Tag: Revive Your Marriage For Business Success

‘They are always thinking about how much it costs. “Eat and drink,” they say, but they don’t mean it.’ Proverbs 23:7(NLT)

‘“Besides, who would patch old clothing with new cloth? For the new patch would shrink and rip away from the old cloth, leaving an even bigger tear than before. “And no one puts new wine into old wineskins. For the wine would burst the wineskins, and the wine and the skins would both be lost. New wine calls for new wineskins.”’ Mark 2:21-22(NLT)

‘Take delight in the Lord , and he will give you your heart’s desires.’ Psalms 37:4(NLT)

‘Faith shows the reality of what we hope for; it is the evidence of things we cannot see. ‘ Hebrews 11:1(NLT)

‘This is a trustworthy saying: “If someone aspires to be a church leader, he desires an honorable position.” So a church leader must be a man whose life is above reproach. He must be faithful to his wife. He must exercise self-control, live wisely, and have a good reputation. He must enjoy having guests in his home, and he must be able to teach. He must not be a heavy drinker or be violent. He must be gentle, not quarrelsome, and not love money. He must manage his own family well, having children who respect and obey him. ‘ 1 Timothy 3:1-4(NLT)

To move from a chaotic marriage to a successful one, you first must forgive your spouse. I know moving from a state of unforgiveness to forgiveness can be difficult because of the years of unmet expectations. The only way to make this transition is to start your marriage over in your mind. 

Proverbs 23:7 teaches us that we do what we think, so you need to think as if you are just married and forget all the years of hurt feelings. If you cannot do this, then there is no hope for your marriage. 

Mark 2:21-22 gives a great illustration of this concept of starting over. It points out that new things require new containers. For your marriage, the new thing is forgiveness, and the new container is a new marriage (in your thought process). 

If you try to forgive without forgetting the past and starting over, the marriage will not work. After you restart your marriage by forgiving and forgetting, the next step is to not place any expectations on your spouse.

What the Bible and I want you to do is just serve the needs and desires of your spouse, and cast your needs and desires onto God, because the Bible never told us that our spouses would give us the desires of our hearts. The Bible says that God will give us the desires of our hearts – Psalm 37:4. Furthermore, Hebrews 11:1 says that faith is the substance of our desires, not our spouses.

Can you now see that we have been expecting our spouses to do something that only God can do? You cannot unconditionally love your spouse until you get your expectations off of them, and the only way to do that is to conclude that your spouse owes you nothing. 

When you truly believe in your heart that your spouse owes you nothing, you will find a freedom to love your spouse. From this freedom, a successful marriage will be birthed, and then you will qualify to be one of God’s leaders according to 1 Timothy 3:1-4.

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‘Then the Lord God planted a garden in Eden in the east, and there he placed the man he had made. ‘ Genesis 2:8(NLT)

‘This explains why a man leaves his father and mother and is joined to his wife, and the two are united into one.’ Genesis 2:24(NLT)

‘Hope deferred makes the heart sick, but a dream fulfilled is a tree of life.’ Proverbs 13:12(NLT)

‘So again I say, each man must love his wife as he loves himself, and the wife must respect her husband.’ Ephesians 5:33(NLT)

‘Wives, submit to your husbands, as is fitting for those who belong to the Lord. Husbands, love your wives and never treat them harshly.’ Colossians 3:18-19(NLT)

We have so many bad examples of marriage that we must go back to the book of Genesis to see what marriage should be like. In Genesis 2:8, God said, “It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him an help meet for him,” and in Genesis 2:24, God said, “Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh.” 

From these two statements, we get the original definition of marriage straight from God. A wife is a help meet (companion) to her husband, a husband is to cleave (hold on) to his wife, and both should operate together on the same page.

Within God’s definition of marriage, there is nothing stating that the wife should cook or the husband should take out the trash. Man added all these extra definitions and many more to marriage; however, to have a successful marriage we must follow God’s original definition.

By following man’s definition, we add many unnecessary expectations to marriage, and expectations that go unmet will cause your heart to get sick – see Proverbs 13:12. Once your heart becomes sick, you will live in a state of unforgiveness with your spouse.

How can we expect to qualify as one of God’s business leaders if we are living with unforgiveness? Mark 11:23-26 shows us that unforgiveness stops our prayers from being answered. Without our prayers answered, we cannot receive direction for our businesses from God. 

Therefore, it is critical that we remove all expectations from our spouses except what the Bible expects. The Bible simply instructs husbands to love their wives and wives to reverence their husbands – Ephesians 5:33, Colossians 3:18-19. To love someone is to serve them; to reverence someone is to submit to their leadership. In both cases, the husband and wife are in the position of serving the other person. 

