And you'll finish the week with a time of reflection, thanksgiving and prayer. Each week you will be guided with questions applying biblical truth to your relationship with your spouse. You will read their story, learn about their cultural setting and explore how their story can teach you important truths about your own marriage. Each week focuses on one couple of the Bible, from Adam & Eve to Christ & His Bride. Through this 52-week devotional experience, you will be reacquainted with the obstacles and outcomes of familiar couples like Abraham & Sarah.and meet some lesser-known couples like Othniel & Aksah. Some bring encouragement, others offer a stern warning. But all of these ancestors, Couples of the Bible, will give you a snapshot of your biblical heritage. With the help of others, and with God’s encouragement and strength, we can have hope.In this scrapbook of your spiritual family tree, you have the faithful patriarchs and matriarchs who make you proud.and the scoundrels who you'd rather not talk about. This story and others remind us that we live in a broken world in which we depend on one another for encouragement when the waiting is long or when children don’t turn out the way we had hoped. Should we stop asking for children because they bring pain into our lives? No. But what did they think when their son lived like a wild man in the desert, provoking the wrath of Jewish leaders and priests with his scathing sermons and unorthodox baptisms? Were they alive when their son was imprisoned, then beheaded? The old priest Zechariah and his wife celebrated the day of John’s birth. And even miracle children, bathed in spiritual significance, carry with them no guarantees of piety. Many couples remain childless after years of agonizing prayer. There is no magic formula for having kids, let alone having them turn out well. They could only vow to do their best and ask for God’s help. And I’m only now beginning to realize how much my parents were like the infertile couple Elizabeth and Zechariah, who one day felt ecstasy as well as fear when God actually answered their prayers for a child. “Then we learned to pray for our children every day.” “We just begged God to give us kids,” they say. To this day the postwar couple shrugs when asked how it all came about. One son wed a doctor, and together they have been active in cross-cultural mission efforts the other son became a pastor and Bible teacher. Instead, the four daughters became teachers in Christian schools. The couple had a good life on the farm, but none of their six children followed them into the family business. A baby boy followed, then three more girls and another boy. Against human odds, a healthy baby girl was born in the fifth year of their marriage. They prayed that God would trump the doctor’s word. Unfortunately, after years of trying, they learned they were not likely to have children. Growing a family was more important to them, though, than raising crops. It took some time to find work, but they finally found employment at a farm. So the ship kept going, and the young man did his duty.Īfter his tour was over, the soldier married his sweetheart back home. Of course, the ship could not turn around there were clean-up operations to be done in Europe. Halfway across the Atlantic, word arrived that an armistice had been signed. The Second World War was thundering to a close when the young soldier stepped onto the troop carrier that would carry him from the United States to Europe. Your wife Elizabeth will bear you a son, and you are to call him John.” “Do not be afraid, Zechariah your prayer has been heard.
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