I guess I seem to have our wedding on the mind here, considering our recently celebrated Anniversary. That evening, we pulled out our wedding video and watched it all again. I could not stop thinking about the words Pastor Don Whipple spoke during it, and have since watched it again and again trying to copy down certain phrases so I can have them to look at and remind myself. I find it incredible how God’s truth can sink in and work in our hearts one day (such as on our wedding day) but then five years later you can hear it once more in an even deeper way. It reminds me of the verse in Hebrews 4:12 “For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart.”
How thankful I am for the truth of God’s Word- and how thankful I am to have been taught by godly pastors who don’t shy away from it.
The following are the main points of the charge for our marriage of what to build it around, though really it is what we should all build our lives around.
Colossians 2:6-7 “Therefore, as you received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in him, rooted and built up in him and established in the faith, just as you were taught, abounding in thanksgiving.”
1. Build it around the Word:
“From the Bible you heard the truth about God, you heard the truth about you, and you heard the truth about Jesus. The eyes of your hearts were opened up. You need God’s words in your lives, in your marriage more than you need groceries. The greatest gift that you can give each other is that you will maintain individual quality and quantity times in God’s Word.”
2. Build it around an ongoing repentance/forgiving attitude
“The greatest threat to your marriage intimacy, the greatest threat to your marriage oneness is not outside of you but inside of you- it’s your selfishness, it’s your selfish perspective. The greatest threat you must deal with is in your heart…. I want to encourage you to reflect Christ, as the glorious and magnificent Savior He is, by being quick to forgive, quick to seek forgiveness, quick to say I’m wrong.”
3. Build it around your faith
“The promises of God will intersect your lives everyday- decisions, unexpected challenges, joys- it really is good news, though it doesn’t sound it, but God is committed to stretching your faith, to stretching your trust- to making it bigger than it is now, and it’s going to come. So you have to answer the question every day, ‘Is God trustworthy?’ Remember that your roots don’t go back to your profession of faith, your roots of trusting God go back to his promises. We don’t sit there and say, ‘Boy I can be confident in God today because I remembered I prayed a prayer.’ We are confident in God today because God’s promises are true, they are overwhelmingly true.”
-From Don Whipple, Kossuth Street Baptist Church, August 7, 2010