Esteemed Worthy

God has been preparing me for marriage a long time now (it feels that way), and sometimes I wonder why it is taking so long. I know that he is preparing us both. I get really tired of the wait and sometimes I charge God foolishly. It seems that I keep waiting and nothing happens and I speak out in anger at the Lord. May God forgive my foolishness at these times.

Marriage is for purpose, for destiny. It is not just so we have some man or woman in our lives. There is a greater purpose. One of the purposes of marriage is found in
Malachi 2:15

"And did not God make [you and your wife] one [flesh]? Did not One make you and preserve your spirit alive? And why [did God make you two] one? Because He sought a godly offspring [from your union]. Therefore take heed to yourselves, and let no one deal treacherously and be faithless to the wife of his youth."

God is seeking a godly offspring from your union. It is the desire of his heart that we raise for him a godly offspring. A new generation he can use in this last days. We must never lose sight of that.

When I first read that it blew my mind. I had never thought of marriage as a good thing. I had never seen a good marriage in my life. Especially not in Kenya. All the women I talked to, said if possible I should never marry. Many of them even advised that I have children out of wedlock and raise them on my own. For the longest time, marriage was not on the agenda. In fact, I went the other way, totally feminist. I wanted to study hard, get myself a good job, make all kinds of money and be ready so that if I went astray and got married, I would be financially stable when my husband started acting up. I was convinced that all men beat their wives and I would tell my mom that the day he even dared I would be out of that marriage faster than he could say "Jesus", I would tell her not to worry about housing me and my kids since I would be rich, I would live in a 5 star hotel temporarily before buying us a house to live in. (Yes! I was messed up.)

God has had to do a lot of work to change my heart and mind on this issue. First of all he let me know he does not condone violence in marriage. For all you wife beaters read this:

Malachi 2:16 "For the Lord, the God of Israel, says: I hate divorce and marital separation and him who covers his garment [his wife] with violence. Therefore keep a watch upon your spirit [that it may be controlled by My Spirit], that you deal not treacherously and faithlessly [with your marriage mate]."

God will not have it. So he said to me, "I will not give you a husband who beats you." That made me relax a little bit on that issue. But now we had to deal with the issue of oneness. It did not make any sense to me to be one with my husband and keep things secret from him. Clearly that meant we were not one per se. I came from a family where the finances were kept separate. Mom had her money and dad had his money. Mom would never share her money with dad because that meant he was being oppressive. And since he was the man of the house, he provided everything which sometimes meant that things were tight around the house. Even at those times, she would never help out financially even though she had a better job than he did and earned more. And when she did, we would all suffer for it. That in turn made him very bitter and their marriage has been strained for as long as I can remember. I did not want that. I wanted oneness even in our finances.

I want to be able to have a joint account and not worry that my husband will take the cash and bail out on me, or freeze the accounts or whatever men do to create all the horror stories I have heard about joint accounts with ones mate. I want a generous husband. Generous to me and our children. I want to take part in the financial decisions made in our home. Many African men will not allow their wives to be part of financial decisions and that is not my portion. In fact if the man does that, I have heard it said that he is whipped! And you know men and the thought of being whipped.

Anyway, I have changed a lot in my attitude towards marriage. Marriage I now know is for destiny. It is for purpose and is to be esteemed in all things according to Heb 13:4

"Let marriage be held in honor (esteemed worthy, precious, of great price, and especially dear) in all things..."

It is esteemed worthy. It is of great price. It is precious. It is especially dear. Who ever thought of marriage like that?