Staying in Love is for a Lifetime

People are falling in love everyday. Then you notice that after a short run they are out of love. More and more today I'm hearing couples who have been married less than three years announce that they are no longer in love. This made me wonder why? After all of the hoopla over the wedding and the honeymoon then the first year of marital bliss the real life marriage begins. This is the time when the gloves come off and the true face is shown. 

This is the time that the couple should dig in and become determined to grow their love and relationship. A lasting love takes work, time and patience on the parts of both spouses. The marriage will go through many seasons of change. During those changes the couple will experience different degrees of their love. There will be times when the couple might look at each other and just not feel that loving feeling.

Its during those times that the couple must choose to love one another and push their marriage to another level. People fall in love everyday for many reasons. We see it on TV and in the movies where people meet and then before they know it they are in love, in bed, and standing before the preacher. They have a crazy relationship and end up separated or divorce. Its funny and we think that this is the way love really is. You fall in, have fun, and when it gets rough you move on.

This is not love or a base for a long life with the love of your life. Everyday from the moment you become one you must pray over your marriage. Set your mind to work on keeping your marriage healthy and choose to love no matter what. As the couple in the above picture shows us staying in love is oh so special. This is what God ordained marriage to be and all marital couples should set staying in love as their marital goal. To love one another by any means necessary is ok but to love each other with God as your center will allow for that goal of staying in love for a lifetime.

Has It Come To This?...The Only Way To Be Happy and Married Is To Marry A Vampire!

Are Vampires our only choice as a suitable spouse?

I am a lover of fiction. That is the best way for me to relax. To sit down with my favorite beverage and in my cozy chair. With my blanket with the arms already on it that way I won't get cold as I turn the pages of my book or press the bottom on my nook. Don't get me wrong I love reading the latest vampire craze. However what gets me is to see that the only way it seems that anyone can be in love or have a happy marriage is to be with a vampire.

I do understand the Twilight craze and True Blood. In fact I like both of these (well maybe not all of the Twilight saga) and they make the vampire lover so alluring. He out shines any man that God could ever create. But lets face it people not only is it fiction if this so call lover existed he or she would be dead. How in the world could anyone want to be touched by something dead? Having a spouse that when you touch them they feel cold as ice. When you lay on their chest there is no heartbeat. And in the latest part of the Twilight saga Breaking Dawn she not only marrys the vampire but gets pregnant. OK this is a stretch even for me. A dead man creating life with a living woman....really!!!

Believe it or not there are ladies and some men who are secretly wishing that they could marry a vampire. How crazy is that? Has marriage sunk that low that we would rather be with a fictitious dead man or woman who happens to come out at night and live on the blood of the living. Is that what love and marriage is all about? Us desiring to share our intimate lives with an undead creature.

Sure its fun and entertaining and really would make a great date night movie adventure. But its when I see or hear people emulating the vampire life because they would rather be this creature than what God has made them that's when I start to see just how sick the world is becoming. I'm for married couples playing out their fantasies with each other during their datenight fun time however that's where it should end.

Many reading this may think that I'm taking it to the extreme. But how much does TV and movies influence the lives of the young and the lonely?

I know for one when I was young and read the romance novels I expected life and love to be just that way. I looked for the knight in shinning armour. I expected my married life with my knight to be happily ever after. But the truth of the matter is that we are living in the real world.

A world that's hard and some times uncaring. A world that will not show love in the way that it was created to be. That's why we need God. We need Him to guide us into all truth and teach us how to love each other and to be mates for life. When we follow the creator of love and marriage than we will be able to endure in this harsh world. We will be able to stay together during the hard seasons of marriage.

We will desire each other instead of looking at fiction and wanting our lives to be like the minds of a gifted writer. Marriage is always a work in progress. When we remember that then there is nothing that will come our way that we can not work together with God as our leader and solve.

Personally I don't do well with cold. I don't like cold weather and I know I could not live with a cold dead person and having that person drinking my blood or even the blood of animals to live. That person who could never walk in the sun light or as the latest vampire stories they can walk in the sun light but will glow and appear strange. This is fiction and makes a wonderful spooky story. But that's where it stays in fiction land.

When we get married we come together to become one in Christ Jesus. We build our lives on the rock of God and there is nothing that will bring us down as long as we follow the real author of the life novel.

Don't get caught up in the nonsense of the world. Remember that the Creator makes all the rules. Love the living and enjoy one another as you grow together. Allowing Jesus to direct and guide your union.

So what do you think?..... let's talk about it.

The Wedding Ring

Together forever

The Wedding Ring

"The symbol of joining together in life and love. Once you put that ring on my finger I had no intentions of taking it off. It let the world know that I was in a union. A union that was blessed by God. Even if I didn't have one I would know that I belonged to you and you to me as we belonged as one with Christ. But sometimes when I least expect to I'm looking at my ring and thinking about how I love my wife and being a couple together in marriage."

