In Sickness

Betsy wanted to leave her husband, and she came to us seeking approval. She was in a second marriage that had never gone very well. She thought that she shouldn’t have married this man in the first place. Now her husband was facing an illness that she expected to gradually take away his ability to work or to speak clearly. She expected that he would need a lot of care and more each year until he died. She hadn’t planned on this and wanted out. We couldn’t give her the approval she was asking for. (It’s always puzzling to see people seek approval from others when they know they are doing wrong.) We told her instead that she should stay and find a new depth to her love and commitment.
We were given to each other in marriage to help each other. Sometimes the needs of one increase, creating more responsibility for the other. We see this principle in this passage.
Two are better than one, because they have a good return for their work: If one falls down, his friend can help him up. But pity the man who falls and has no one to help him up! (Ecclesiastes 4:9-10)
If your spouse becomes ill, it’s time for you to step up as their closest friend.
We believe that God hears and answers prayer and it's great when people are healed in answer to prayer. However, we want to offer help to couples who are enduring illness.
Here are some principles that may be helpful if you face illness in your marriage.
Thank God for Small Things, Thank God for Big Things – A hard year or a hard decade can get a person down. We can find joy, though, if we thank God for today’s small blessings and for God’s eternal promises. If you are down, you can benefit from focusing on a smaller picture, thanking God for today’s daily bread. You can also benefit from focusing on a larger picture, thanking Him for His promise never to leave you and to give you eternal life. When Naomi said, “The LORD has afflicted me; the Almighty has brought misfortune upon me.” (Ruth 1:21), she was focusing on the tough times of the previous few years. Later, when she said, “He has not stopped showing His kindness to the living and the dead,” (Ruth 2:20) she was focusing on that day’s blessings. By the end of the book of Ruth, we can see the big picture of what God was doing in Naomi’s life. By then, her friends are praising God for His goodness to Naomi. If the picture you are looking at seems scary or depressing, stand back and look at the bigger picture, or move in and look at encouraging details.
For example, suppose your spouse has become very ill and the doctor hasn’t been able to find an explanation. You’ve been in and out of the hospital and the doctor has brought up the possibility of long-term nursing care. You are worried about your medical bills and wonder if your spouse will ever recover. You worry how you will manage if you lose your spouse. You can find joy in the simple blessings of this day. You can thank God for a meal you particularly enjoyed or thank Him that you slept better last night than you had been. You can also find joy in focusing on the bigger picture. No matter what happens, you can thank God for the years you and your spouse have had together. You can thank Him for the promise of being reunited in heaven. You can thank Him that He is always with you, even in hard times.
Recognize Your Primary Purpose – Jesus said that two commands define the most important things we have to do in life.
Jesus replied: 'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.' This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: 'Love your neighbor as yourself.' (Matthew 22:37-39)
Loving others is your second most important responsibility. If you have a spouse who is sick, you have a unique opportunity to show them love. Many other things can wait, but you can show them love with simple acts of service and by just spending time with them.
Get Help – We were never meant to go through life alone. When you need help, ask for it. Someone else’s life will be enriched with the opportunity to help you in some practical way. Call your family members or your church when you need someone to run an errand or take care of something around your house that you don’t have time or strength to do yourself.
Do Your Best, Trust God With the Rest – Sometimes people struggle with guilt over decisions they made when a spouse was sick. When the doctor starts asking questions about what medical help you want or don’t want, these decisions can feel overwhelming. Make your decisions based on love. If you feel confused, talk it over with someone you trust. Ask God for guidance. He promises to give it.
Trust in the LORD with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways acknowledge Him, and He will make your paths straight. (Proverbs 3: 5-6)
Honor whatever wishes your spouse has expressed. When you’ve done what you can, pray and trust God. Don’t spend energy mulling over what you would have or could have done. Your spouse’s life is in God’s hands and if you have acted in love, you need not regret your decisions.

Praying Together

Do you think your marriage would be any different if Jesus lived at your house, joined you for dinner, helped you plan your finances, and intervened when you argued? It’s hard to imagine things not improving if Jesus was there all the time. That’s just what He wants, to be there all time. Praying together is one of the most powerful tools you have for welcoming God into your daily lives.

Here are some simple principles of prayer that apply to marriage.

And when you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by men. I tell you the truth, they have received their reward in full. But when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you. And when you pray, do not keep on babbling like pagans, for they think they will be heard because of their many words. Do not be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you ask Him. (Matthew 6:5-8)

In this passage Jesus taught that prayer:

• Is not a show, so we shouldn’t be worrying about how we sound or what anyone else is thinking.
• Is talking to God and we can expect Him to hear and answer prayer.
• Shouldn’t involve the repetition of empty words, so we can pray in plain English about the daily issues that are on our minds.

He really made it pretty simple. Prayer is talking to your Father. Because your Father loves you, He will hear you when you pray. Talking to Him will make a difference. But, because He is smarter than you are, He may answer in ways you don’t expect.


Why should we pray together?
For one thing, Jesus taught us about the power of praying in agreement.
“Again, I tell you that if two of you on earth agree about anything you ask for, it will be done for you by my Father in heaven.” (Matthew 18:19)


Praying together also adds a dimension to our relationship with each other. It’s difficult to disrespect each other when we are together honoring the One who made us both. We can often communicate more effectively about things when we have talked together to God about it.


Why is it hard for some couples to pray together? Praying together with your spouse has so many benefits that it is well worth overcoming whatever obstacles you may find. Here are some of the things that may stand in the way of couples praying together.

