Escolar Documentos
Profissional Documentos
Cultura Documentos
By Rick Warren
“Do all marriages go stale after 25 years? Ours has. My husband and I don’t
seem to have much to talk about any more. We used to talk about our kids.
But now they’re grown and gone, and we really don’t have anything to
converse about. I have no major complaints with my husband. But the old
excitement is gone. We watch a lot of television. And we read. And we have
friends. But when we’re alone together, it’s pretty dull. We even sleep in
separate bedrooms now. Is there someway to recapture the old magic?”
– The Song has Ended
How incredibly sad! Too many marriages in our churches are struggling
because the romance has died. Looking around, there is a disturbing trend
that plays itself out in most troubled marriages. They go from fiery romance to
reality to rut to resentment to regret. Before long, divorce comes.
Pastor, the marriages in our churches – including our own – are either
growing together or drifting apart. There’s no middle ground. Your church has
a unique opportunity to encourage healthy, growing marriages. How do flat
marriages rekindle their romance? The same way Jesus tells us to rekindle
our love for him in Revelation 2:4-5. Jesus says, “You have forsaken your first
love. Remember the height from which you have fallen? Repent and do the
things you did at first.”
First, you remember the good times. You do again what you did when you first
fell in love. Then, you repent or deliberately change how you treat your
spouse. But what are those actions that you “did at first”? Married people did
five things when they first fell in love. And they’ll need to do it again if they are
going to recapture that romance: attention, affirmation, affection, adventure,
and accordance (spiritual oneness) they had when they first fell in love.
1. Attention: The very first sign that you were falling in love was
that you noticed that someone was paying attention to you – and
you started to pay attention to that someone. Do you remember
how much attention you paid your mate before you were married?
You wrote notes. You made phone calls. You spent hours talking
together. You sent cards. You bought flowers. You brought gifts.
You said over and over again, “You have my total and undivided
attention.”
What happened after you got married? Instead of saying, “I'll get
that for you,” we started saying, “Get it yourself!” We became
complacent in our relationship and took one another for granted.
But if you’re going to rekindle the romance, you’ve got to make
time for each other and pay attention to each other. If you don’t,
you’re headed for trouble.
You’ve probably heard this before, but it’s so true. “Treat your
husband like a king and he will treat you like a queen.” Very simple
yet profound. We tend to become what others expect of us.
Verbalize your love for your spouse every day. If you will verbalize
your love, you will begin to feel that love you once had.
God wants you to have oneness. Romance was God’s idea. The
Bible says two shall become one – intellectually, emotionally,
physically, recreationally, and spiritually. When you are only
having oneness in three of those areas, your marriage isn’t fully
what God wants it to be. But when you and your spouse connect
in all five areas, that’s when you find real, honest oneness.