A Study Guide for Sacred Marriage by Gary Thomas



A Study Guide for Sacred Marriage by Gary Thomas

Study Guide Prepared by Joseph Snider

The following sets of questions are meant to aid individuals, couples, and small groups in understanding and applying the ideas of Sacred Marriage. The first set of questions is intended for use by individuals or couples. It's probably best to write out answers to them individually. Couples can then talk about any of the questions they find beneficial. The questions for small groups can complement the first questions or stand alone. Usually the first small group question invites couples to get better acquainted. The second question often asks for a general impression about the topic of the day. The last question draws some sort of conclusion from the discussion. Feel free to use any of the questions for individuals to supplement small group questions.

 

Chapter One

The Greatest Challenge in the World: A Call to Holiness More Than Happiness

These questions are intended to help participants look at the attitudes they brought into marriage, their expectations of marriage, and their openness to viewing marriage as a call to holiness.

1. When you got married, what did you expect to receive from marriage in terms of self-fulfillment? In terms of happiness? In terms of holiness?

2. Which of these best describes how you feel when you contemplate your marriage?

a. satisfied

b. depressed

c. loved

d. frightened

e. peaceful

f. apathetic

g. passionate

h. cynical

i. hated

j. hopeful

What would you like to gain from studying Sacred Marriage?

3. Gary Thomas writes, "The idea that marriage can survive on romance alone, or that romantic feelings are more important than any other consideration when choosing a spouse, has wrecked many a marital ship." To what extent do you agree with Gary Thomas' criticism of romantic love?

4. Are you stimulated by or put on your guard by the author's premise that marriage is a crucible in which you can learn about yourself and God? Why do you respond that way?

5. As you assess your marriage, what has it revealed to you about your disappointments, ugly attitudes, and selfishness?

6. Why do you think marriage brings so many character issues to the surface? What resources do you think marriage provides for dealing with these character issues?

7. What were your reactions to the idea that spouses often hate and love one another at the same time? How would you like your marriage to grow in terms of being able to talk about and deal with some of these mixed emotions?

8. "The real purpose of marriage may not be happiness as much as it is holiness," Gary Thomas writes. What do you think about that statement?

9. If you ranked what you want from your marriage on a scale of 1 to 10 (10 the highest), where would you rank happiness? Holiness? As you mature, how would you like those ratings to change? Why?

10. Is the spiritual seriousness of marriage something young people need to realize before they marry, or is it something most people have to realize through time and experience? Why do you think so?

11. Gary Thomas says God is the One who ultimately fulfills you, not your mate. If that's so, what contributions does your mate make to your life?

12. "This is a book that looks and points beyond marriage. Spiritual growth is the main theme; marriage is simply the context," Gary Thomas writes. As you think about the context of your marriage, where might God be indicating that He wants you to grow as a person? Where might He want your marriage to grow?

13. What is the biggest challenge you received from chapter one? What should you do about it? Meditate? Act? Discuss it with your mate? Something else?

FOR GROUP DISCUSSION

1. When you got married, what did you expect to gain from your marriage? How have your expectations matured since then?

2. What do you think of Gary Thomas' critique of romantic love as a basis for marriage? How have your attitudes toward romantic love changed over time?

3. How has your marriage served to show you how you need to grow and develop as a person and as a Christian?

4. Which of these best describes what you want from marriage: Peace and quiet? Happiness? Successful children? Growth in Christ? Why?

5. What is your reaction to the idea that marriage is a call to holiness more than a call to happiness?

6. What would you like to gain from this group study of Sacred Marriage?

Chapter Two

Finding God in Marriage:Marital Analogies Teach Us Truths about God

These questions will help couples look at certain biblical analogies and consider what their marriages can teach them about God in relationship to his people.

1. Reflect on your wedding day. What might this experience teach you about God's joy and our own anticipation for the ultimate marriage feast, where Christ is the bridegroom and His church is the bride?

