The first two Beatitudes in this series were general concepts meant for any marriage, regardless of religion. This next one is slightly different. This Beatitude shows the foundation our marriages should be built on.
Blessed are they who thank God for their food and who set aside some time each day to read the Bible and pray.
This Beatitude actually has nothing to do with marriage… yet everything to do with marriage. Why do I say that? Because marriages work best when our relationship with God is at its best.
Let’s look separately at the three parts to this Beatitude:
- Thanking God for your food
- Setting aside time each day to read the Bible
- Setting aside time each day to pray
Thanking God for your Food
As parents, we often teach our children early on to pray for our food. But I don’t think this is referring to a habitual saying of “grace” before meals. Read the rest of this entry »
These past few weeks have been slightly tumultuous in the lives of the Marshall family as we “figure out” what God has planned for our lives in the coming weeks/months/years. We have been seeking God for guidance, praying constantly, and discussing many many many different paths and options. Thankfully, in this time of stress and uncertainty, we have not turned mean… in fact, we have been following this next beatitude pretty well, without even realizing it!
Here is our 2nd Beatitude of a Christian Marriage:
Blessed are those mates who never criticize or speak loudly to one another and who instead quietly discuss their disagreements and work toward solutions.
Do you ever feel like certain times “justify” criticizing your husband? Financial stress or periods of unemployment can put a strain on relationships; colicky babies or rambunctious toddlers can make a wife resentful of a husband’s life outside the home; no matter what the situation, criticizing and speaking angrily may seem like the best solution, but it certainly is not!
Remember what the Bible says about harsh words: Read the rest of this entry »
Recently my mom gave me a plaque that had on it the Beatitudes of a Christian Marriage. As I read through them, I realized just how true they are!! There are only four of them, & I’d like to take some time to go through each one.I hope you will join me as I work to make each of these my own “Be-Attitude”!! 
Here is the first:
Blessed are the husband and wife who continue to be considerate and affectionate long after the wedding bells have ceased ringing.
It’s easy to be the “best” wife when you’re a newlywed! Sure, there are a LOT of new things to get used to, living with your husband for the first time… but there’s that new glow, new excitement, new areas of romance that keep things going strong.
Then two or three years go by… those little nuances of your husband are no longer endearing, but are downright annoying. Sex is less spontaneous & more planned (most likely because, at this point, you’re either trying to have a baby, or trying to avoid having more), and much of your life is in order & quite routine.
How’s your marriage at this point?
So, in April Jason and I bought our first house! Very exciting stuff… we absolutely LOVE this place!
We are still working to unpack some boxes, mostly in our spare bedroom. The other night Jason and I were trying to get organized, unpacking books and placing them on the bookshelves in the room. We were being quite productive… until he found some of my old diaries!! Uh oh!!!
The first one he cracked open was from 1994… written by 13-year-old me! HA! Such a boring play-by-play of my life. He moved on to the next one, from 2005. THIS one I knew would be interesting - it was from the year before we got married! (If you’re unfamiliar with our unique Love Story, be sure to read about it here!) Read the rest of this entry »
I’m sitting here in my new home while my precious baby boy is napping, surrounded by piles of folded laundry, unsorted mail, and half unpacked boxes… writing a blog post. Does this seem like I’ve got my priorities wrong? On the contrary, my friend! I’m making time for ME!
Last month when I sat down to write my latest blog post (the first in sooo long), I realized that I had been missing out on something all this time! It felt sooo good to get back into writing, answering emails, reading blog comments… I’d been missing out on ME time!
So much of what we do as wives and mothers centers around others. We cook, clean, care for, and spend time with our husbands & children. We run errands, go to church, and attend family BBQ’s. Even when we snuggle up with our hubbies to watch a movie, it’s with another person.
What many of us miss out on is time spent doing something for yourself. Perhaps it’s reading a good book. Maybe it’s taking a class. It could be a hobby, like crocheting or scrapbooking. Perhaps it’s even exercise! For me, well… I’d like to do ALL of those things but… blogging is definitely on the list for me!
