, and He's always looking towards our eternal benefits. It's not that He doesn't want to, and even that He doesn't promise to, take care of us here on earth. But that shouldn't be our focus because we're all going to come into hard times. We're all going to come into difficulties and God wants to bless us spiritually in those times. So, when we're talking about God's blessings, we're talking more about God spiritually prospering us, no matter what's going on in our lives.
Rose, what Jeff was saying makes me think of how often men coming out of sexual sin have worked so hard to try and bless their family and bless their wives with a nice house, financial support from a good job or whatever. In your experience is that really what most wives are looking for?
Rose: No. What they want is a husband that just loves Jesus and a husband that's willing to do His will. I've seen that with most of the wives I counsel. All they want from their husband is that he just falls in love with Jesus and follow Him.
<pull-quote>"If you want to experience real blessing in your life, must understand what it means to embrace the suffering of the Cross just as Jesus did." — Jeff Colon<pull-quote><tweet-link>Tweet This<tweet-link>
Well Jeff how do you begin to choose the way of God's blessing in a marriage?
Jeff: I could just mention our own testimony and what God did in our lives. For many years I was bringing a curse upon my marriage and both of our lives. You know when my sexual sin had devastated the marriage we were in desperate need of God's blessing and God showed us the way to that blessing. But it wasn't what most people might think it was. It was actually coming face to face with the Cross and realizing that if I was going to experience spiritual blessing, I had to go down the pathway that Jesus told us we all need to go down. It's called the Narrow Way, and both Rose and I had to learn what it meant to start embracing the Cross and everything that meant in our lives so that we could experience the resurrection life. Jesus made a way of blessing for us, but it began with His suffering. Our blessing begins with suffering and embracing what Jesus went through, and anybody that wants to experience real spiritual growth and blessings in their life is going to have to understand what it means to embrace the Cross in the midst of hard times just as Jesus did.
And Rose, what does embracing the Cross mean for a wife as she seeks God's blessing on her marriage?
Rose: For a wife, I'd like to use an example of someone I know personally. She is really going through a very hard time with her husband. But she has chosen to pray for him and to fast for him and to hold to faith and believe God to give her husband a breakthrough. What I've seen over the years while she's waiting on the Lord to break through to her husband's heart is spiritual fruit in her life. I've seen spiritual maturity and spiritual growth in her. It's been a blessing to sit back and to see that she's chosen the hard way - the Narrow Way. She could have bailed out of her marriage a long time ago, but she's still standing in her marriage and she's still believing in God and standing in the gap for her husband and God is blessing her spiritually.
Jeff: And I'd like to add to that. It really is a wonderful picture of the blessing I described earlier. That woman had a choice. She could have gone the easy route, which would have been to just get out of her marriage and seek relief in another way. But she embraced the Cross and has prayed for her husband and what we have seen is blessings of intimacy with God. And the anger and bitterness she once had, has been replaced with joy. So, what I see are spiritual fruits that have been developed in her life through it, which to me are the greatest blessings God wants. That's what I'm talking about when I say spiritual blessings and spiritual prosperity. She has prospered spiritually because she chose the hard way - the Narrow Way. She chose to embrace the Cross and it really is a beautiful picture of how God turns our curses into blessings when we do that.
<pull-quote>"I look at our marriage and it's worth what we went through because of the blessings we receive." — Jeff Colon<pull-quote><tweet-link>Tweet This<tweet-link>
You know, what you've both described makes me think of two types of couples and how they'd face this set of circumstances. In one household, you might have a couple that's full of despair, hopelessness, and backbiting. But then, you could see another couple going through the exact same thing and because their attitude is one of faith in God they're saying, "Yeah, we're going through all of this and it's not pleasant, but God has something for us in all of this." It just makes me think what a difference that attitude and that spirit is going to make in that home.
Jeff: Absolutely. Absolutely, the whole atmosphere is different. I look at our marriage and it's worth what we went through because of the blessings we've been able to receive. Not just for ourselves, but the hope we've been able to give out to others. The same comfort we've been given, we've been able to give. To me, there's no greater blessing and I would never ever regret embracing the trials and the suffering we had to go through to get that.