2. Isaiah wrote, "As a bridegroom rejoices over his bride, so will your God rejoice over you" (62:5b). How do you respond to the idea that God delights in you as His spouse?

3. As you evaluate your relationship with God, how much of your motivation for obedience would you estimate is based on self-serving fear and how much is based on a quest for love and intimacy?

4. Have you ever watched your spouse flirt with another person or do something which caused you to question his or her faithfulness? How did you feel? Why do you think God chose the analogy of marital unfaithfulness to describe His people's rejection of Him?

5. In what ways does viewing yourself and your spouse as "one flesh" help you to understand the mysterious reality that Jesus was fully God and fully man at the same time?

6. Reflect on the birth of your children--the waiting, the discomfort, the pain, the effort, and then the joy and elation. What might this experience tell you about God "giving birth" to His children?

7. What qualities of a strong marriage will picture to the world the reconciling love of Christ for His church?

8. As you think about your marriage, how could it become a better picture of Christ's reconciling love for His church?

9. Gary Thomas writes, "According to pollster George Barna, self-described 'born-again' Christians have a higher divorce rate than nonbelievers (twenty-seven percent to twenty-three percent). Those who adopt the label 'fundamentalist Christian' have the highest divorce rate (thirty percent)." Why would you suppose that those who proclaim their dependence on God's grace are so ungracious in their marriages?

10. Are you motivated to maintain your marriage by the notion that it proclaims to the world that Christ loves His church? Why or why not? What spiritual concepts will motivate you to stay with your spouse through bad times as well as good?

11. When you think of doing something to please God, do you imagine God more as a bully trying to make your life miserable with unpleasant tasks or more as a loving Father whose pleasure includes your welfare and blessing? How will those different concepts of God affect your commitment to preserving your marriage through thick and thin?

12. As you look back through chapter two of Sacred Marriage, which idea about marriage as a teacher of truth about God made the strongest impression on you? How would you like that truth to change the way you relate to God or your marriage?

FOR GROUP DISCUSSION

1. Which of these best expresses the concept of God you grew up with: A vacuum? A harsh judge? A Platinum VISA card? A loving father? How does this view still affect the way you interact with God?

2. How do you respond to the idea that God rejoices over His people as a bridegroom delights in his bride?

3. What does marital infidelity teach us about our faithlessness to God and His response to it?

4. What do the agonies and joys of childbirth teach us about God "giving birth" to his children?

5. What qualities need to exist in our marriages for them to reflect Christ's reconciling love for His church?

6. Are you motivated to maintain your marriage by the idea that it shows Christ's enduring love to the world? Why or why not? What else motivates you to maintain your marriage?

7. What aspect of God's character would you most like your marriage to reveal to the world? How can you accomplish this?

Chapter Three

Learning to Love: How Marriage Teaches Us to Love

These questions will help participants use their marriages as a gauge of the quality of their love. They will evaluate how to strengthen their love for one another and God.

1. Have you wholly renounced your singleness? How are you remaking your attitude in life to accept your role as one-half of a couple, called to love your spouse in newer and deeper ways?

2. If somebody tried to describe your love for God solely by how well you love your spouse, what would they say?

3. Katherine Anne Porter wrote, "Love must be learned again and again; there is no end to it. Hate needs no instruction, but waits only to be provoked." How have you discovered in your marriage that love must be learned while hate only needs to be provoked?

4. Gary Thomas says that if one spouse tells the other, "I don't love you. I have never loved you," that person is admitting he or she has never acted as a Christian in that marriage. Usually we never say those words, but what kinds of thoughts and behaviors may reveal the same failure in a spiritually unhealthy marriage?

5. In what ways can your marriage teach you to love your mate in spite of her or his unlovable traits since that's the way God loves?

6. Gary Thomas writes, "The thought that God wants me to serve him by concentrating on making my wife happy was extraordinary. Can it mean, then, that if my wife is unhappy, I'm failing God?" What are two things you could do regularly that would make your spouse happy, strengthen your marriage, and please God?

