First of all a husband and wife must be honest with each other.
What kind of marriage do you have and what kind of marriage do you want.
Lets talk about 3 types of marriages: Healthy and fruitful, unfulfilled troubled, just alright or so so.
Just ask yourself and be honest, what kind of marriage do I have.
On a scale of 1-10 how do you grade your marriage? "And as Adam said, this is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh: she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man.
" (Genesis 2:23).
The very fact that woman was taken out of man suggests that holy matrimony should be the closest union and the most affectionate attachment on earth.
A husband should always consider and treat his wife as though she were part of him.
This motivates him to always nourish and cherish her, just as he does his own flesh.
If a husband and wife really become one as the Bible teaches them to do, their marriage will become sweeter and more fulfilling each year.
"Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ also loved the church, and gave Himself for it (her) (Eph.
5:25).
The key to being a Christian husband and loving your wife is loving her as Christ loved the church.
Jesus loved the church with a self-forgetting and self- sacrificing love, even unto death.
This is the way Christian men should love their wives.
"So ought men to love their wives as their own bodies.
He that loves his wife loves himself".
(Eph.
5:28).
If a man cares about his own body, he will love, cherish, and protect his wife because they are "one flesh.
" Instead of hating our wives, we should nourish and cherish them as Christ does the church.
In this passage, the word "nurture" means to care for one's own flesh.
Because we have become one flesh with our mate, we care for her to the best of our ability and rejoice that we have the opportunity to do so! Don't you know its gonna cost you something to have a successful marriage.
You are gonna have to dig deep and I mean deep! The word "cherish" actually means to keep warm, like a bird protecting her young with her wings, shielding them from the chill winter air.
A Christian husband keeps his wife warm and comfortable with tender, loving care.
How lovely she will find her nest when she receives this kind of care.
The only thing that does not have needs is something dead.
Rejoice and thank God every day that you have a living, breathing woman who has needs and, by the grace and strength which God gives you, you are able to minister to those needs! This is not a burden, but a rich blessing from God, and all the time you are ministering in a beautiful way to yourself! The Bible says, "He who finds a wife finds a good thing" (Prov.
18:22).
"Rejoice with the wife of your youth: (Prov.
5:18).
Understand this- A solid marriage is a marriage where both partners have committed to relate to each other according to God's word biblical principles and not according to the world's standards or flesh.
(Luke 6:46) "And why call ye me Lord and Lord and do not the things which I sent".
Look at that.
Now you're saying Jesus is your Lord but you can't call him Lord unless you are willing to obey and abide of God's authority.
So you have to submit to what God says to you as a husband and a wife.
If you don't have enough concern about your marriage to just hear God's word surely you can't have a successful marriage.
It has to built on a solid foundation.
Some people think that rock is salvation, the word of God, church membership, being a good person.
If the rock was the new birth and salvation then every married person would never separate or get a divorce but there have been many good christian people within a marriage to get divorced.
So remember that rock that you build your marriage on salvation or church membership.