I wonder how many millions of people think, I just don’t feel the way I once did about my husband or wife. I wish I still felt excited about our marriage —— that romantic feelings would come back.
Just a reminder: wishing does no good; only action changes things. If you don’t feel you’re getting anything out of your marriage, perhaps you are not putting enough into it. I say that only because that was about what I felt I wasn’t getting from Dave. What God said was not what I wanted to hear, but it was true. He said, Joyce, if you want more out of your marriage, put more into it. I may not have liked hearing that, but I knew He was right.
We usually give our spouses the responsibility of making us happy rather than living to make them happy. In the process, neither one ends up happy. But you change change that! If you want your marriage or any other relationship to improve, just start doing more of the right thing yourself.
Don’t have unrealistic expectations. Recognize the feelings you had in the early days of your relationship for what they were. They were feelings — no more, no less — just feelings! When I married Dave, I didn’t even know what love was, and my emotions were so dysfunctional that whatever I did feel couldn’t have been trusted to tell me anything. I married Dave because he asked me to, and I knew he was a good man. He did excite me because he was and is very good-looking. He was also an amateur bodybuilder and had muscles everywhere. I liked the way I felt when he kissed me. He had a car and I didn’t have one. He had money and I didn’t have any, so there were lots of things to excite me. We have been married forty-four years now, and I can say without any hesitation that I sincerely and definitely love Dave. I don’t always feel excited when he comes home, my heart doesn’t pound when he kisses me, but I truly do love him.
No matter what happens, I am committed to Dave. That is love! Love is not a mere feeling. It is a decision about how we will behave and treat people.
Love can produce feelings, and I am not saying that feelings aren’t enjoyable, because if they are good ones, they’re very enjoyable! But I am saying that feelings cannot be depended upon and they don’t always tell the truth.
A woman told me recently that she loved another man and did not love her husband anymore. I am trying to get her to understand that even if she chooses the other man, her feelings toward him will eventually change too. Then she’ll be left with no good feelings, and lots of negative feelings of guilt, shame, and failure. If the man she has feelings for is willing to cheat on his wife, then he is likely to cheat on her also. His character is not too admirable, if you ask me. On the other hand, her husband is willing to forgive her and wants the marriage to work. That alone shows me that he does have character because he is willing to set aside his own wounded feelings and disappointment in order to save his marriage.
The woman in question feels she can never be happy without the other man, but I know for a fact, from the Word of God and life’s experiences, she will never be happy with him either. Once the the excitement of having the forbideen fruit wears off, the misery will begin.
Just look at Adam and Eve in the garden. Satan made the fruit look like something Eve just could not pass up. She had to have it, and I am sure it excited her to think about what the thought it would bring her. Satan said that if she ate it, she would be like God! But the moment she ate and gave the fruit to Adam and he ate, they both lost something they never got back. They were ashamed and felt guilty and they hid from God. Doing the wrong thing, no matter how excited it makes us feel, absolutely choose now what you will be happy with later on. Make decisions based not on excitement or the lack of it, but on God’s principles.
The nature of the flesh is to want what it thinks it cannot have, but once it has what it thought it wanted, the craving starts all over again. The one word that the flesh screams the loudest is more, and no matter how much it has, it is still never satisfied.
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