Thanks,
Karen
Marriage
~ written by Loren Romeus (Belle and Paul’s son ~ written May 10, 2003)
I’ve
got several things written and prepared to send, but a lot of things have been
pulling my spirit toward the issue of marriage and specifically the spiritual
warfare surrounding marriage, so we’ll try to go that route today.
I
really don’t have anything profound to say regarding marriage today. Many of you have much more experience in that
field than I do, but I think it is worthy of our collective focus for a least a
week.
First
of all, marriage is one of the foremost battlegrounds of spiritual
warfare. The enemy devotes tremendous
effort toward the destruction of individual marriages and the institution of
marriage as a whole. At any given time
in our life, other areas of your life (health, finances, career, friendships,
etc.) may or may not be under attack depending on the tailored strategy of the
enemy for your downfall. However, you
can be sure that your marriage is under continuous attack. There are a number of reasons that I can
think of for this, and I’m sure many more exist.
1. Marriage is a reflection of Salvation. If a person truly understands mutually
exclusive, intimate, life-long covenant based on unconditional love (marriage),
they can easily understand and embrace mutually exclusive, intimate, life-long
covenant based on unconditional love (salvation).
2. Marriage
is the foundation of family. A godly
family and household is God’s design for raising and developing people. One of the easiest ways for the enemy to
unravel the fabric of a person’s life is to begin destroying their family
environment during childhood. If a child
doesn’t learn about love, discipline, forgiveness, affection, respect,
commitment, integrity, and all those types of subjects at home, the world is
more than happy to teach them all they need to know.
3. The
spiritual power of a united couple is tremendous. The enemy attacks marriage so hard because it
holds great danger for destroying his kingdom.
The accountability, support, prayer, encouragement, and combined
anointing available within marriage holds potential for phenomenal men and
women of God.
4. Since
marriage reflects salvation, it is a constant reminder to the enemy of his
defeat at the cross and the restoration and intimacy with God that will never
again be available to him. Yes,
marriages are attacked because they pose a threat, but more than that, they are
attacked because the enemy vehemently, viciously hates marriage.
Last
Sunday night, a group of us concluded a study on marriage that we had been
conducting for a number of weeks. That last night the only thing on the agenda
was prayer. We prayed for each other and
for marriages of certain other couples we knew.
It ended up being nearly an hour and a half of effectual, fervent
prayer. I came away from there thinking,
“Man, I really needed that!” and “Why in the world don’t we do things like this
more often?” We are so concerned with
maintaining an image of good, stable, shining Christian lives that we hesitate
to ask people to pray for us. James 5:
16 says, “Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so
that you may be healed. The prayer of a
righteous man is powerful and effective.”
The second sentence is quoted all the time in church, but the first
sentence is remarkably less popular.
Whether
your marriage is experiencing difficulty at the moment or not, I challenge you
this week to find a prayer warrior or two and request prayer for your own
marriage. Furthermore, let the Spirit
guide you to pray for marriages of people you know. Tear down strongholds of pride, selfishness,
materialism, lust, bitterness, and so forth.
Cancel every demonic strategy and plan against those marriages in the
name of Jesus Christ. Proclaim peace,
passion, intimacy, understanding, support, and clear communication by the
authority of the True and Living God.
This is a war zone, get in there and FIGHT! While you’re at it, pray for Tina and me.
The
Lord be with you all,
Loren
No comments:
Post a Comment