Have you ever had a week where your wheels just never seemed to stop spinning?
Truck drivers get paid by the mile.... country pastors do not.
However, there is a silver lining to my busy week....
I get to spend a lot of miles with my wife.
Due to gas prices and our vehicles getting a lot of miles on them,
Michele and I are making a conscious effort to car-pool as much as possible.
This week, our car-pooling has taken us from Spokane to Republic,
and it is only Tuesday.
We have found that no matter what is happening in our lives, the one place that we can go as a married couple to spend quality time together, is to take a road trip together.
We discovered this very early in our marriage and it has proven to be a consistent in our relationship.
A couple years ago, we decided that we were going to be motorcycle people. We got our endorcements and purchased bikes. However, there was a serious problem. We LOST our connection when we were on our motorcycles. We were surprised to find that we both were disappointed at how unsatisfying the motorcycle trips were because it violated the connection we always had on road trips.
Quality time with no distractions is a rare thing in our society today.
So my first free question for you is, "Where is the special place that you and your spouse go to be alone together without distractions?"
Remember this, "Priorities never conflict".
So if your relationship is a priority, you will make time to be together.
Another thought along this same line is, "A good definition of LOVE is -- ATTENTION".
If you love someone, you will make them a priority and set aside time to give her/him your undivided attention.
We live in a very busy and cynical world. It is important that you have a place where your relationship can go -- and be protected from the world and all its distractions.
Think of your relationship as a plant. It can die from neglect or it can flourish from proper care. It will struggle to survive if it is planted in a crowded pot.
Let me give you a word to think about: EXCLUSIVITY
1. Maintaining exclusive barriers
2. Not allowing something else; mutually exclusive conditions
3. Not divided or shared with others
4. Not accompanied by others
5. Undivided: gained their exclusive attention
Ask yourself this: "Am I keeping my relationship with my spouse exclusive?"
Or have you allowed other priorities to creep in
and steal a bit of the exclusiveness away from your relationship?
I had a married friend that spent hours searching on-line internet dating sites.
He even exchanged e-mails with some of the women he met on-line.
He convinced himself that since he wasn't meeting them in "person",
that he wasn't being "unfaithful" to his wife.
When his wife found out, she didn't see it that way.
God designed marriage for two people to receive all the validation and love they from each other.
So to reach outside the marriage for an emotional connection -- is to violate the EXCLUSIVITY that God intended for married people to protect and cherish.
"Love is patient and kind.
Love is not jealous or boastful or proud or rude.
It does not demand its own way.
It is not irritable, and it keeps no record of being wronged.
It does not rejoice about injustice but rejoices whenever the truth wins out.
Love never gives up, never loses faith, is always hopeful,
and endures through every circumstance."
1 Corinthians 13:4-7