If you follow this principle of serving the other spouse, then you’ll have a successful marriage without unnecessary expectations.

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‘But if you do get married, it is not a sin. And if a young woman gets married, it is not a sin. However, those who get married at this time will have troubles, and I am trying to spare you those problems.’ 1 Corinthians 7:28(NLT)

‘And I tell you this, whoever divorces his wife and marries someone else commits adultery—unless his wife has been unfaithful.” Jesus’ disciples then said to him, “If this is the case, it is better not to marry!” “Not everyone can accept this statement,” Jesus said. “Only those whom God helps. ‘ Matthew 19:9-11(NLT)

One of the major reasons marriage is important is because it is a training ground for our businesses. However, having a successful marriage is not easy. In fact, it will be one of your biggest challenges on earth. 

The apostle Paul warned us of the difficulties of marriage in 1 Corinthians 7:28: “if thou marry, thou hast not sinned; and if a virgin marry, she hath not sinned. Nevertheless such shall have trouble in the flesh: but I spare you.” 

Paul is basically telling us that it would be better to stay single than to get married, because you will have trouble in your marriage. Why? Because marriage is not a natural state of existence for two individuals. 

For example, take a manicured golf course and do not tend to it for a year. Return to that site after a year has passed, and you will find that the once manicured golf course looks like a wilderness. The natural state of the golf course is not an ordered manicured lawn but a chaotic wilderness. 

In the same manner, if a marriage is left alone, then it will return to its natural state of divorce (two individuals returning to being single). So you see, like keeping a golf course manicured, keeping two people married requires a lot of work for it not to revert to its natural state.

Even Jesus’ disciples recognized the difficulties of staying married. In Matthew 19:9-11, Jesus taught that married people should never get a divorce (except for reason of adultery), and his disciples responded by saying, “If the case of the man be so with his wife, it is not good to marry.” Jesus responds to their observations of the difficulties of staying married by saying, “All men cannot receive this saying, save they to whom it is given.” 

Jesus basically said it is difficult, but God has ordained some to get married and stay married. So if you are married, and desire to qualify as one of God’s business leaders, then you are ordained to stay married and to have a successful marriage. It will take some work on your part, but you are graced to do it.

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‘This is a trustworthy saying: “If someone aspires to be a church leader, he desires an honorable position.” So a church leader must be a man whose life is above reproach. He must be faithful to his wife. He must exercise self-control, live wisely, and have a good reputation. He must enjoy having guests in his home, and he must be able to teach. He must not be a heavy drinker or be violent. He must be gentle, not quarrelsome, and not love money. He must manage his own family well, having children who respect and obey him. ‘ 1 Timothy 3:1-4(NLT)

‘For if a man cannot manage his own household, how can he take care of God’s church?’ 1 Timothy 3:5(NLT)

‘He looked around at them one by one and then said to the man, “Hold out your hand.” So the man held out his hand, and it was restored! ‘ Luke 6:10(NLT)

In 1 Timothy 3:1-4, a bishop is defined as an overseer of God’s works, and this same definition applies to a Christian entrepreneur – he or she is an overseer of God’s works in business. If God has given you the vision to start a business, the business you start is a result of His work, and you are the overseer or CEO.

Therefore, the qualifications to become a bishop are the same qualifications to become a business owner, and from the list of qualifications, one stands out – “you need to rule your own house well.” For a married entrepreneur, this means that your marriage needs to be successful in order to qualify. 

Why? Because the principles that you need to run a successful business God’s way are first learned and mastered by creating a successful marriage. Your spouse is your first customer, and the techniques you learn to make them happy are then applied on a larger scale in business where you have many more customers you are trying to make happy through your products or services. 

This is why in 1 Timothy 3:5, Paul tells Timothy: “If a man know not how to rule his own house, how shall he take care of the house of God?” This is not because marriage is more important, but because ministry or a Godly business is a larger representation of your marriage. 

Remember Luke 16:10: “he that is faithful in that which is least is faithful also in much: and he that is unjust in the least is unjust also in much.” Your marriage is the least, not in importance but in scale, and your own business is the much.

The training ground for a success business starts with a successful marriage. When we violate this principle, we are disqualifying ourselves from a success business God’s way. 

Over the next few days as you read this devotional and the associated scriptures, don’t get in condemnation but instead allow Holy Spirit to speak to you about restoration and change in your marriage. 

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