7. Gary Thomas notes that sacrifice has taken on a negative connotation in our day. What is your first reaction to the idea of making a personal sacrifice for the happiness of your spouse?

8. Can you identify a sacrifice you have refused to make for your mate? Do you think love would have prompted you to make that sacrifice? Why or why not?

9. For men: In what ways do you suffer from what Dr. Barger calls "male scorn of women"? How do you show it? What can you do to repent from and transform this attitude?

10. For women: Dr. Barger talks about the virtues that are necessary to love a woman (patience, listening, humility, service, and faithful love). Which virtues do you think are necessary to love a man? How might these virtues help you relate to God?

11. Gary Thomas writes, "It is far less of a leap for a man to love a woman or for a woman to love a man than it is for either of us to love God. . . . I think marriage is designed to call us out of ourselves and learn to love the 'different.'" How do you think the skills you are learning in loving your spouse across the gender divide help you love God across the divinity divide?

12. What has chapter three of Sacred Marriage shown you to be the greatest strength and the greatest weakness of your love for your mate? How can you maximize that strength? What are you going to do to deal with that weakness?

FOR GROUP DISCUSSION

1. Which of these best pictures how your parents showed love to one another: An iceberg? Edith and Archie Bunker? Ward and June Cleaver? A volcano? How has their model affected your ability to express love?

2. If someone tried to describe your love for God based solely on how you love your spouse, what might they conclude?

3. The book says love must be learned but hate needs only to be provoked. How does marriage testify to the truth of that statement?

4. God loves us in spite of our flaws. How does marriage teach us to love in spite of our mate's imperfections?

5. What have you learned from marriage about making sacrifices for someone you love? In what ways is this unnatural for you?

6. You and your spouse are different in many ways. Which differences have you grown to appreciate? Which ones that still bug you do you sense you need to learn to understand?

7. What do you think is the strongest quality of your love for your spouse? The weakest? How can you strengthen that weakness?

Chapter Four

Holy Honor: Marriage Teaches Us to Respect Others

These questions will help couples evaluate the respect level in their marriages and explore how to show better respect in the future.

Law enforcement officials deal with a troubling new phenomenon called "suicide by cop." Some men deliberately create a situation in which a police officer will be forced to shoot them. Michael Generakos took a California school board member hostage at gunpoint in the late 1990s. He was despondent over losing custody of his children, but showed surprising empathy for his hostage. As he marched the board member out of the education building, Generakos explained, "Police will have to shoot me, and you will have to run away. I don't want you to get hurt." When Generakos was confronted by police officers and told to drop the gun he held behind the official's back, he refused. A police marksman killed him with a single shot, only to discover that the hostage-taker had been carrying a relatively harmless pellet gun.

Some people commit emotional, relational, and spiritual "suicide by marriage." They force their spouse and themselves into situations that bring anguish, suffering, and conflict. Rather than deal with the underlying issues, they make life miserable for themselves and everyone around them.

1. What attitudes and actions of yours might intentionally or unwittingly bring misery into your own marriage?

2. Evaluate each of these crucial relationships of your life for the presence of contempt. If contempt was/is present, how did/does it express itself?

a. your parents for you

b. you for your parents

c. you for your spouse

d. your spouse for you

e. you for your children

f. your children for you

3. How is your lack of respect or active contempt for your spouse negatively affecting your own life and the lives of your children? How is this comparable to slow suicide?

4. Scripture calls us to respect our parents (Lev. 19:3); the elderly (Lev. 19:32); God (Mal. 1:6); and our spouse (Eph. 5:33; 1 Pet. 3:7). Consider your own level of respect in each relationship. Do you tend to be a respect-giving person? Or is your response to others more typified by cynicism, neglect, apathy, malice, gossip, or ridicule?

5. Some of us enjoy feeling contempt for others. It's a means toward feeling in control. We explain everyone around us as unworthy of us and unkind to us. Then we can pity ourselves and justify our anger and lack of relational success. It can be a real sacrifice to develop "contempt for contempt." If you feel contempt in your marriage, how do you express it, subtly or openly? What contempt messages play regularly in your mind?

