The blog has been silent, but behind the scenes we have been busy! With the Family Room scaling back to about three meetings a year, as a team we decided it was time to bring back the Married Life Blog. 

We want to give you a blog of significant and consistent benefit for your marriage and family. 

So in the mean time, spend some time with CJ and the Girltalkers. We can’t recommend their content more highly! 

We’ll let you know ASAP of our launch date. 

With the most watched sports game of the year just a day away please check out a post from our friend, CJ Mahaney, to get some of his thoughts about how to watch the game. We hope this serves you as you spend this day with friends and family.

Enjoy!

This past weekend Seth and I celebrated our first anniversary. We made plans to celebrate the occasion by taking up Brian’s recommendation to try out DC’s Restaurant Week. I booked our Sunday evening reservations for Ruth’s Chris online and everything was good to go. Funny sometimes how even our best laid plans don’t work out. God knew we needed rest and–long story short–we cancelled our reservations. I know, who cancels their reservations for a $60 meal at Ruth’s Chris? But we didn’t entirely miss out all together. God gives second chances and this time it comes in the form of Baltimore’s Restaurant week which started on January 28^th and goes until February 3^rd, and the best part, Ruth’s Chris is joining in! We may get to enjoy our 1^st anniversary steaks after all.

That’s guy-speak.  You see, sometimes in life there are such high impact events, people, activities, or even messages that they stick with you long after time has passed.  Friday night was one of those nights. Dave Harvey’s message, God’s Mercy and My Marriage was so powerful, truth-rich, convicting, and helpful for me and many I have talked to that it has become an automatic “Top Five-er”–a message so important that it will be listened to and reflected upon over & over!

As Dave preached & applied the passage from Luke 6:27-36 to our lives and marriages many of us in the room experienced the Holy Spirit clearly revealing to us some of the many times we have been unmerciful and impatient with our spouses.  Many of us felt the appropriate weight of our sin and the costly fruit such sin has born out over the course of our marriages.  BUT GOD DOES NOT LEAVE US THERE!  Praise God for the most important verse in the text, v. 36, where we are reminded that our Father is merciful!

Clearly seeing my lack of mercy toward Yvette is needed.  Working to cultivate mercy in our marriage is also needed.  But such work is wearying and fruitless without the gospel.  So for those tempted to stop at the point of identifying sin, let’s meditate on the Father’s mercy toward us.

God is not counting our sins against us anymore because of the person and work of Christ.  The death of Christ on the Cross for our sin is the crowning jewel of His mercy to undeserving people.  Dave reminded us we will avoid the discouragement that comes from condemnation as we consider his Fatherly mercy to forgive all our sins. 

His mercy on the Cross has transformed us.  And so we should be people filled with faith for change. The same power that raised Christ from the grave lives in us!  Not only are we totally forgiven for our lack of mercy but we have access to God’s power to become merciful husbands and wives…to “put on” kindness, patience, and self-control in those moments of temptation.

Marriages marked by the mercy of God—sounds pretty inviting doesn’t it? Will you join me in making Dave’s message a “TOP FIVE-ER”? 

Wasn’t Dave’s message from the Family Room outstanding? The message is up on the resource page and here are some great questions for you and your wife to consider. Enjoy!

For parents of young children, time is precious. After a full day of work, child training, dinner, baths, family prayers, and the inevitable final trip to the bathroom by the newly potty-trained youngster…well, reading and discussing a book on parenting might not seem like the perfect cap to the day.

But in only 34 pages, J.C. Ryle, a 19^th Century British pastor, offers incredible parenting insight.  The Duties of Parents draws from the familiar words of Proverbs 22:6, “Train up a child in the way he should go . . .”

As a parent, I receive a smorgasbord of great wisdom in such few pages.  This booklet is filled with reminders of God’s promises and the vital importance of grace-based parenting.  An example of Ryle’s wisdom comes out line upon line.  Consider this one, “Home is a place where habits are formed; home is the place where the foundations of character are laid; home gives the bias to our tastes, and likings, and opinions.  See then, I pray you, that there be careful training at home. (Ryle, p. 33)

Want this parent’s counsel?  Go to our bookstore or go on-line and get Ryle’s booklet!  It just might be the best 34 pages on parenting your children!
             

