Your Daily Devotional

Many people like to use a daily devotional. For years, I used Ozwald Chambers’ “My Utmost for His Highest.” The inspirational words of Chambers challenged me in my personal walk and my growth in Christian character. His writings were an important part of my growing in understanding my responsibility as a believer to become Christ-like and manifest the fruit of the spirit.

Even though many believer’s have their own personal study time, whether it is with a devotional or directly out of the Bible, there are very few who take the time to study together as a couple. Yet, if our relationship with God is supposed to strengthen our marriage, then shouldn’t we seek Him together?

One of the great benefits of studying together is that we have the opportunity to work together to gain understanding. At times, an incredible synergy takes place, where what one is saying triggers a fresh thought for the other. Then that thought triggers something new in the first. Working off of one another, wonderful things can be discovered and learned.

I clearly remember the first couple who ever came to me for marriage counseling. The very first complaint that she made was that the two of them didn’t see eye to eye on anything. To back that up, she said, “Every time the Holy Spirit gives me revelation about something from the Bible and I tell my husband, he comes back with something totally different.” I guess she thought she’d made some points with that one, because she sat back with a satisfied look on her face. However, I didn’t see things the same way. I responded to her, “Wow, what a blessing!” Surprised, she jumped up to say, “What do you mean?” “Well,” I responded, “you get one revelation from God and your husband gets another. Then, when you share them with each other, you’ve both got twice as much.” Needless to say, she was stunned.

You see, what that couple experienced (less the disagreement) was in fact a great blessing. By studying the Word of God together, they were able t gain more understanding than they could alone. That’s one of the things that marriage is supposed to do for us, help us to gain more than we can alone.

Imagine if a couple made a regular habit of that. Instead of studying alone, each took the opportunity to draw out of the other one what God had deposited in them. That looks like a great opportunity to me.

Now, get me straight here. I’m not talking about just reading a passage from the Bible, or reading a devotional together, but talking about it as well. It’s not really in the reading that we’ll get the advantage, but in the sharing. As we talk together, we’ll have that opportunity for the synergy of studying together to take place, where we are each fueling the engine of ideas in the other.

Not only that, but it’s a great way to draw closer together. The very fact of studying God’s Word together makes us more as one. It helps us to understand each other better and at the same time, understand our God all that much better too. Why not give it a try?