6. Perhaps you have "loved your love" out of your marriage through familiarity. What traits of your mate which once fascinated you now bother you? What weaknesses of your mate that you didn't notice at first now stand out and bother you?

7. In contrast to those weaknesses, what evidences of grace can you see in your mate when you take the time to look for them? What are personal qualities of your mate and contributions your mate makes to your life for which you should regularly thank God?

8. Spend some time at this point thanking God for your spouse.

9. The Ricuccis write, "Honor isn't passive, it's active. . . . Honor not expressed is not honor." What can you say or do in public or in private to actively honor your spouse this week?

10. How do you think your spouse would like you to show respect for her/him? What concrete step can you take this week to express your respect for him/her?

11. Gary Thomas writes, "You will never find a spouse who is not affected by the reality of the Fall. If you can't respect this spouse because she is prone to certain weaknesses, you will never be able to respect any spouse." Do you agree or disagree with that statement? Why or why not?

12. For men: How do you think a man can balance being masculine and having a gentle and humble spirit that demonstrates respect toward his wife?

13 For women: How can you show respect to a husband who doesn't show respect to you?

14. What is the most important issue you need to work on in learning contempt for contempt and showing respect for your spouse? What is the first step toward doing this?

FOR GROUP DISCUSSION

1. When you were growing up, whom do you remember for showing you respect: A parent? A grandparent? A teacher? A pastor? Someone else? What did that person's respect mean to you?

2. How well would you say you respect each of these: God? Your parents? Your spouse? Your children?

3. Do you tend to give respect to others or demand it from them? Why?

4. How do you tend to express feelings of contempt within your marriage? What do you want to accomplish by these methods?

5. What are some qualities of your spouse for which you should thank God?

6. How do you think your mate would like you to show respect for him or her?

7. How can you show respect for a mate who doesn't show respect for you?

8. What do you think would be the greatest benefits to your marriage if you and your spouse became better at showing respect for one another?

Chapter Five

The Soul's Embrace: Good Marriage Fosters Good Prayer

These questions will aid couples in exploring the relationship between marriage and prayer and in planning how to improve their praying by strengthening their marriages.

1. Gary Thomas writes, "Paul urges us to pray continually (1 Thessalonians 5:17). . . . It marks prayer as the heart of our devotion, the constant awareness of God's presence, our constant submission to his will, and our frequent expression of adoration and praise." How can you make prayer more a part of your attitude and of the stream of thought always running through your mind?

2. What obstacles hinder praying with your spouse? What practices work best to encourage joint prayer for you and your spouse?

3. What negative attitudes toward your mate do you need to overcome so your prayers are not hindered?

4. Gary Thomas writes, "We are told that if we want to have a stronger marriage, we should improve our prayer lives. But Peter tells us that we should improve our marriages so that we can improve our prayer lives." How can you imagine your prayer life improving if your marriage were more the way God wanted it to be?

5. Which of your ambitions, dreams, and energies need to be more team-focused rather than me-focused so your praying is less selfish and more servant-like?

6. Do your spouse and you have joint ministries or solo ministries? Is your ministry pattern healthy? Are the two of you supportive of one another's ministries? How can you become better prayer partners in ministry?

7. Evaluate how considerate and respectful you are of your mate as a partner in life, ministry, parents, and household management. Ask your spouse to evaluate your consideration and respect in the same areas. Compare and contrast the evaluations. What action steps are suggested by what you learned?

8. How would you say the quality and quantity of sexual activity in your marriage affects the way you pray?

9. Gary Thomas writes, "Sleeping with your spouse can leave your heart, mind, and soul free, for a time, to vigorously pursue God in prayer without distraction." When you think about your marriage, what are your reactions to that statement?

10. Gary Thomas writes, "Dissension is a major prayer-killer. Looked at from this perspective, the institution of marriage is designed to force us to become reconcilers. That's the only way we'll survive spiritually." How well do you and your spouse resolve disagreements in a timely manner? What happens to your praying when you are upset with your mate?