D.C. Restaurant week…it’s become a tradition for Kathy and I. During this twice a year promotion many restaurants have a special menu that includes an appetizer, entrée and dessert for $30 per person.  If you order water to drink you can eat in a top-notch restaurant under $75, tip included. 

This year we visited Bobby Van’s Steakhouse, which boasts a casual but elegant atmosphere. Kathy’s only observation was that the dining room was not as romantic as others, such as The Prime Rib or 1789 in Georgetown (other restaurants participating in restaurant week), however, the food was outstanding; especially for the price.

The menu had an option of a salad or shrimp bisque for appetizer.  Go for the bisque–it was really good with a creamy, curry fragrance. The options for entrees were salmon with risotto, pasta with shrimp and mussels, chicken or a filet with potatoes.  We both ordered the filet. This is a steakhouse and the regular price is $39 a filet!  It was excellent.  All their steaks are Dry Aged, which gives their beef great flavor. For desert we had a cheesecake, nothing spectacular but it was good.  So for $30 per person we got to enjoy a meal that could have easily been $60 per person.  Most importantly, we got to dress up a little, romance each other, and have some great fellowship.

Recently a humble newer mom, Gretchen, wrote me with some very good questions about training and correcting younger children.  Some of her questions were “common to us all”:

1. What do you do with a child refusing to eat or spitting out their food?
2. What do you do about the touching of non-dangerous things like toilet seats, banging on the computer keyboard, remote controls, and stereo equipment?
3. How do you know what to choose as an authority issue with your children?

My kids are like me.  They don’t change in every needed area at once. 

So what specifically do Mom and Dad pick to work on?

We might serve our children better if we parent them to maturity one area at a time.  In other words, let’s train and correct in fewer but consistent areas.  We can assess the number of areas we work on based on the ages and capacities of our children.  I have found the developmental readiness to be different between each of my three children. What one child is ready for at age 3 might vary widely from another who later arrives at that age.  But both need to learn the principles of a Godward orientation and the importance of Dad and Mom’s authority.

As we seek to discern where to train and correct our children it might be helpful to ask some of the following questions:

1. What categories are we are focusing on in training each of our children?  (Keep in mind that the focus will change from time to time.)
2. Is this an issue that occurs frequently enough for the younger child to remember our training?
3. If so, how we can train our children in an ongoing manner towards obedience through words or through creative steps of modeling obedience?
4. How can I not only identify sin, but unveil God’s grace to my children? 

Moments of training and correction provide opportunities to remember our need for a Savior–and to tell our children of the God who loves to not only save, but transform his children, one degree of glory at a time.

One of our readers, Carol Nelson, sent these questions in.  Consider discussing them with your spouse and praying through them in the week to come.She writes:

These New Year’s questions aren’t the typical: “Lose 10 pounds.”  ”Read this book,” etc.  They encourage father’s, husband’s and pastor’s to go through these with children, wife, and others.  I thought about our Married Life Blog and thought perhaps this might make some great (and meaty) date night fodder:

They are at the “9 Marks/Church Matters,” blog.

I included just the top ten to give a sample: 

1. What’s one thing you could do this year to increase your enjoyment of God?  
   

2. What’s the most humanly impossible thing you will ask God to do this year? 
   

3. What’s the single most important thing you could do to improve the quality of your family life this year? 
   

4. In  which spiritual discipline do you most want to make progress this year, and what will you do about it? 
   

5. What is the single biggest time-waster in your life, and what will you do about it this year? 
   

6. What is the most helpful new way you could strengthen your church? 
   

7. For whose salvation will you pray most fervently this year? 
   

8. What’s the most important way you will, by God’s grace, try to make this year different from last year?   
   

9. What’s one thing could you do to improve your prayer life this year? 
   

10. What’s the single thing that you plan to do this year will matter most in ten years?  In eternity?  
    

There is nothing like starting off a new year with new goals, plans, and ideas. 

We’re here to help slip you a few new date night ideas. Surprise your spouse with a fancy dinner out and a change of scenery. Twice a year about a 100 DC Restaurants open their doors and lower their prices for one week, offering $20 lunches and $30 dinners for a 3 course meal. If you and your spouse have never done it before get in this time around. It starts on January 14^th and concludes on the 20^th. Keeping it a surprise couldn’t be any easier with online reservations here.

If you miss out, don’t worry. Baltimore picked up on the idea too and will be featuring their restaurant week from January 26^th to February 2^nd. 

If you go, make sure to send us a brief story about your time!