The Fight: Claiming God’s Victory in LifeSample

The Fight for Your Marriage

When asked what it took for him to defend the heavyweight title 25 times, legendary boxer Joe Lewis quipped, “Everybody wants the title, but nobody wants to put in the work it takes to get the title. It’s like this – everybody wants to go to heaven, but nobody wants to die.”

It’s part of the human mantra – we want comfort, relaxation, the easy way. But that’s not usually the way things go. Life can be a fight for everybody, it doesn’t matter your station in life, what you do or where you came from. And when life is a challenge, we tend to see other people as the enemy, even our spouse. But God tells us not to fight with our spouse, fight FOR our spouse. To God, the marriage covenant is precious and worth fighting for.

What, in God’s eyes, is marriage? Marriage is, after all, God’s idea, a gift he’s given to bless us, a small sampling of what he considers to be the relationship between himself and his Church, the bride of Christ. In its simplest form, marriage is a covenant between two people – both moody, impatient, selfish – who learn to think of others before themselves, who become less selfish and more like Jesus through the grind of marriage. But at it’s core, marriage is a deep-seated commitment that declares you’re going to be in this together, no matter how good or how bad, in spite of your feelings or emotions,. Marriage is not the declaration of present love, it’s the binding promise of future love, just like God’s unconditional love for us. Marriage takes two people and makes them better together than they could ever be apart.

So, how do you make marriage work? Continue to pursue each other, find out what makes each other tick, make each other a priority, even above children or other family members. Connect with each other, regularly, and pray together and for each other. Most importantly, keep Jesus at the center of your marriage. You get strength and power when you worship God at the center of your life.

Look, we all know that humans are prone to stay only until they’re not getting anything out of it anymore, then they leave. Jesus helps us stay true to our commitments, even when it doesn’t make sense. He’s a continual example and reminder that this thing is bigger than you.

God wants your marriage to not only survive, but thrive! And he’s already won the battle – walk in it.

Prayer: Father God, thank you for my spouse and for our marriage. Help me to always fight for my spouse and not with him/her. Help me to become more like you as I honor and cherish my spouse, in Jesus’ name.