My Spouse Does Not Meet My Needs

“What if I marry someone, then I meet somebody prettier or funnier? What if they don’t fulfill me? I’m afraid I’ll become unsatisfied or discontented.”


“My husband doesn’t meet my needs. You see, I need romance and affection, and my husband just isn’t very affectionate. I need someone who can give me this.”


What’s wrong with these statements? What’s wrong is that each of these individuals has expectations that their marriage partner or future marriage partner should always and continually fulfill them.


Tim Keller, in his book The Meaning of Marriage (which I highly recommend) says,


Both men and women today see marriage not as a way of creating character and community but as a way to reach personal life goals. They are all looking for a marriage partner who will ‘fulfill their emotional, sexual, and spiritual desires.’ And that creates an extreme idealism that in turn leads to deep pessimism that you will ever find the right person to marry. This is the reason so many put off marriage and look right past great prospective spouses that simply are ‘not good enough.’


Let me repeat one phrase: “They are all looking for a marriage partner who will ‘fulfill their emotional, sexual, and spiritual desires.’”


When we have an expectation that a husband or wife fulfill us, we set ourselves up for disappointment, because no human being can satisfy another human being. To hope that another human can meet our needs is asking too much of anyone. For only Jesus can meet our needs. Only Jesus can satisfy us. Only Jesus can fulfill all our desires.


Expectations are killers.


If you come into a marriage with expectations of the other person, and then they don’t meet those expectations, you will be frustrated and unhappy. Expectations are dangerous and will always disappoint. Unless you have expectations like these – I expect:

• That my spouse will fail in many ways. 
• That my spouse will not fulfill my desires. 
• That my spouse will not always try to please me. 
• That my spouse may not always understand me. 
• That my spouse may not always appreciate me. 
• That my spouse may not love me in the way I would want. 

If your spouse happens to actually appreciate, love or serve you, then praise God! It will be unexpected. The problem comes when we have expectations and then they aren’t met. Here are a few expectations you can cultivate though – of yourself:

• That I should serve my spouse and lay down my life for her/him. 
• That I should seek to please my spouse. 
• That I should try to listen to and understand my spouse. 
• That I should seek to lay down my life for my spouse. 
• That I should seek to fulfill his/her desires as best I can. 
• That I should seek to love my spouse. 

Here’s my suggestion: Don’t look at where your spouse needs to change. Look to where you need to change. Don’t have expectations of your spouse. If you have expectations, place them on yourself.


If anyone has the right to have expectations of us it is Jesus. Ask him what he would like you to do to please your spouse. Ask him to help you and make you the biggest most cheerful servant in the house and not to worry about if anyone is serving you or not.

Quote of the Day

‎”Christian, let God’s distinguishing love to you be a motive to you to fear Him greatly. He has put His fear in your heart, and may not have given that blessing to your neighbor, perhaps not to your husband, your wife, your child, or your parent. Oh, what an obligation should this thought lay upon your heart to greatly fear the Lord! Remember also that this fear of the Lord is His treasure, a choice jewel, given only to favorites, and to those who are greatly beloved.” 

-John Bunyan

10,000 Things

“God is always doing 10,000 things in your life, and you may be aware of three of them.”

That was one of our most widely spread tweets in 2012. So we want to say it again for 2013 and make this promise even more solid.

Not only may you see a tiny fraction of what God is doing in your life; the part you do see may make no sense to you.

• You may find yourself in prison, and God may be advancing the gospel among the guards, and making the free brothers bold. (Philippians 1:12–14)
• You may find yourself with a painful thorn, and God may be making the power of Christ more beautiful in weakness. (2 Corinthians 12:8)
• You may find yourself with a dead brother that Jesus could have healed, and God may be preparing to show his glory. (John 11)
• You may find yourself sold into slavery, accused falsely of sexual abuse, and forgotten in a prison cell, and God may be preparing you to rule a nation. (Genesis 37-50)
• You may wonder why a loved one is left in unbelief so long, and find that God is preparing a picture of his patience and a powerful missionary. (Galatians 1:15; 1 Timothy 1:12-16)
• You may live in all purity and humility and truth only to end rejected and killed, and God may be making a parable of his Son and an extension of his merciful sufferings in yours. (Isaiah 53:3; Mark 8:31; Colossians 1:24)
• You may walk through famine, be driven from your homeland, lose husband and sons, and be left desolate with one foreign daughter-in-law, and God may be making you an ancestor of a king. (Ruth 1–4)
• You may find the best counselor you’ve ever known giving foolish advice, and God may be preparing the destruction of your enemy. (2 Samuel 17:14)
• You may be a sexually pure single person and yet accused of immorality, and God may be preparing you as a virgin blessing in ways no one can dream. (Luke 1:35)
• You may not be able to sleep and look in a random book, and God may be preparing to shame your arrogant enemy and rescue a condemned people. (Esther 6:1–11)
• You may be shamed and hurt, and God may be confirming your standing as his child and purifying you for the highest inheritance. (Hebrews 12:5–11)

There are three granite foundation stones under this confidence for 2013: God’s love. God’s sovereignty. God’s wisdom.

