Married to a Friend

"Be kindly affectioned one to another with brotherly love; in honour preferring one another; - Romans 12:10

Jim Martin, moderator for A Place For the God Hungry is starting a series on marriage and says something to remember.

"Many marriages end because husbands and wives stop behaving like friends.

Marriages would be helped by husbands and wives renewing their friendship with each another. This would mean eliminating behaviors that should be not be a part of any loving friendship. This also means being intentional about behaving in ways that rebuild and give energy to their friendship" - Jim Martin¹

Renew your friendship.

- fritz

^{1 - Read Jim's whole post here}

A Friendship that Sustains

"Now will I sing ... a song of my beloved touching his vineyard. My wellbeloved hath a vineyard in a very fruitful hill: ... and it brought forth wild grapes"- Isaiah 5:1,2b¹

Isaiah is giving an analogy - God, the owner, was expecting His vineyard, Israel, to produce good fruit.

What I see is Isaiah's relationship with that owner, the Almighty. Notice how he describes God - "My wellbeloved hath a vineyard..."! The term means "Friend".

Isaiah lived in the midst of injustice on a scale we, too, are beginning to see in today's world. Daily he was grieved with what he saw and he stood strong for righteousness, speaking truth without fear, living without depression, and looking forward to God's presence because he had a friend-to-friend relationship with the Almighty!

Jesus offers that same relationship to sustain us through difficult life tasks.

"Henceforth I call you not servants; ... but I have called you friends; for all things that I have heard of my Father I have made known unto you." - John 15:15a,c (KJV)

- fritz