Circumstances to Character

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Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen. — Hebrews 11:1

For many of us, we know what the Bible tells us about marriage – all that “counter-cultural advice” that tells us to give up our rights and commit to serving the other person. Right? That’s great when both of you are doing it. But when the circumstances are not great and your spouse is not being very nice, or the circumstances are difficult (such as before, during and after deployments) we can lose faith in God’s advice and revert to our selfish, rights-demanding nature, making things worse. That’s when we definitely need to shift our faith from the circumstances we are in to faith in the character of God.

But beware—for we can trick ourselves into believing that even though God in His character is all-powerful and all-knowing, the writers of Scripture slipped in principles that only applied to their time, their circumstances or their culture. I’ve even heard someone claim you can ignore the Apostle Paul’s advice on marriage (presumably Ephesians 5) because he was a chauvinist. Hmmmm. Could the problem be that we are just disobedient? In a lot of cases that will be true, but there are those who genuinely wonder if the Bible is right. No wonder we can be faced with a world full of relationships constantly out-of-step with the Biblical model, and constantly taunting us with accusations that we are out-dated and just plain wrong.

At other times we struggle in our relationships because we know what we need to do but we have a seemingly endless capacity for justifying why we don’t do it. We read passages in the Bible about needing to serve one another, treating each other as more important than ourselves, loving and respecting each other, and staying committed to each other, but somehow we can think that we are special . . . an “exception to the rule” based on our circumstances. This is selfishness.

So it becomes an issue of faith—not just in what but in Whom.

In the military, we use faith in follow-ership all the time. No one wants to follow someone with a reputation for messing up. We can follow them as long as the circumstances are manageable, but if things start falling apart around us, such as in combat, then we will no longer truly follow someone we don’t trust. To keep following someone even when things don’t look good, we need to know that the person we follow is competent in their knowledge and ability and that they care about our lives, otherwise, we are never going to commit fully to following them. This principle applies to following God also. Because we know His character, we can follow Him with great faith.

If we focus on better understanding the character of God, by spending more time getting to know Him through prayer, reading our Bibles and talking about who He is with others, then we will discover that He is wholly trustworthy. He can see everything (even across time), He knows us intimately and He loves us immensely. This means that His advice can be trusted, not because it feels like it fits our circumstances, but because His character is trustworthy.

We need to shift our faith from our circumstances to His character, then take another look at all of His marriage advice in the Bible, and apply it with a faith that transcends our circumstances. Imagine the possibilities!

Questions:
1. What marriage advice in the Bible do you find difficult to apply in the midst of your circumstances?
2. How much do you trust God and the advice He provides in the Bible? How much should you trust Him and His advice?
3. As a couple, what can you do together to better understand God’s character, so you can shift your faith from circumstances to trusting in who He is? Make a plan and do it!