This was the answer that my husband gave when I asked him how did he feel about his wedding ring. I didn't expect his answer in fact I never thought about the rings I wear. After getting his answer I began to think about the wedding ring and what it really meant.

During our ceremony and when I have married many couples we speak about the rings. The fact that it is an outward symbol of our union. The wedding ring is a complete circle. That continues from beginning to the end and onward. The ring is worn on the third finger left hand. This finger has a direct line that goes directly to the heart. This means that your marriage with its symbol is the closes thing to your life line your heart.

Many men don't wear their ring. Some say because they are not allowed to wear it at work this we can understand. Others say they just don't want to wear it. That has always bothered me because he should want the world to know that he has his special lady and that he is hands off. Many ladies state that they don't like to wear their rings. Most say because they can't at work but many say that they don't have to wear a ring to be married. That is true but this token was a major part of your wedding day and something that you can always look at that will lift your mood when you are having a really bad day. Or when you are upset with your spouse just looking at that symbol will take you out of that bad mood.

I do understand that a ring is not the marriage but just like what my husband said I do find myself still looking at my rings that are over 30 years old and maybe outdated and thinking how beautiful they are and how proud of my husband that I am for giving them to me. I want the world to know I belong to someone and just back off. Don't waste your time.

I love looking at the different wedding rings both male and female. I love to hear the story about how the female was asked and was she surprised or not. I love to see the glow in her eyes when she looks at her hand and thinks about her husband. Likewise I found that most of the men that wear their rings love them and are proud to be married. I see that they take their wedding vows serious and the ring is like a daily reminder of this great act of love. 

So what comes into your mine when you look at your wedding ring? Do you still wear your ring? How many times have you thought about the vows you said as you placed that ring on your spouse's finger? Let us know really what you think.

With this ring I do thee wed!

Sometimes inorder to be a great couple you have to be great apart!

You must love yourself first before you can couple with another

Writing this post today seems strange because our emphasis here at 2R1N CHRIST is to promote marriage and relationship. So how can I say that being a great couple would have you at a place of being apart? Our bottom line goal is to establish all married couples to be individuals together becoming one in Christ Jesus. However in order to do that there are times when you just need to be a lone individual before you can really enjoy being part of a couple.

If you have been a part of this marriage ministry you understand that this is wedding season. Many couples are planning and taking that next step. We are elated and have been extremely busy. Not only that we have started our summer season of lectures and are speakers at many local and some out of town marriage ministries as well. We have started the next phase of our ministry which is to establish a social network that places God in the social mix and that is in its infancy stages so its taking a lot of work.

Let me stop here and have a quick sidebar: I must invite you all to become a disciple of the new social network FEELING GOD. Its two weeks old today and a great place to gather and fellowship. http://www.feelinggod.ning.com  sorry end of sidebar back to the blog post.

So to say we have been very busy and in that the regular everyday life of working and living we don't know if we are coming or going half the time. So a strange think happened last Thursday. We found out that a church who had booked us for their spring marriage ministry conference canceled. My long weekend of running around and being busy with the conference etc. was now gone. Driving home from work I had been noticing that I just didn't feel like myself in my physical. I needed something but just didn't know what it was. Thinking that maybe I needed to change my diet (which I do) I decided to stop pass this natural health store and buy some vitamins.

To my surprise once there the store turned out to have a wonderful day spa in the back. I had just missed the May specials (gee whiz) but their prices were reasonable. I set everything up for Sat. since I was free and then wondered what was I going to do with my husband.

I got home and my husband was sitting on the bed making fishing lures. He greeted me with the sunniest smile and then said " So we are free this weekend?" I answered him in the affirmative and he shouted..."great I'm going fishing Friday night and won't be back until the end of the day Sat."!. Then he looked at me and asked as an after thought if I wanted to go. I said no go have fun I have something planned.

Long story short the weekend came. He was away having a ball with one of our sons fishing and fellowshipping. And I was in heaven. I had the best "ME" day ever. I had the works and by the time I left I was walking on air and all was right with the world. I made it home had a light meal and picked up my computer to work only to listen to the Holy Spirit and put it back down. I relaxed and listened to music and just thanked God for the joy of having a day that was just about me.

My husband arrived home excited and beat but so happy. We looked at each other and knew that this day apart was so needed. We talked about each other's day and decided that we must do this more often. We ended up the evening in each other's arms more appreciative of the fact that we were together but enjoying that we could be apart and have time that was only for oneself.

Moral of the weekend. You must have a "ME" day every now and then in order to enjoy the daily couple life. Decide what you want to do and then just do it. When you come back together you have a mini date night where you talk about your wonderful time of enjoying yourself and friends if you are like my husband.

Second moral of the weekend....I've already schedule a repeat of my day in two weeks and have encouraged him to do the same.....ha,ha,ha....

OH THOSE "ME" DAYS GOT TO LOVE THEM!!!