1 Peter: Peace in ExileSample

A Family Affair

. . . so that nothing may hinder your prayers. (v. 7 NRSV)

How we need the encouragement and moral direction Peter offers husbands and wives today. When the Lord saw Adam alone in the Garden of Eden, he announced that this wasn’t good (Gen. 2:18). So from Adam’s rib God himself fashioned a woman, and the two became one flesh.

Shaped in intimacy and meant for fruitfulness, God put his stamp of approval on Adam and Eve, and has never changed his mind. And after careful descriptions of how each is to relate to the other, Peter is Spirit-prompted to explain why: “so that nothing may hinder your prayers.” Apparently, if we trifle with God’s vision for marriage and family, we run the risk of his turning a deaf ear when we call on him in our hour of need.

For the last 35 years I have either been a pastor in a college town or taught at a seminary in that same town. With my life wrapped up working with college-aged young people, I have officiated at hundreds of their weddings. Every time I hear their trembling vows spoken to one another in love with the highest hopes, my prayers for them always turn toward Peter’s admonitions.

Please pray for some couple, young or old, and ask the Lord that their lives might be lived in such a way that nothing would hinder their prayers.

As you pray, think of a couple you know who needs encouragement, and ask God to bless their marriage.