I love love love Focus on the Family's website! They are a buffet table of resources, encouragement, conviction, and direction to grow in your walk, your marriage, and your family. Jim Daly has done an excellent job heading up Focus on the Family. Just about once a day, some times more, I get emails from them with just loads of information. Today's I just thought would be great to put on our blog, it is about praying together with your spouse. Mo & I have found that praying together for our marriage has been the key that has broken through our tough times, big and small. We have seen God work when we pray and especially when we pray together. It truely is vital to a great, life-long marriage!
So today on my Focus on the Family email was some tips on "Beginning to Pray Together". Here's the 8 suggestions shared taken from When Couples Pray Together, by David and Jan Stoop. I just feel like I should mention that these are just beginner suggestions so don't feel like you have to do each one of these things in order to start praying together, just like Mo tells me sometimes when I think things out too much - just go and do it!!
1.Take the time needed to talk with each other about your thoughts and feelings about prayer and praying together. Do this without pressuring one another or trying to make the other feel guilty. See if you can agree that this is something you both want in your marriage. Talk about your fears in as open a way as possible. Talk also about your expectations up front, so they don't undermine you later on.
2.Pick a specific time and make a commitment to each other to begin praying together at that time. You'll never get started praying together on a regular basis if you don't make this definite commitment to a specific, agreed-upon time.
3.Don't be upset if you miss a day. It's important, if you miss a day, to just start again the next day. Consistency will come over time. Let yourself off the hook here.
4.Decide who will do what. For example, who decides where you will pray together? Who reminds the other that it is time to pray together? Couples reported that they couldn't just make a commitment to a time and then assume both of them would remember. It helped for one person to take on the responsibility to say, "Hey, it's time for us to pray together." It was interesting to note that for the couples who were successful, it was more often the husband who did the reminding.
5.Start where you are both comfortable. This means that if only one of you is comfortable praying out loud, then you don't start there, for both aren't comfortable at that place. If one of you insists that you pray together silently, then both can be comfortable at that place and that's where you begin.
6.Set a time limit. It was surprising how many couples made this point. "No long-winded prayers," they said. One wife wrote, "No long monologues with fourteen items in them!" Another couple suggested, "First start small and grow from there. Anyone can pattern five or ten minutes into their lives, as opposed to one hour." Another couple said, "Start with five minutes and then gradually, over time, see what happens. Don't try to take too much time as you begin."
7.Agree at the beginning that neither one of you will preach in your praying. Nothing can stop the process like using the time to pray together as a way to preach to your spouse, or to make suggestions in your prayer. Sometimes just making this a rule will give a reluctant spouse the freedom to get started, for a common fear is that one’s spouse will use this time to preach rather than to pray. (Tiff note: Wives....re-read this) ;)
8.One husband suggested: "Start with a list of things you want to pray about. This could be done individually or together. Then pray individually about your time of praying together before you actually come together for prayer."
Now - just go and do it!! =)
We know you will be amazed at how God will honor your prayers together as a married couple to help and strengthen your marriage.
For more information from Focus on the Family: Beginning to Pray Together
~TiffTiff~
