So, I read the "Girlfriends in God" Devotionals just about every day except for Saturday and Sunday! Being a mom, sometimes that is all the devotions I can get done in the morning! :/
Today's devotional was really good on marriage (she has been focusing on marriage for the month of February). Today it was on losing that "lovin" feeling and focused on Revelation 2:4 which says, "Yet I hold this against you; You have forsaken your first love."
She states in the beginning how she hates when people talk about falling in and out of love, like it's something you can turn on and off like an electric blanket to keep you warm at night. Love is a commitment. I loved how she says that she married her husband because she loved him, but NOW she loves her husband because she married him. She says that if we let our hearts be jerked around because of how we are feeling on any given day, then we are headed on a never ending roller coaster ride that will leave us heart sick.
She also wrote a statistic that people who are unhappily married and just "stick it out" find that five years later, they describe their marriage as being happier than before! I found this so interesting! I sometimes find my "emotional" self thinking I don't have the marriage that "I" want one day ... but, if I just "ignore" those "feelings", I will feel completely different a few days later! Jeff tells me often, "One day I'm a good husband and the next day I'm not!" Poor thing! Shame on me for making him feel this way and shame on me for not showing him that my love is unconditional... because it is and that is always what I want to show, even though I don't always show him this.
I love Revelation 2:4 and how it reminds us of "WHO" our first love is or who it should be! Sometimes we forget! Normally, when I feel that my marriage isn't what it should be... it's because I have forgotten who my first love is. I can sometimes be so focused on my marriage that I completely neglect the one who created marriage and gave me my precious husband! I forget who my first love is and that He loves me more than my husband ever could!
Father, forgive me for putting you at the bottom sometimes, instead of the top (where you belong)! Forgive me for allowing my marriage to be an idol in my life! Help me to see marriage as a gift and help me to see my husband as a gift! Thank you for blessing me with a GREAT marriage and I pray we can both put you 1st in our lives, so that we can love each other the way you want us to!