Love: In the death of Christ on our behalf God has totally removed his wrath from us (Romans 8:3; Galatians 3:13). Now there is not only no condemnation (Romans 8:1), but now God is only merciful (Romans 8:32). Even his discipline is all mercy.

Sovereignty: There is no power in the universe that can stop him from fulfilling his totally good plans for you. “I know that you can do all things, and that no purpose of yours can be thwarted” (Job 42:2).

Wisdom: God’s infinite wisdom always sees a way to bring the greatest good out of the most painful and complex situations. “Oh, the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments and how inscrutable his ways!” (Romans 11:33).

Therefore, no matter what you face this year, God will be doing 10,000 things in your life that you cannot see. Trust him. Love him. And they will all be good for you.

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The Lord Opened Her Heart

Acts 16 So, setting sail from Troas, we made a direct voyage to Samothrace, and the following day to Neapolis, and from there to Philippi, which is a leading city of the district of Macedonia and a Roman colony. We remained in this city some days. And on the Sabbath day we went outside the gate to the riverside, where we supposed there was a place of prayer, and we sat down and spoke to the women who had come together. One who heard us was a woman named Lydia, from the city of Thyatira, a seller of purple goods, who was a worshiper of God. The Lord opened her heart to pay attention to what was said by Paul. And after she was baptized, and her household as well, she urged us, saying, “If you have judged me to be faithful to the Lord, come to my house and stay.” And she prevailed upon us.

In Lydia’s conversion there are many points of interest. It was brought about by providential circumstances. She was a seller of purple goods, from the city of Thyratira, but at just the right time for hearing Paul we find her at Philippi; providence, which is the servant of grace, led her to the right spot. Again, grace was preparing her soul for the blessing—grace preparing for grace. She did not know the Savior, but as a Jewess she knew many truths that were excellent stepping-stones to a knowledge of Jesus. Her conversion took place in the use of the means. On the Sabbath she went to a place of prayer, and there prayer was answered. Never neglect the means of grace.

God may bless us when we are not in His house, but we have more reason to expect that He will when we are in fellowship with His people. Observe the words, “The Lord opened her heart.” She did not open her own heart. Her prayers did not do it; Paul did not do it. The Lord Himself must open the heart to receive the things that make for our peace. He alone can put the key into the door and open it and gain entry for Himself. He is the heart’s Master just as He is the heart’s Maker.

The first outward evidence of the opened heart was obedience. As soon as Lydia had believed in Jesus, she was baptized. It is a sweet sign of a humble and broken heart when the child of God is willing to obey a command that is not essential to his salvation, that is not forced upon him by a selfish fear of condemnation, but is a simple act of obedience and of communion with his Master.

The next evidence was love, displaying itself in acts of grateful kindness to the apostles. Love for the saints has always been a mark of the true convert. Those who do nothing for Christ or His church provide no evidence of an “opened” heart. Lord, grant to us the blessing of opened hearts always!

Devotional material is taken from “Morning and Evening,” written by C.H. Spurgeon, revised and updated by Alistair Begg.

God doesn’t love us because we are lovable

“We must remind ourselves that God loves us, not because we are lovable, but because we are in Christ, and the love which the Father has for him flows over to us because we are in him.” – Jerry Bridges, Who am I?

God doesn’t love us because we are lovable.

In fact, in and of ourselves we are very much unlovable.  But Mark, you ask, aren’t I good enough, smart enough and doggone it don’t people like me? Yes people may like you.  Yes, you may be smart enough.  But you’re not loveable enough to merit God’s blazing holy love that burns up all impurities in its presence.

The Bible gives us pretty rough assessment of our “lovableness”.

