Praying Together Makes Our Joy Complete
Editor’s note: After we aired a 2003 FamilyLife Today series on couples praying together, we heard from listener Vicki Moore in Colorado, who wrote to tell us about how it helped her marriage:
I love Wednesday—it’s my favorite day of the week. On Wednesday morning, I leave my house at 7:30 a.m. to drive to Colorado Springs for my Bible Study Fellowship (BSF) class. On the way, I tune into KGFT and listen to “the greats”: Chuck Swindoll at 7:30, “FamilyLife Today” at 8:00, and Charles Stanley at 8:30—an hour and a half of great spiritual programming followed by two hours of BSF. What could possibly be better?
Today, I began my morning in something less than a great mood. It all began last night. I arrived home at about 10:00 p.m., having taken my junior high academic competition team to a meet at a school about 55 miles away. Allan, my husband, was still awake watching television, but he seemed very abrupt and distant when I asked him about his day. This morning, his mood seemed equally abrupt and distant.
I even went so far as to ask him what I had done to make him mad at me, but he gave me one of those classic husband stares, the one that says, “What are you talking about? There’s nothing wrong; I’m just exercising my husbandly prerogative to act like nothing you could say would interest me just now.” I think that stare is the male equivalent of the female classic response when asked, “What’s wrong?” and we tearfully reply, “Nothing!”
So I left for BSF wondering what I’d done, why he was irritated with me, and what I should have or haven’t done. I carried on my usual routine, and listened to the lineup of “the greats” on the radio.
First, Chuck talked about the importance of being in relationship to God. Then, Bob and Dennis talked about couples in prayer. There was an interview with the couple that experienced an answer to prayer when the husband was in flight over Iraq in 1997 and the engine of his wingman went out. The wife had an urge to pray for the wingman without knowing why. Lastly, Charles preached about the entire nation of Israel praying when the nation was at war.
Sometimes I’m pretty slow to catch on, but God certainly got through to me quickly this morning. I thought back to where Allan and I were in our mutual prayer life. A few years ago we made a commitment to pray together on a daily basis. We haven’t exactly been star pupils at this task, but we haven’t been dismal failures, either. As with the rest of our walk with God, sometimes we are doing what we’ve committed to and sometimes we aren’t.
For the last several months, however, we’ve been very committed to a bedtime prayer together and a morning devotional from Moments Together for Couples by Dennis and Barbara Rainey. This morning, as I looked back, I realized that we were three days behind on our daily devotional together, and we had not prayed together for two nights. And I couldn’t see why we were distant with each other?
When I arrived at BSF, God made sure that He got my attention when our teaching leader explained about the complete joy that results in our having a prayerful relationship with Christ. He said when we are in prayer, we are close to God and have that present joy with Him. When we see answers to our prayer, we have the joy in seeing those answers. Prayer makes our joy complete.
Could it be that the lack of joy in our relationship these last two days could be from lack of prayer together? Even I, as obtuse as I can often be, saw that God was using my Wednesday morning routine to get my attention.
God used the radio as an instrument that day to get my attention. It was more effective than a 2 x 4 upside the head, but not quite as deadly! I continue to look forward to my Wednesday morning routine, painful as it may sometimes be.
©2003 by FamilyLife. All rights reserved. Used by permission of author.