HOUSE OF ROBERTS BLOG

This is for all my married mama’s and if you are a wife in waiting this is for you too…read and consider for the future! I am writing this as Mike and I celebrate 15 years married today! All I keep thinking to myself today is “Marriage is such a gift!” It’s not easy and you never arrive and yet it’s proven to be one of the greatest adventures and one of the greatest ways I continue to know and grow in God daily. The Catholic Church considers marriage a holy sacrament because they believe it is one of the ways Christ is formed in us greater. If our spouse was perfect and if we always felt like loving them and serving them there would be no need for God in it but as all of us know this is just not the case. Marriage is a continual opportunity for us to tap into our greater nature, our God nature, and to love and serve our spouse like Christ served us, thus providing us the opportunity to have Christ formed DEEPER in us! We can’t do it by ourselves we were never supposed to!

Mike and I have a mantra that we always say not only to ourselves but anytime we get the opportunity to speak to married couples. We say “The greatest thing you can do for your kids is love your spouse.” Sometimes we get it so backward and it’s so easy to do. We tell ourselves the greatest thing we can do for our kids is LOVE THEM with all we have, and in some ways yes that’s correct, but it can’t be at the cost or in place of loving our spouses first (Well second after God of course)! Every time Mike and I leave for date night the kids always say “Please don’t leave us!” Michael always tells them “You want us to go, it’s good for us to go, Mommy and Daddy are better at being a mommy and daddy when we go on dates and spend time together.” It’s true! We really are! As Michael and I have endeavored to keep each other a priority through the years it has kept us being the best versions of ourselves as we parent our four kids. Our marriage health directly affects the health at which we parent. It affects the unity and the spirit in which we parent, and it impacts the way our kids think about marriage or if they think about it at all.

I have had this awareness over the last few years that I believe is from God, an awareness that our kids our watching our marriage. That they are observing if it looks like we like and enjoy each other, they are figuring out appropriate affection through the way we physically handle each other, they are seeing what humility looks like through how we serve one another, what forgiveness looks like when we fail one another, what honor looks like in the midst of a disagreement, what communication looks like through our interactions. This awareness holds me accountable! it compels me to keep working at my marriage so that it is authentically growing. NOT PERFECT but authentically in a continual, intentional way, becoming a marriage that is thriving to be in and reflects Christ to my kids! 

Healthy Marriages produce Healthy Kids! The best thing we could do for our kids is love our spouses fiercely!  I am praying for our marriages! I am praying this week that the Lord would point out one thing we can do to better to love, serve, and honor our spouse! That He would turn our hearts deeply towards one another and that we would see each other through the eyes of Christ! That if there is pain or disunity that this week healing would come and forgiveness and freedom would take over! I am praying our marriages reflect heaven itself and make it the most beautiful thing for our kids to catch vision for in life! In Jesus name!!