…as it is written:
“None is righteous, no, not one;
no one understands;
no one seeks for God.
All have turned aside; together they have become worthless;
no one does good,
not even one.”
“Their throat is an open grave;
they use their tongues to deceive.”
“The venom of asps is under their lips.”
“Their mouth is full of curses and bitterness.”
“Their feet are swift to shed blood;
in their paths are ruin and misery,
and the way of peace they have not known.”
“There is no fear of God before their eyes.”
(Romans 3:10-18)

Observe how lovable we are: we’re unrighteous, have no interest in or understanding of God.  We’re worthless. Our throats are open graves – what a lovely stench! And the the venom of asps under our lips makes us doubly attractive to God, as well as our mouths full of curses and bitterness.

Can you imagine a husband saying to his wife, “I love you honey.  Your mouth reminds me of an open grave. And your lips  are like the venom dripping from a Gaboon Viper.”  Somehow I don’t think that wife would feel particularly lovable.

Though our sin renders us repellent to God, when he saves us he not only washes our sins away, but he plunges us into Christ. We become so organically and intimately one with Christ that when God looks on Jesus he sees us, and when he looks on us he sees Jesus. When God loves Jesus, he loves us in him and when God loves us he loves his Son in us.

The Father doesn’t love believers because we are lovable, but because Jesus is infinitely lovable and God has made us one with Jesus. And because we are one with him, when the Father pours out his love on  his Son, that love washes over us as well.

Let this truth fill you with joy today.  No matter what kinds of trials you’re facing, remember the Father loves you with the love he has for his own Son.  And nothing can separate you from that love.  Ever.

Quote of the Day

“The Pharisees’ problem was not that they were too concerned with orthodox teaching, but that they had invented their own orthodoxy. Jesus condemned them for replacing and modifying the clear truth of Scripture with their own traditions (Matthew 15:1-9). They were the chief theological miscreants of their day.

So how did Jesus treat them? Did He show them love — i.e., did He obey the Second Great Commandment in His dealings with them? Of course.

What did that love entail? First and foremost, Jesus declared the truth to them. He also frequently delivered public rebukes for the errors that threatened to damn them. He castigated them. He occasionally held them up to public ridicule. He obviously valued their souls more than their feelings. That is what authentic love looks like. In other words, Christ, not Rodney King, is the paragon of perfect love.

The vast majority of Pharisees didn’t heed Jesus’ warnings, of course. The smug or snide ones might have even claimed it was because He didn’t “have a relationship based upon love.” It was nonetheless the right thing for Him to correct their false teaching and warn others of the danger posed by their error.”

– Phil Johnson

What If I Don't Feel Love For My Spouse?

Steve Cornell writes:

A wife once told me that she planned to leave her husband because (in her words) she “just didn’t love him anymore.” When I asked her to change the way she worded her decision to say, “I am choosing to no longer value my husband and to break my commitment to remain faithful to him,” she insisted on using terms that made her a victim of feelings she could not change. Ironically, she also thought of her decision as virtuous because of her honesty and lack of hypocrisy.

Over the years, I have had people tell me they want to be married because they love each other and I’ve had people (like this woman) tell me that they want out of their marriages because they no longer feel love for their mate.

This has led me to ask some serious questions about the nature of love. What is love? Is it something we can fall into and fall out of? Is it chemistry? Infatuation? Is it an emotional response or a choice? In my evaluation, I’ve concluded that we need to distinguish two dimensions of love.

BEING in love and BEHAVING in love.

1. Being in love

This dimension is the emotional attraction of love. It’s what people mean when they speak of “falling in love.” It’s usually based on more superficial reactions to appearance and first impressions. Clearly, it’s a natural part of human attraction and although not necessarily wrong, it’s not enough to sustain a meaningful and lasting relationship. It’s far too superficial. Deeply satisfying relationships are built on the second dimension of love:

2. Behaving in Love This dimension does not depend on feelings and chemistry. It’s the love of volition. It’s the choice to respond to my mate in a loving manner–regardless of feelings. This dimension of love is a choice to value my mate and seek his or her best. While I can’t always make myself feel a certain way, I can always choose to act in a loving way.

In the context of marriage, the distinction between these two dimensions is very important. Most relationships start with a high dose of the BEING dimension of love and, in most relationships, this feeling diminishes with time. When this happens, the key to keeping the flame of love burning is not the pursuit of a feeling — but a decision to value the other person and be devoted to his or her best — no matter what one feels.

It’s a choice to act in love even when we don’t feel love. I realize that to many people this sounds almost like a great sin. It sounds as if I am advocating some form of dishonesty. Yet, surprisingly, when we choose to love, the feelings often follow the actions!

