Last year we had the honor of sharing our story with Lifehouse Church in Hagerstown. We’re preparing to speak there again, and as we’ve been preparing, were reflecting on whatwe shared last year – 10 things our disabled marriage is teaching us about God.

we’d like to share them here too, beginning with number one:

1. God is the author of marriage God created man. Genesis 1:26-28 Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on earth.So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him, male and female he created them. And God blessed them. And God said to them “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and every other living thing that moves on the earth”

Then God created woman. And marriage. Genesis 2:23 “This at last is bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh. she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man. Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh. And the man and his wife were both naked and were not ashamed.”

But He didn’t just create marriage to exist without purpose or glory. He created it to reflect Christ and the church.

Ephesians 5:28 In the same way husbands should love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. For no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as CHrist does the church, because we are members of his body. THerefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh. This mystery is profound and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the church.

Because of that, He will be true to it. He will value and protect it. He’ll treat it with tender compassion. He will not let your marriage story be undone and He will not leave you to keep it healthy on your own.

From Ian – He’s the author of this marriage, which means that we are living with His story. That means I’m leading my life like a screenplay. That idea of living through a screenplay shows me that my words matter. My words matter in marriage because Larissa, my wife, hears every word I say. He’s the author, so I have confidence in my marriage because He’s faithful.

God created this covenant, this promise, for us to enjoy. Why would we ever doubt the value or worth of fighting hard for something that in scripture is so clearly valued and worth fighting for? We couldn’t have made our lives come together like they did. I love thinking about how separate our lives were for 20 years, existing entirely without each other. And then our lives merge and we know we have a God that does not make mistakes and from that, we can deduce that he authored this. And since God authored this purpose for my life and for Ian’s life, I don’t have to fear during the days that I don’t think I like my husband any more – because God has ordained this relationship and God will sustain it. He has made this gift for me.