Marriage Mondays ~ Divine

The Lord began to prompt me some weeks ago (in the midst of silver bells and stocking gifts) with the idea and vision for "Marriage Mondays", as we approach our 20th anniversary. I'm prayerfully excited about how He may use these Mondays. But something amazed me last week at the end of our first "Marriage Monday." I was reading the Proverbs 31 daily devotional, written that day by Melanie Chitwood. Imagine my SHOCK when she said, "Welcome to Marriage Mondays! Each Monday this year I'll blog about marriage matters. I'd love for you to join me every Monday, so we can share the ups and downs of marriage."

Amazing. Sort of weird. I chose to consider it divine movement. :)

I am not a copycat, but I recognize that while God was stirring my heart and mind, He was stirring hers in the same way. I wonder who else's heart is stirred with Marriage Mondays. :) He must be planning something wonderful concerning His earthly miracle called marriage. I hope you'll jump over here to read Melanie's Marriage Mondays too. All of a sudden, I feel like I'm part of something heavenly, and it feels so exciting!

Divine movement is part of marriage from before we're ever aware of it. Eve must've been the only gal to never wonder about or wrestle with knowing if she'd met "the man of her dreams." Think about that. ;) Each woman has her radar ready for indications she has met her life's partner. In discipling teenagers I've always encouraged them to think through qualities that are non-negotiables for them and to write them down, so they have a solid frame of reference before their emotions are added to the mix or long eyelashes and a square jaw muddy their thinking.

When Jeff and I met in college on the volleyball court, it was not love at first sight, but my radar was working. It didn't take long to see Jeff's quality of humility that drew me to him (in addition to that manly jaw and blue eyes). I loved how he saw himself in relation to God's great grace and what that meant for his life ... "our" life. On the other hand, when I was picked up in a Camaro by a quarterback with wavy locks and long lashes who spent the first hour impressing me with his sports statistics, I was ready to sign up for "singles skating." When we seek God's best, there's great confidence in knowing it's divinely directed, and that's comforting in years to come when life is hard or when you are "found" on Facebook by an old flame (not me, but others I know ...). Even when the circumstances of a marriage are not God's ideal, we recognize He saw and knew our relationships before their time came, and if we are to marry, He prepares us for the man we will share life with.

So what difference does that make today? Well for one thing, it reminds me to be in prayer now for the growth of my daughter and son and for their potential mates as they grow. I need to train my children to be expectant about God's plan for them, should it include marriage or singleness. And I need to look at my husband when he comes home and be confident he is the man God wants me to be with, the one I need to encourage and pursue, the one I need to complement and care for. I need to welcome him home, remembering our relationship isn't just aiming for divine. It already is divine.

A "divine" step for a wife to take would be:

• stop right now and thank God for your husband, the one He chose for you
• write in a prayer journal, on a note card, on a napkin that "_____ is the man God wants me to encourage, complement, care for, pursue"
• when you meet at the end of the day, tell him that he's still the man for you
• write on your mirror with lipstick "you are mine & I am yours"
• write on a page in your planner or Bible "God has prepared me all of my life to be the best wife for ___________"