• 5 Things You Have to Do Well to Have a Great Marriage

       When studying in preaching class, the professor asked us what we should do when we hear a great sermon and would like to use it.  He said it wouldn’t be right to copy it directly without giving credit and that it would be better to use the main points and make the rest of it our own.  That makes sense because personal illustrations don’t transfer well. He suggested that if we find something and want to use it, just make the following announcement at the beginning of the message: “The bread I bring you today is not from my bakery, but another, but I have tasted of it and found it nourishing and would like to share it with you.”  So it is with what I am sharing with you today. This is a marriage ceremony sermon I liked and found nourishing. I’d like to share it with you.

       As you get married, there are five things you will need to do well to have a good marriage.

  1. Communicate

       Every marriage problem starts when you can no longer talk. Remember the day she gave you her phone number?  Remember how over the next months you called her and couldn’t hang up? Remember your phone battery going dead?  Remember your hand getting sweaty from holding the phone? If it takes that to get her to the altar, it takes that and much more to keep her.

       In every marriage, there is a talker and a non-talker.  One says, let’s do this. The other says, why? If you don’t communicate, all this is great for Facebook and Instagram, but your marriage will fail.  But if you actually talk, you can find your way through it all. Learn to listen.

       Key Point: You don’t have to always agree, but you always have to communicate.

  2. Budget your plan and plan your budget.

       Love is great, but it doesn’t pay the bills.  In most every marriage, there is a spender and a saver.  Here are some words of wisdom. Let the cheap (would frugal be more politically correct?) one keep the money.  If you can share a bed, you can share a bank. They are your family resources.

       As Christians, 10% off the top of our money goes to God. Our money isn’t ours.  Who created the world and its contents? God. It is all His. God doesn’t want or need our money, but our obedience.  Because He created us, He knows us… and He knows our allegiance is tied to our bank account. The scripture doesn’t say, “Where your heart is, there your treasure will be also,” but instead, it says, “Where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.”  That means look at what you treasure and that’s what is important to you.

  • Give 10%, invest 10% and learn to live on 80%.
  • Eventually, you will be able to live on 80% and ask God what to do with the rest.
  • God favors us for doing this.  The only place in the Bible where God says to test Him is with the money He entrusts us with (Malachi 3:10).  God says to give and see if He doesn’t pour out a blessing so great that we can’t contain it. God also warns us and says we are robbing Him if we don’t give.
  3. Avoid Third Party Intrusions

       At a wedding service, it is appropriate for the pastor to say, “On behalf of this couple, if you love them, stay out of their business.”

  • If you tell your family the things that go on under your roof, they will learn to dislike your spouse… and you will have forgiven your spouse, but they won’t.  There are some things you need to keep under your roof or you will start a mess.
  • Instead of talking to others, learn how to talk with God.  He’s the best counselor you will ever have.
  • Should you reach the place where you need counseling, go to a good Christian counselor.  Don’t just listen to your friends. People with good advice but a bad marriage are bad counselors.
  • Find somebody with a Bible and a good marriage of their own who will be confidential with your marriage struggles and hold them to your heart.  They will give you honest and genuine feedback. Other than that, only tell Jesus. He’s still a wonderful counselor.
  4. Avoid Infidelity

       We live in a sex-crazed culture where people with marriage problems tend to think the grass is greener on the other side of the fence.  They think the grass stays green all the time. That grass is fake. It is probably astroturf! No marriage is perfect all the time. If it’s real grass, the grass may look greener, but it still has to be watered.  You have to learn to water your own grass.  

  • The only hands that should touch you intimately are the hands that you held on your wedding day.
  • Men are microwaves.  Women are crockpots. Listen to me, groom, no deposit, no returns.  
  • You have to learn to love her all day long if you expect intimacy at night.  You have to wake up in the morning and say, deposit, deposit, deposit…. Fill her love tank.  Fill it, fill it, fill it. A woman’s body is very precious to her and she has to be loved, valued and have security to lovingly give it to you.  You can’t treat her badly and expect her to respond. Be a man and be the man God wants you to be to her.
  • She is a crockpot.  She will only give to you what you give to her.  
  • Look at her and say, “Everything I need in a woman is standing right here before me.  From the top of your head to the bottom of your feet. God made you to satisfy me, and today, I proudly announce that I’m completely satisfied.”
  • Look at him and say, “Everything I need in a man is standing right here before me.  From the top of your head to the bottom of your feet. God made you to satisfy me, and today, I proudly announce that I’m completely satisfied.”
  • 1 Cor. 7 tells us not to deprive each other sexually so that Satan doesn’t tempt us.  Here’s what Paul was saying: “It’s hard to eat a snack if you’ve already had a meal.” Satisfy each other with words of affection, kisses, hugs, and touch – as a married couple should.  The irony of our culture is that we are trying to get single people to be celibate, and we’re trying to get married couples to enjoy it.
  • Know now that you are to enjoy your bedroom.  The Bible says it is holy and undefiled.  
  • Anything we do in reverence to God is called worship.  Sex wasn’t created in a dark alley behind a bar. God created sex and it is God’s beautiful gift between a husband and a wife.  Sometimes before you partake in this wonderful gift of sex, pray and thank God for this blessing and then partake with His blessing.  You may not want God to know you are having sex… but He knows anyway, so from time to time give Him thanks for it.
  5. Build everything on Jesus Christ

       You will never learn to be happy until you learn to satisfy God.

  • To the groom: your task is to make God happy with you as a husband – and if you make God happy, she’ll be crazy about you.
  • To the bride: you will never make him happy, but when you seek to make God happy, you will be the object of his eye.
  • Learn now that everything is going to change.  Little people become big people, older people pass, but Jesus lasts forever.
  • Build your marriage on Him, and I promise it will last a lifetime.

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