11. Gary Thomas writes, "I wonder if it isn't possible for the marriage relationship to reawaken this humility within us. If we experience a shadow of this surrender before a sinful human being during a sexual encounter, can we not learn to offer ourselves equally unreservedly to a perfectly loving and absolutely benevolent God?" How do you think improving your humility toward your mate could improve your humility toward God?

12. Overall how would you like your praying to become more your soul's embrace of God than a quick grocery list of your petitions for the day?

FOR GROUP DISCUSSION

1. Do you know any married couples who seem unusually successful in prayer? If so, what stands out to you about their praying?

2. What obstacles tend to hinder praying with your spouse? What has worked best to create enjoyable prayer times with your mate?

3. What negative attitudes or actions within your marriage might need to change so your prayers won't be hindered?

4. Which of your ambitions or goals might need to become more team-focused rather than me-focused to make your praying more servant-like?

5. How do the ministries you and your spouse engage in enrich your marriage and your prayer life?

6. What idea about sexual activity and prayer intrigued you most in Sacred Marriage? What will you do in response to this idea?

7. Does your praying tend to be more your soul's embrace of God or more a grocery list of wants? What are some first steps toward making your praying still better?

Chapter Six

The Cleansing of Marriage: How Marriage Exposes Our Sin

These questions will assist couples in exploring how they can permit their marriages to reveal and heal sins and character weaknesses.

In Reforming Marriage, Douglas Wilson writes, "A short walk through the marriage and family section of the local Christian bookstore easily demonstrates that modern Christians have a tremendous interest in the subject of marriage and family. But this booming marriage business (books, conferences, seminars, marriage counseling) is really a sign of disease and not health. In a very real sense, our interest is morbid, almost pathological. We are like a terminal cancer patient, fervently researching alternative treatments, hoping against hope that something can be done. Desperate for happiness in our relationships, and discontent with what God has given us, we are imploring the experts to show us the way out. . . . A mature Christian is one who understands that it is the duty of all human creatures to glorify God in all things. It therefore stands to reason that a mature Christian man will be a mature husband. Likewise, a mature Christian woman will be a mature wife. Maturity in the Lord is a prerequisite to maturity in marriage."

1. How is your marriage helping you to mature as a Christian? How might this increased maturity, in time, strengthen your marriage as well?

2. What sin(s) in your life has the relational intimacy of your marriage put the spotlight on?

3. Why do you think we try to hide our weaknesses, faults, and sins from our spouses rather than admitting them and looking for help from our mates?

4. What do you think would happen in your marriage if your spouse knew the worst there is to know about you? What would need to become true of your relationship for you to confess this to him/her? (Or what is true of your marriage that has let you confess this?)

5. If your spouse confessed a failing to you that you felt was a betrayal of your trust in him/her, how prepared are you to forgive her/him? Who could you go to for mature, biblical guidance if you felt yourself betrayed?

6. Identify the top two weaknesses in the way you relate to your mate. What are the positive virtues that are the moral/spiritual opposites of those two weaknesses? (For example, if one of your weaknesses is harshness, gentleness would be an opposite virtue.) Pick one of these to work on this week.

7. Think about how you handle conflict in your marriage. Who or what do you tend to blame in order to deflect responsibility from yourself for your relational failings? How does your thinking and talking need to change so you can be more honest and responsible for your role in things?

8. Give an example of a time when you used your knowledge of a weakness in your mate to shame or punish her/him. How could you have used that situation to build him/her up and encourage her/his spiritual growth?

9. As you evaluate how you at times may have wished your marriage were better, what percent of your focus would you estimate has been on changing your mate and what percent on changing yourself? How should you adjust those percentages in light of chapter six?

10. As you reflect over chapter 6 and these questions, how do you think your marriage can best reveal your sins and strengthen your character?

FOR GROUP DISCUSSION

1. What's the worst trouble you ever got into at school when you were young? How did you get caught and what happened to you?

