From Destruction to Restoration
When we launched our 8 Things that Destroyed Our Marriage series last week, we had no idea what to expect. We felt like God laid the mistakes on our heart to share, and we just prayed that He would use the ways that we messed up our marriage to help other marriages. The response has been beyond our imagination. Thank you for reading, responding, emailing and Twittering us your stories and your encouragement.
For some of you that have followed our series…your heart has been hurting as you have read the mistakes. Maybe you have made the same mistakes in your marriage, but the reality is that your marriage didn’t survive…and the pain or the regret from that relationship has revisited your heart.
Maybe for some, our series was a wake up call to some things that are going on under the surface in your marriage right now. So many people have emailed and told us that Mistake 1 or Mistake 4 or Mistake 8 really hit home. I want you to know that Trisha and I have prayed for you. We have prayed that God would show up and use our mistakes to restore life and love to your marriage. For others, your marriage is in great shape and this was just a good reminder of how to avoid some pretty deep pitfalls.
No matter where you are in your relationship with God and no matter how you would categorize your marital status or condition…God has a laid a few things on my heart to share this morning….
-There is hope! If you are single, married, single again or remarried, our greatest desire is that you will find HOPE for your heart from our story. No matter how bad it was, how hard it is, how lonely you feel, how much regret you have, how many mistakes you have made…if God can restore and redeem our marriage, YOU HAVE HOPE.
-Your identity and your value are NOT defined by your marital status or your marital success/failure. So many times in my life I have allowed things other than God to define my value and be my identity. Both Trisha and I had to come to a place individually that we would be all that God wanted us to be, whether or not we stayed married. God loves you and assigns value to you only because you are His…that is not something that can be earned…it is something that is given, but you have to receive it and choose to live in it.
-It is worth it! I know for many people, reading some of the mistakes we made in our marriage is difficult and the conversations that those mistakes can prompt are hard. But, I want you to know that if you choose to go there, and you choose to identify areas in your marriage where you are not hitting the mark, if you determine to have gut-wrenching conversations…IT WILL be worth it. It will cost you some heartache on the front end, but the intimacy you will experience will be what you always thought married life should be. It is worth it!
We had no idea when we started this thing where it would go. But several people have asked how we moved past the mistakes? How did we restore our marriage? So over the next couple of weeks we are going to be walking through how we moved from Destruction to Restoration.
I know many of you have been through this and I would love your input…how did God restore your marriage? Maybe it wasn’t your marriage that was broken, but a relationship with a parent or sibling that God miraculously healed…please give us your feedback.
We are working through some things that we can identify that moved us from where we were 3 ½ years ago to where we are now. Looking forward to continuing the journey of being refined and restored.
Remember, there is hope! You have value! It is worth it!