A cultural barrier:

We must confront a cultural barrier that threatens this understanding of love. Our culture sends a strong message telling us that above all else, we must be true to our feelings! A failure to do this, we’re told, would simply be dishonest and hypocritical. It has become a contemporary mark of good character to be true to your feelings.

This cultural ethic is often used to give people a false sense of virtue when breaking deep commitments. By “avoiding hypocrisy” and “being honest enough to admit the loss of feelings,” they feel justified (perhaps even virtuous) in breaking their wedding vows.

There is a deep and self-destructive deception in this line of reasoning. It implies that we are somehow victims of our feelings instead of capable of mastering them. A big problem with this is that feelings can come and go with changes in the weather.

Do you go to work only when you feel like going? Do athletes or great musicians only practice when they feel like it? We simply cannot live a healthy and productive life if we let our feelings master us. This is especially true in relationships.

If we hope to experience deep and lasting relationships as intended by God, love must be understood as a value word and as an action more than a feeling.

Remember that God demonstrated His love for us not because we were a warm, lovable group of people whom he could not resist. Instead, “God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us” (Romans 5:8). This is the kind of love husbands are commanded to show toward their wives (Ephesians 5:25).I invite you to share this post with others and to use it for conversation as couples, in small groups and with those preparing for marriage.

Reflect often on this distinction between: Being in love and Behaving in love.

Prayerfully evaluate your love based on the best definition of love available to humanity.

“Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self- seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails” (I Corinthians 13:1-8a).

The Pharisee's Problem

“The Pharisees’ problem was not that they were too concerned with orthodox teaching, but that they had invented their own orthodoxy. Jesus condemned them for replacing and modifying the clear truth of Scripture with their own traditions (Matthew 15:1-9). They were the chief theological miscreants of their day.

So how did Jesus treat them? Did He show them love—i.e., did He obey the Second Great Commandment in His dealings with them? Of course.

What did that love entail? First and foremost, Jesus declared the truth to them. He also frequently delivered public rebukes for the errors that threatened to damn them. He castigated them. He occasionally held them up to public ridicule. He obviously valued their souls more than their feelings. That is what authentic love looks like. In other words, Christ, not Rodney King, is the paragon of perfect love.

The vast majority of Pharisees didn’t heed Jesus’ warnings, of course. The smug or snide ones might have even claimed it was because He didn’t “have a relationship based upon love.” It was nonetheless the right thing for Him to correct their false teaching and warn others of the danger posed by their error.”

- Phil Johnson

Mercy

Mercy is God withholding the just punishment of sin from those who deserve it. While grace lavishes on; mercy puts off, or holds back. God’s mercy is propelled into motion by His love:

“But God, being rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us (Eph 2:4).

The love of God—His goodness in action—moves Him to not give us what we deserve. This mercy, not our goodness or works, is what leads to our regeneration, salvation, and justification:

“He saved us, not on the basis of deeds which we have done in righteousness, but according to His mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewing by the Holy Spirit, whom He poured out upon us richly through Jesus Christ our Savior, so that being justified by His grace we would be made heirs according to the hope of eternal life” (Titus 3:5-7), and causes the new birth: “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who according to His great mercy has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of JesusChrist from the dead” (1 Pet 1:3).

The Apostle Paul put himself forward as an illustration of one who was rescued from spiritual blindness and the tragic consequences of unbelief by the mercy of God and for the glory of God.

“And yet for this reason I found mercy, in order that in me as the foremost, Jesus Christ might demonstrate His perfect patience, as an example for those who would believe in Him for eternal life” (1 Tim 1:16);

“…even though I was formerly a blasphemer and a persecutor and a violent aggressor. And yet I was shown mercy, because I acted ignorantly in unbelief” (1 Tim 1:13).

The conversion of any sinner is sheer mercy.

Questioning Your Pastor

Mark Altrogge: “Help your pastor. Help him preach more accurately. Help him see how to lead and care for people better. Encourage him. And if you have questions, feel free to ask.”

Why We Need Jesus

Michael Horton has an article in the December issue of Christianity Today. He says that reason and morality cannot show us a good and gracious God. For that, we need the Incarnation.

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Quote of the Day

“God doesn’t love you because you repented. You repented because He loved you.”

– R C Sproul, Jr

Quote of the Day

“It cannot be emphasized too strongly that God’s love is the source, not the consequence, of the atonement. . . . God does not love us because Christ died for us; Christ died for us because God loved us. If it is God’s wrath which needed to be propitiated, it is God’s love which did the propitiating.”

– John Stott

Quote of the Day

“They do not love Christ who love anything more than Christ.”

– Thomas Brooks