Dedicated to God, Dedicated to Each Other

Blessed are the husband and wife who humbly dedicate their lives and their home to Christ and practice the teachings of Christ in their home by being unselfish, loyal, and loving. Author unknown

According to Webster the word dedicate means to set apart for a definite use, to commit to a goal or way of life, to offer, donate, and bestow. We dedicate ourselves to our favorite sport as we train to be the best at it. We dedicate ourselves to our job or a hobby we love, to the point where that is all we seem to do. When we get married we dedicate our lives to our spouse as we promise to love honor and obey them.

We like the sound of dedicating our lives to a sport, hobby, or job but when someone mentions being dedicated to our spouse we tend to cringe. Whether we like it or not this is the way God set it up to be. We were made to be together dedicating our lives, families, and home to Christ.

One must ask the question, “What does it take to be dedicated?” It certainly takes strength, determination, and the will to succeed. We need to be willing to give it our all and hold back nothing. Strong enough to weather the storms and diverse enough to live our lives together with the one we love instead of letting our attitude of, “It’s my way or the highway” separate us emotionally and spiritually.

In the amplified Bible they give the definition of blessed as “happy, fortunate, to be envied.” If you put the two definitions of blessed and dedicated together you come up with, “Blessed or happy, fortunate, to be envied are the husband and wife who humbly dedicate, set apart their family for a definite use, to commit to the goal or way of life that is found in Christ.”

Wow, that is a wonderful definition that we need to hold on to and remember. Remember like we should commit to memory the first time we fell in love with our spouse. Once when I was at Disneyland with a friend every time I saw a couple that was kissing and smiling at one another I prayed for them to “remember Disneyland.” Later in their lives as it happens to everyone, there will be moments of doubt, stress, and difficult times that will make anyone wonder if they really were in love in the first place.

We need to remember our commitment to one another and to Christ as well. Living daily, in spite of the season we are in at the time, loyal, loving, and unselfish lives. Dedicated to doing well, to stand by Christ and the commandments He has given us to follow and stand by each other. As we would never in our lives forget we were dedicated to the sport of football or the hobby of oil painting we should never forget our dedication to each other.

Someone once said the longest sentence in the English language is, “I do.” How long that sentence is, how well it is spent, the good moments we get out of it all depends on us and our attitude going in and our dedication to Christ to succeed. But what about if …….. this or ……….. that happens! STOP! We can't live our lives on the “what ifs.” We need to move forward in our dedication and leave the rest to the Lord. No worries about the “what ifs” only the determination to succeed whether we truly do or not.

My husband sometimes probably thinks he got the raw end of the deal going into our marriage. He should have checked my medical records but they weren’t created yet. A week after being married I had a grand mal seizure, lost my job, my driver’s license was taken away and I was disabled for 12 years before being cured. Twenty years would pass and I would be diagnosed with breast and bone cancer. Was this what he signed up for? More or less, yes, as our marriage license didn’t assure us smooth sailing ahead but our dedication to each other and to God would assure us success, strength, and the ability to endure, together, dedicated to Jesus and that is where we all need to be.

Love you Don, thanks for loving me through the thick and thin of life.

Our host today is Urailak at her blog , LivingforGod it’s a must that you go there and read and share with others what they have to say about today’s quote. For some it’s not a happy subject as things have happened in their relationships but with God we are still able to move forward, to rise above those moments, take our struggles and learn from them instead of allowing ourselves to fall a victim to what deck of cards life has handed us.