• Time pressure – Life is always going to seem busy, but you will always find time for the things you think are important. Even a few minutes each day spent together in prayer will be well worth the time you put into it.
• Disrespect – It can be tough for a couple who has been treating each other with disrespect to sit down and pray together. They know they are going to have to change their attitude to be able to pray sincerely. This is one great reason for praying together despite whatever disagreements or disrespect you may have had with each other. If you have been arguing or insulting each other, don’t bring that into your prayer, other than repenting and asking God to show you both His will.
• Discomfort – Some people are uncomfortable praying out loud around other people, sometimes even more uncomfortable with their spouse or with their family. This is something you just need to get over through practice. Make it a point to pray together. Pray out loud. Keep it simple. If your spouse is the one who is uncomfortable, avoid any criticism of the way he or she prays.
• Shallow Relationship With God – When I was in elementary school, a Sunday School teacher impressed on us the importance of a regular prayer life. I decided to begin to pray each night as I went to bed. For a couple of days I asked God to bless my family, help me in school, and keep my friends safe from harm. After about three days of that, I really couldn’t think of anything else that needed to be said, so I prayed, “God, you know, the usual. Amen.” After a day or two of that, I quit praying at bedtime at all. My problem was that I had a very shallow relationship with God. There really were many more things on my mind, but I didn’t see God as a part of my daily life, so I didn’t think about talking to God about them. I wasn’t thinking about God’s plan for my future, so I wasn’t thinking of praying about the future. I wasn’t aware of how much God loved everyone else, so I wasn’t praying for others at my school to find God. There really were many things I could have been praying about.

If you find that your prayers are superficial, you may also need to deepen your Bible study, to see more of what is in God’s heart and how He works in the lives of people. Serving others will also add a dimension to your prayer life.

Giving Your Attention

Why did Absalom set Joab's barley field on fire?  He just wanted to talk to him.

In 2 Samuel 14:29-31 Absalom wanted to talk to Joab.  He wanted Joab to be a mediator between Absalom and Absalom's Dad, David.  Absalom sent for Joab, but he refused to meet with Absalom.  He tried a second time and Joab still refused.  So Absalom had his servants set Joab's barley field on fire.  Then Joab showed up and asked the obvious question, "Why have your servants set my field on fire?"  Absalom set Joab's barley field on fire because he wasn't getting his attention otherwise.

Maybe your spouse has done something that seems crazy and a big overreaction.  In some cases your spouse may be crying out for the opportunity to talk about something important, feeling like they can't really get your attention.

Some married couples have poor communication because they just don't allow time for it.  There's always something to do and having a good talk gets pushed aside.

We've always believed that a couple needs to make sure that every day they have an opportunity to ask each other, "How are you doing?" and then listen to the answer.

Sometimes couples don't connect because one wants to talk about the problem while the other wants to get to the solution.  Men are stereotypically focused on finding a solution, while women are stereotypically more interested in a good listener than a problem solver.  This short clip on youtube illustrates that difference (mostly from a man's perspective) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-4EDhdAHrOg

Other couples communicate well on most topics but have some subjects that they avoid because they know there is going to be conflict.  Friends of ours have scheduled an occasional planning retreat.  This is a trip for 2 or 3 days just for the two of them.  They plan time for relaxation, but also time to discuss and plan some of the more challenging areas of married life, such as money and parenting.

We don't recommend that you set anything on fire.  We recommend that you work at communication so neither of you feels like you have to start a fire to get your spouse's attention.

Love and Respect

Emerson Eggerichs wrote Love and Respect and several books that build from Ephesians 5:33, "However, each one of you also must love his wife as he loves himself, and the wife must respect her husband."  He has observed that when a woman feels unloved she may respond in ways that feel disrespectful and when a man feels disrespected he may respond in ways that feel unloving.  When this pattern gains momentum with a couple, Eggerichs calls it the "Crazy Cycle."  What he recommends instead is for the man to offer unconditional love and for the woman to offer unconditional respect.

But Eggerichs urges us not to overreact when our marriages have crazy moments.  1 Corinthians 7:28 says, "But those who marry will face many troubles in this life."  He believes that we will all have a few turns on the crazy cycle, but we need to learn how to end it in a healthy way.

One of the most heated disagreements Shirley and I ever had was early in our marriage.  We were headed home from a Sunday night church service.  I had to get up the next morning to work in an auto factory at a job I pretty much hated.  My mission was to get home and get to bed as quickly as possible so I could at least feel refreshed when I got up in the morning to face my commute to work.  Shirley had sung in the church choir, was thirsty, and said, "Pull over so I can get something to drink." (This was a few years before McDonald's or Burger King opened their first drive-through windows.)  I said, "No," kept driving home, and went straight to bed.  Shirley was unwilling to let this end there and started flipping the bedroom light switch on and off until I got up to explain myself.  I don't remember what happened next but we stayed married without violence or separation.  

This is a funny memory to us now because there is so much more love and respect in our marriage that every step in the story would be different.  I would be less stressed knowing that a few minutes of sleep wouldn't make a big difference. She would understand how I was feeling.  I would understand how she was feeling.  She would ask nicer.  I would not ignore her thirst.  There would be a drive-through open. We would have ice and root beer at home and wouldn't need to stop anyway.  Churches don't have Sunday night services much anymore. But if this was our grandparents' story from early in their marriage, they wouldn't have had a light switch to flip on and off.