15 – First Things First

By AMY JOHNSON

 

“If a man has recently married, he must not be sent to war or have any other duty laid on him. For one year he is to be free to stay home and bring happiness to the wife he has married.” (Deuteronomy 24:5)

Everyone loves the honeymoon stage of marriage. You are on cloud nine and your spouse could do no wrong in your eyes (except putting the toilet paper roll on the wrong way, not pushing up the toothpaste from the bottom of the tube, leaving wet towels on the bed, etc…) I think you get my point. When we got married, my husband and I had an idea of what we wanted our marriage to look like; we wanted a WRLLR marriage, which stands for Wildly Romantic Long Lasting Relationship.

Unfortunately, in the beginning of our marriage, we (and by we I technically mean my husband) were broke – or another way to put it is that he had a lot of debt. The Bible says, “and the two are united into one, since they are no longer two but one” (Mark 10:8, NLT), so his debt became mine. This was hard for me at first, but I accepted the challenge when I knew I had found the man of my dreams. We decided to cut out our cable and internet subscriptions to save money and we put that money towards debt. Everyone we talked to thought we were crazy for not having TV or internet. They would ask us, “what do you do?!”

What we did that first year was to put a little extra effort into our marriage; we read a lot! Luckily for us, we both enjoy reading. But the important thing was that we specifically chose to read books on marriage (for example Love & Respect, His Needs Her Needs, The 5 Love Languages.) We would read them separately and then discuss the parts that we read. By doing this together, I believe we were setting a foundation of what we wanted our marriage to be like.

In Deuteronomy 24:5 it says “If a man has recently married, he must not be sent to war or have any other duty laid on him. For one year he is to be free to stay at home and bring happiness to his wife.” Not only is this mentioned in the Bible, but so many of our friends and family had also mentioned to us how important that first year of marriage is. I am so glad we put the effort in during that time.

Fast forward 8 years of marriage, 3 kids under 5, and owning our own business…life is definitely busy! But something we learned early on in our marriage is to put God first above all else. There are so many more things to distract us now than there were 8 years ago. We live in a culture of technology. Looking back at that first year of marriage without a smartphone, without internet, without TV, we were able to put more focus on each other. There is a quote I’ve heard that says “If Satan can’t make you bad…he’ll make you busy.” We need to overcome busy and turn away from all the distractions out there so we can be intentional about our relationship with each other and with the Lord. We need to trust in the Lord, not lean on our own understanding, acknowledge him in all our ways, and watch him make our paths straight! (Proverbs 3:5-6)

 

TALK ABOUT IT

What are your biggest distractions right now?

What are your biggest goals and priorities currently as a couple?

Which areas of your marriage do you need to prioritize better and how can you help each other do that?

 

 

Skip & Amy live in Maplewood, MN and have three very busy little girls. They enjoy cooking, hunting, golfing & waterskiing together as a family and they own a successful financial planning business.