I know what you may be thinking… in fact, I’m willing to bet that at least one of these objections are yours: Read the rest of this entry »
So… how do I explain my absence from the blogging world for the past 8+ months? Well… I suppose I could blame it on being in my last trimester of pregnancy, or having a newborn, or going back to work full time, or moving into a new house (all of which happened these past 8 months!) but in truth, my reason for not blogging goes much deeper than that.
How can I write about being a striving wife when, for so long now, I’ve felt like a STRUGGLING wife? I’m sure I could have written about my struggles & found that I’m not alone, but for some reason I turned inward and refused to give a voice or any recognition to my struggles. I couldn’t figure out why I was so discontent & constantly snapping at my wonderful husband (& no, I am not suffering from post-partum depression!).
A few weeks ago, though, God finally got through to me & I realized that my attitude and struggles had NOTHING to do with my job, my baby, my husband, or my new house but had EVERYTHING to do with my waning relationship with God!
In all my busyness, I had been neglecting Him. Go figure, He’s the most important key to it all!!
WOW, where did the summer go? I thought I’d have so much time for blogging, but… WOW! I completely missed August!
This has been a busier summer than expected, working 3 part-time jobs, trying to stay on top of menu-planning, house cleaning, baby preparation, youth ministry, friends leaving for college, and family visiting on vacation. Oh yeah - and house hunting.
I’m now 30 weeks pregnant, back to work at my full time job at a school (occasionally picking up a few extra hours of work here & there), and wating to hear back from the bank about a house we’re trying to buy (& still looking at other house options in the meantime). I wouldn’t exactly call this schedule easier, but it’s slightly more predictable than the summer schedule.
I have spent a lot of time reading this summer. I read Max Lucado’s newest book “Fearless”, as well as some parenting books and fiction books. Ted Dekker’s Circle Trilogy was just as riveting the second time around and also painted a beautiful picture of Christ’s love for us, His Bride.
Jason and I have also been working on developing the youth ministry at our church. We have a small group (8-15 teens, depending on the night), making a traditional “worship” time awkward, so we’ve taken a non-traditional approach. Instead of making the kids stand up and uncomfortably sing karaoke to the songs we play, we take one song (especially one that we sing often on a Sunday morning) and break it apart. By the time we’re done, the kids know what the song means, and can (hopefully) actually worship God through it, not just sing karaoke. Or stand there, bored.
Last Wednesday, in addition to our time of worship, we took a Spiritual Inventory of our lives. Each teen was given a survey to fill out - as honestly as they dared. Their names were included so that we can take those teens and pray for them, disciple them, and gear lessons toward them accordingly.
Well, the other day I was in a BORING meeting at work that had absolutely nothing to do with me and my position at the school, so I tuned out a bit and began to think about how we can take inventory in other areas of our life. Jason, when telling the kids why we were taking an inventory, explained it this way:
If you managed a retail store, you would have to take an inventory of your supplies. Why? To see what you need to order more of, what just isn’t selling (& see if there’s a reason), what works, and what doesn’t.
The same thing occurs in our spiritual lives - we need to take stock of what’s lacking, what’s working, what we need to do more of, what needs to change or be purged.
So, this got me thinking…. why don’t we do the same in our marriages? We can take a marital inventory to see what’s working, what isn’t, what needs to change, and what we’re doing great at.
Of course, I won’t ask you to give ME your results (unless you want to!), but I think it would be a great idea to do this inventory either with your husband or a female accountability partner or ladies group, and discuss the results candidly.
So, here it is… The Marriage Inventory: (Remember, it will only work if you’re HONEST!) Read the rest of this entry »
A little over a year ago, I started this blog…. & since then, God has shown me SOO much about what it means to be a wife after His own heart. Sometimes I felt like the best wife ever…. but so often I’ve felt inadequate and barely striving.
