I realize that being in sync spiritually is not realistic for every marriage as some couples don’t share the same faith or the relationship is so fractured that spiritual intimacy takes a back seat, but for those who do have that common ground, I think it’s worth the reach.
Each couple has their own story for how they walk out their faith, both individually and within the context of marriage and family, but one thing we decided to do on the advice of many of you, was to make it a priority to pray together.
Strong Marriage Experiment Day 8 – Pray Together
Today’s action is to spend time praying together.
After 14 years of marriage we have had seasons in which one or both of us prayed every night and then other times in which it felt like pulling teeth just to mutter a prayer. In general, I think it’s a good idea to pray together not because of some sort of superstition, or the thought that something bad will happen if you don’t, but because it’s another way to share life together.
Maybe something has bothered me a little over the last few days that I haven’t mentioned to David yet. Once it randomly comes up during prayer, David knows that I need support in a particular area that he was previously unaware of.
The problem is I get into it, end up rambling, and he falls asleep — which puts a slight damper on things. Anyway, because of this, we usually have David pray first. He is a man of few words when praying and I used to be really bothered by that until I realized that he is consistently growing in character and practicing the values we proclaim. So there’s really nothing to be upset about.
I think that we are like a lot of people who live in the tension of knowing that God is omniscient while at the same time believing that He wants us to bring our requests and thoughts to Him. We don’t really know why an all knowing God would want to hear from us about what we need, since He already knows what we need, but the bible does indicate that He likes the exchange.
One thing we have learned from experience is that doing a lot of praying while taking little action does next to nothing to build a great marriage. Yep, we tried that. Still, God does seem to like the partnership thing so I’m sure we’ll grow and mature in our shared prayer life over time.
All you really need to know about how today’s Strong Marriage Experiment went is, in typical Oak fashion, I put him to sleep!
True story.
