Holy Father, The Ten Commandments are intended to be a blessing, not a burden. When we rearrange or discard your commands according to our own wishes, we shouldn’t be surprised when things begin to unravel. Sadly, we see this damage play out in homes and families as a result of tearing apart your gifts of marriage and sex. Your intent was for these two blessings always – and only – to be enjoyed together. So much collateral damage has been caused by our insistence on treating these gifts separately and according to our own selfish views.
Forgive me for my role in contributing to the diminishing views of marriage and sex. Where I have objectified and lusted after women and glorified sex, I have been a part of the problem. Help me to speak well of marriage and hold it in high regard. When I see husbands and wives struggling or the topic of divorce becoming a part of the conversation, lead me to pray for those marriages. Compel all married couples to pursue you along with each other, and grant those who are single a spirit of contentment with their station in life, opening their eyes to the unique blessings you have for them. Guard all of our hearts from sexual temptation, and restore this precious gift to its rightful place within marriage.
Lord God, While it is a special blessing when you bring a husband and a wife together in marriage, let us also appreciate the blessings that come with being single. Each station in life, being single and being married, provide unique opportunities. Without the responsibility of caring for a spouse or child(ren), singles often have more freedom and flexibility in their schedules. That may allow them to more readily enjoy experiences in their lives that aren’t available to families or couples. Not being as tied down also opens up additional chances to serve others in more ways.
While marriage requires much time and attention to be given to a spouse, being single means that time and attention can be directed to one’s relationship with you, Lord. Provide contentment to those who are single, and patience to those praying for a future spouse, so that in their desire to be married, they are not robbed of the joys unique to being single.
Dear Savior, The world has taken your gifts of marriage and sex, separated the two from each other, and the results have been disastrous. Marriage has been stripped of so many of its blessings as it is viewed as an out-dated, optional arrangement. Sex is treated as simply another self-serving pleasure to be pursued at will. Without the commitment, the faithfulness, and the spouse-first humble service of marriage, families and individuals have been deeply hurt, broken, and trampled on by the misuse and abuse of relationships and sex.
I pray that you help me to address the issue and lead by example. Help me to speak highly and respectfully of your gifts of marriage and sex, and of women in general. Guard my own heart from sexual temptations. I want to celebrate wedding anniversaries as precious milestones that serve as testaments to the blessings attached to your institution of marriage. Surround me with solid marriages, dedicated spouses, and flourishing families, all for the betterment of our society and for your glory.
So is being the one in the position of having to even consider having such a procedure carried out on her own body, as well as the tiny body given life in her womb. My heart goes out to every expectant mother ever having to wrestle with such a gut-wrenching decision when two lives are at stake.
In this era of “toxic masculinity,” however, I will refrain from telling women what they should do with “their own bodies” (the ones which in reality belong to the gracious God who formed and redeemed them…). Instead, let me steer the conversation in a little different direction and focus on what too often has been too little a part of the discussion: Me.
Men.
After all, lest we forgot how the whole process works and how children are conceived in the first place – men, I think we have a role to play here. Think about that. Men, if we played our part the way we ought to, instead of treating women like scorecards and God’s gift of sex like an itch to scratch, it’s not likely we’d be where we are today, giving so much attention to such an atrocity as abortion. In case I’m not being clear enough, let me put it bluntly: we’re a REALLY big part of the problem. We’ve failed to live up to our noble role of husband-to-wife, head-to-helper, simply because we cannot control ourselves enough to reserve our passions for one woman for life. We’ve allowed the blessing of marriage to become marginalized. We’ve debased, devalued, and degraded sex by tearing it away from the marriage boundary for the purpose of self-gratification, instead of protecting it as the most selfless expression of love by which a spouse is served.
But, there is hope, for what we have been in the past does not need to be who we are today or who we will be in the future.
“Do not be deceived: Neither the sexually immoral nor… adulterers… will inherit the kingdom of God. And that is what some of you were. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.”
(1 Corinthians 6:9–11 NIV)
“Washed.” “Sanctified.” “Justified.” Men, those are powerful realities in Jesus! They are the kind of realities that change a man! They are the kind of realities that free men from being tied to the world’s cluelessly distorted definition of manhood and marriage. They are the kind of realities that free men to embrace and strive for their God-designed role in marriage to sacrificially “love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her” (Eph. 5:25).
Tell me our society wouldn’t be better for it if every man would “leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh” (Eph. 5:31). Tell me marriages wouldn’t be better for it if they actually lasted “till death do us part” and husbands committed to strengthening their oneness bond with their wife. Tell me women wouldn’t be better for it if they had the security of a committed husband in their marriage. Tell me children wouldn’t be better for it with committed husbands doubling as dedicated E64 fathers to serve as loving, protective superheroes for their kids.
Tell me unborn children wouldn’t be better off if the only thing we ever aborted… was any discussion of abortion in the first place.
Men, we have more power to actually make that a reality than we realize. Let’s do more to own up to our role in this matter and realize that we need to be a bigger part of the conversation. Unborn lives depend on it.