God is sooo not done with me yet, either! Tonight I finished a 5-week DVD series at church based on the book “Love & Respect” by Emerson Eggerichs. While there were so many amazing points that I want to share with you, tonight’s session really made me go “hmmm… wow”.
As a preface, in case you’re not sure what “Love & Respect” is all about, let me give you a brief summary. A woman’s deepest need is to be loved, and a man’s deepest need is to be respected. In fact, marriage is not about your own personal happiness, but rather meeting the deep need of your spouse - regardless of whether or not he deserves it. We are to give our husbands unconditional respect.
Perhaps another time I’ll talk about some of the specifics of what that means, but right now I want to focus on God’s purpose for our marriage.
God has called us to obey Him… & His command to us women is to respect our husbands. (See Ephesians 5:33). In our obedience to God, our husband is actually irrelevant. That’s right! He’s not even in the picture… It doesn’t matter what he does (or doesn’t do), what he says (or doesn’t say), or whether or not he is obeying… we’re to look past him & obey God. Our obedience to God will spill over onto our husbands as respect.
Crazy concept, huh?
In an effort to stay organized and productive throughout my days, I’ve decided to adopt another good plan in addition to my daily timesheets:
Menu Planning!!!
I’m the type that usually starts thinking about dinner around 4 or 5 p.m., shortly before my husband is due home. Not good when I realize that there is NOTHING in the house to eat! The other day I lucked out because I still had some frozen turkey burgers in the freezer… and since it’s summer, the little market down the corner from me had some corn on the cob & watermelon in stock. Disaster averted.
However, I’m literally down to NOTHING LEFT in my cupboards & fridge that could make a meal worth eating… so I have to grocery shop. Not one of my favorite things to do.
However, I’ve been hearing it for months now (and I’ve half-heartedly tried it on occasion) that menu-planning is the way to go.
Why? Because then grocery shopping has a purpose (all the ingredients can be bought ahead of time) and you’re never left scrounging for some last-minute ideas!
There’s actually TONS of other women out there who swear by menu planning… in fact, there’s even a day dedicated to it, started by Laura over at OrgJunkie.com:
In my effort to join their ranks, I pulled out my recipe box (which was within easy reach, thanks to last week’s organizational skills!) and found some great meals to make for this week!
This is what I’m planning on making: Read the rest of this entry »
I have discovered the keys to being productive! Really!! It works!!
Okay, so by now you may have heard me say (many times) that I am not the neatest of people… clutter is something I hate, but for some reason seem to put up with all the time. I’m not self-motivated to clean, and I get overwhelmed with mess VERY easily. Oh, and I’m also easily distracted (Facebook & Twitter are major culprits!).
So, when the school year ended last week, I knew I was in trouble: All day long, at home, with everything to do but nothing was actually getting done. I’d half-heartedly move some clutter from one pile to another, putter around trying to find places for things, and end up with an even bigger mess than I started with. Frustrated, I’d sit on the computer and update my Twitter status for the umpteenth time, check out my friends on Facebook, and search the Babies R Us website, looking for cool things to get for the baby.
Needless to say, when my hubby would come home at the end of his full day of work (and still have his at-home business to take care of), he would NOT be too happy with the state of the house. He wouldn’t always say much, but by the look on his face, I knew.
For the last week, I felt less like a striving wife, and more like a failure…. but I couldn’t articulate how I was feeling to my husband without getting defensive and us fighting.
Last night, before youth group, Jason and I went out for pizza & broached the subject of the state of our house once again. For once, I was able to listen and be open to suggestions without crying (too much) or shutting down.
Here are the keys to my being productive that we came up with (& that I implemented today): Read the rest of this entry »
![103339: Fireproof, Special Collector"s Edition DVD](http://ag.christianbook.com/g/thumbnail/1/103339t.gif "103339: Fireproof, Special Collector"s Edition DVD")
