360 Degree Marriage
There is a powerful leadership truth that says a high-quality leader is a 360 degree leader. A great leader has the capacity and influence to make everyone around him better. The people he leads, the people he follows, and the people who lead beside him are all made better because of his leadership. This is a strong leadership ideal that we should all aspire to attain.
The same principle is true in our marriage. My wife and I had the privilege of attending CRU’s Weekend to Remember marriage retreat this past weekend with some great friends. We had a wonderful time learning new marriage principles and being reminded of old ones. One the biggest take-a-ways I got from the conference was the 360 degree impact of marriage. Our marriage impacts four keys areas of our lives. If you are single and thinking this doesn’t apply to me please keep reading and ask yourself two questions. Am I becoming the of person that could have a marriage of influence like this? Second, am I looking for someone who I could marry that could have an impact like this?
The key areas marriage impacts are
1. Your relationship with your spouse
There are seven billion people on the planet and you and your spouse chose each other. I would also say that God chose you to be together. It was chosen for us to be with our spouse everyday in sickness and in health. Not only do we get to experience and enjoy life with them but we also get someone to challenge and grow us to become better. Also, someone to be intimate with and show our true self. Knowing the good, bad and ugly about each other is where true love can grow. The driving force for each person in a marriage should be in serving and loving them to the best of our ability not what we can get and take from the relationship.
2. Your relationship with God
Author, Gary Thomas, famously asks in his book Scared Marriage What if your marriage is not primarily about your happiness but about your holiness? This is a great question especially when you realize that God is the main one that brought you and your spouse together and he did that primary so you could reflect His oneness and character to those around you. We have the opportunity to reflect God’s character best to our spouse. His forgiveness, love, and joy can be shown in how we treat them.
3. Your relationship with your children
Marriage is a great place for children to see an example of oneness that reflects the union of God. It also has been scientifically proven over and over again that children develop better in a home that has an involved father and mother. Finally, a strong marriage allows children to see that their parents lives are not all about them. Yes, we should love, cherish, and responsibly raise our children but that doesn’t mean we let them run the house. Children need to see that mommy and daddy love each other first and out of that love they love their children. This allows for a strong, safe structure in which our children can grow and develop.
4. Your relationship with the world around you
When others see you love your spouse like God loves the church, sees you put your spouse over your children, sees you go through times of growth in your marriage giving Christ the glory, they are going to wonder what is different about you and want to know more. They are going to see a one-ness in your life that they are going to want for their life. When they ask what is making the difference in your life you can tell them about them about God’s plan for a 360 degree marriage.
A 360 marriage shows God’s glory as He leads us. It creates oneness with our spouse beside us. It set an example for our children that follow us. Finally it paints a picture of what God is like for those around us. When you think about it, our marriage might be one of the most remarkable bonds we have in our lifetime.
What key area did you not realize your marriage impacted?