SAFEGUARD #5
BEING IN COMMUNITY

Much, and I do mean much, of the health of our marriage is due to the community we’ve planted our family in. In every geographic move our family made, a big driver of that was what atmosphere or soil I felt my wife and kids would thrive in. The “you and me against the world” vibe is great for romantic movie scenes but not great for real life. We need the strength of the community around us to receive the life, encouragement, and coaching our marriages need. When you buy seeds from a store, the seed packet will give you planting instructions. It tells you the best conditions for growing that particular flower or vegetable. In the same way, one of the planting instructions for our marriage would include being surrounded by healthy couples that model what you’re looking for and provide wise counsel and accountability.

Make Church Central, Not Secondary

There may be three responses to this day’s focus on connecting your family to a church community. The first might be, “I’m not religious, and I’m just reading this to have a better marriage, but I don’t need the church stuff.” Second might be a bit indifferent to this because you occasionally attend a church, but you don’t see how it will impact your marriage that much to prioritize church involvement. And the third group would be giving me a big AMEN because you know how key this is and have seen its value in your life. Of course, every couple that is a part of the church isn’t automatically the ideal picture of a great marriage; I’m sure we all know someone who was a Christian and still found themselves in divorce court, but the truth is that while most of those people went into a church, they most likely didn’t allow the church community into their lives.

The church community provides inspiration, accountability, and coaching.

We need to be able to call each other out and allow our spouse to challenge us, but often we need a third-party perspective that doesn’t have the blind spots that we can often have in our relationships. Getting the benefits of church connection will require transparency and teachability. We often think that being a husband or wife will be natural or intuitive, but then we get a little way into marriage and realize how much effort and development it requires to be a great spouse. One of the shortcuts to being a better spouse is observing someone who is great at it, being in close proximity to other married couples as they live out their marriage in front of you. It’s one thing to take a course or read a book, but quite another thing to watch someone build a healthy marriage in real-time. Be especially mindful of this if you didn’t have a great model of a Godly and healthy marriage in your own life. As Solomon reminded us, there’s power in the collective.