#themarriagedevotional

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I have a marvelous new devotional for couples to tell you about today! It’s The Marriage Devotional from Levi and Jennie Lusko. I’ve read books from the Lusko family before, and I’ve so enjoyed their honesty, love, and devotion to Christ. If you’re looking for a wonderful devotional you can do with your spouse, look no further–I think this could be the one you’re looking for!

About this devotional and its authors, from the publisher

Great marriages are made, not born.

This devotional was written by Levi Lusko who is the lead pastor of Fresh Life Church, a multi-site church in Montana and Utah. Author of Swipe Right and Through the Eyes of a Lion. Together with his wife, Jennie Lusko they created this devotional to help YOUR marriage flourish.

Levi and Jennie are committed to strong marriages and have been on Focus on the Family to talk about how marriages can and should flourish.

In these 52 devotions, Levi and Jennie will point you to God’s word and help you experience a depth and beauty you may have never thought possible. Whether your marriage needs fine tuning, or to be torn back to the studs and be rebuilt, this devotional will help you:

Unlock new joy and vibrancy by recognizing there is better beyond the honeymoon phase
Uncomplicate conflict as you learn to fight fairly as members on the same team
Access Godly wisdom by engaging and staying steady when your marriage doesn’t look the way you thought it would

Perfect for newlyweds and seasoned married couples, this devotional journey will be the encouragement your marriage—not just any marriage—needs to flourish.

God wants you to have a strong, thriving, and fun marriage. Even in the midst of mortgage payments, emotional baggage, drama, mistakes, and a whole lot of laundry, your marriage can not only survive, but be sweet, steady, and strong.

What you’ll find in The Marriage Devotional

I love the subtitle of this book: “52 Days to Strengthen the Soul of Your Marriage.” Because life is BUSY, isn’t it? Work schedules. Kids’ schedules. Bill payments. Extended family relationships. Friendships in town and out of town. And that’s not even including all the screens we live with (you know, on our phones, tvs, tablets, etc.). They are also distracting. And yet, we really do want to find the time to be with our spouses.

The Luskos’ rich devotional is designed to give us that time together, for considering our marriages, for praying together, for looking at Scripture, for considering all the things that make up a union. There are 12 parts of devotional sections, each with 3-5 devotions. Sometimes the portions are written by Jennie, sometimes by Levi, and sometimes by the two together. And these cover a LOT. Such as:

Respect
Communication
Sex
Blessings
Really *seeing* each other
And more

There are prayers to pray together. Questions that will really put you on the spot (which is a good thing, even if it doesn’t sound like it). Spaces to write notes. Conversation starters. Scriptures. Stories. Really fun quotation pages, which have brown backgrounds and white lettering.

All of these are designed to help couples to lovingly dig a little deeper; to go to the spaces below the surface areas we often tend to live. (See that busy-ness paragraph above.) Also, they remind us of the tender and loving things that God thinks about us, about our marriages, and how He, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit are right there to help.

My impressions

WHAT a wonderful devotional.

I’ve been married for a minute. And sometimes I can hardly believe that it has been 20-plus years. I feel as though I know my husband pretty well. But in the busy-ness of life, it can happen that conversations might not touch the really deep parts of our souls. We talk about the meals for the week; the work schedule; the tuition schedule for our child’s college; the oil and windshield wiper fluids in our cars. All those things, and more, are parts of our lives and certainly parts we need. What about the care and feeding of our marriages, though; and the soul care of each of us, individually?

The answer to those questions are some that, according to your bent (or Myers-Briggs, or Enneagram types), you may either find easy or difficult to access. That’s part of the reason why I appreciate the Luskos’ book so much. They’re not afraid to dig into the deep parts of caring for our spouses–bodies, minds, hearts, and souls. Just taking the time to read these devotional chapters together, and doing the work of asking and answering the questions, looking at the Scriptures, and praying together–all of these are things that can draw us even closer to each other–and to God.

Here are some of my favorite moments from The Marriage Devotional:

“Childlike wonder and enthusiasm start to restore our relationships. And as we lift our eyes to Jesus, we start to see Him in each other. When you look for Jesus, you’ll find Him–and He wants to be found by you (Matthew 7:7-8). He longs to have a relationship with you.” (p. 125)
In the prayer on p. 59: “…Help us see that what we have is beautiful and strong. And help us see the potential in us as we create margin in our relationship…”
“He’s looking for us to invite Him into every corner of our lives–and also offer Him the ingredients for a miracle. They are always within reach. God uses what we have and, more importantly, what we give Him.” (p. 50)
“Once you see the significance of the way you are created, you realize that God is still excited about the detail of who you are and who your spouse is–building you up, individually and together. And your job as a spouse is to stay curious about who you are and what God made you for–and how you and your spouse creatively complement each other. We need to fight to see the significance of our better halves sometimes.” (pp. 305-306)

Doing this devotional together: it’s good and healthy work, in my opinion. And it’s work that can bless you and your spouse, as well as your family overall. It’s personal, and it’s intimate. Spend the time. Ask the questions. And God bless you!