2. What's your overall reaction to the idea that God intends your marriage to help expose and deal with your sins?

3. What sin (or sins) has the relational intimacy of your marriage already put the spotlight on? What have you done about them?

4. How do people usually rationalize their concealment of their faults and sins from others? What happens when we do this within our marriages?

5. Why are people afraid to admit their faults and sins to their spouses? What needs to be true in our marriages so it's safe to be transparent?

6. When there's conflict in your marriage, what do you tend to do to deflect the blame for your part in the relational breakdown? What does that accomplish in terms of the conflict?

7. There is risk involved in and energy required for the process of exposing our sins in marriage. What do you think would be the greatest benefits gained in your marriage from the risks taken and energy invested?

Chapter Seven

Sacred History: Building the Spiritual Discipline of Perseverance

These questions will help couples explore the concept of persevering in marriage and apply that concept to their own relationships.

A century ago, Sonia Keppel believed her mother had a "brilliant, goddess-like quality," in part because of the "flowers sent as oblations to this goddess" by King Edward VII. Sonia's eyes filled with the orchids and "beribboned baskets" delivered in horse-drawn vans by a coachman decked out in the king's finest. At the time, Mrs. Keppel's affair with the king did not destroy her marriage or her reputation -- but times have changed. Sonia's granddaughter (and Mrs. Keppel's great-granddaughter) grew up to be Camilla Parker Bowles, longstanding mistress of Charles, the Prince of Wales and somewhat tragic husband of Lady Diana Spencer. What aspirations are your actions in your marriage passing down to the next generation? Will your offspring see the beauty of endurance and persevering love, or will they inherit a message of chasing after romance regardless of the cost to those around them?

1. What strikes you as being true about Nietzsche's description of marriage as a "long conversation" with a good friend?

2. When you view your marriage relationship through the lens of God's relationship with His people in the Bible, what insights do you gain about the likelihood of bad times as well as good and about what it takes to stay true to your mate?

3. Comparing your marriage to God's relationship with His people, which season(s) best describes it right now?

· Great joy and celebration

· Frustration and anger

· Infidelity and apostasy

· Excruciating seasons of silence

How can you best relate to God in this season (these seasons)?

4. Gary Thomas writes, "Some experts suggest it takes from nine to fourteen years for a couple to truly 'create and form its being.'" How long have you been married? Where would you say you are in the process of creating your identity as a couple?

*early in the process

*nearly through creating your identity

*identified as a couple and learning to act out that identity

*identified as a couple and comfortable in acting out that identity

*stymied in progressing toward identity as a couple

5. "We live in a nation of quitters," Gary Thomas writes. Would you say you are known for the kind of perseverance it takes to achieve identity and success as a couple? If perseverance is not one of your natural strengths, how can you improve it?

6. Are you and your spouse well matched in your perseverance quotients? If one of you is more persevering than the other (and that's likely), how can you work together for success rather than drifting apart?

7. "Persistence doesn't make sense unless we live with a keen sense of eternity," Gary Thomas writes. How can your Christian hope for glory, honor, immortality, and eternal life (Rom. 2:7) motivate you to persevere in your marriage?

8. Personal holiness is not an overnight achievement. How might the concept of perseverance and persistence enrich your notion of holiness? How might actually persevering through temptation and difficulty enrich your experience of holiness?

9. Every marriage constructs its unique sacred history. That sacred history is aborted when one partner gives up on that marriage. What would each person lose if the sacred history of your marriage were interrupted?

*you

*your mate

*your children (if any)

10. When you read the story of Leslie dealing with Tim deserting and then divorcing her, what did you learn about perseverance, faith, and forgiveness?

11. Spend some time talking with your spouse about what stories should go into the sacred history of your marriage to be told to your children, family, and friends.

12. Discuss how respecting and telling the sacred histories of your marriages can foster community with other couples you know.

FOR GROUP DISCUSSION

1. Tell about a time when you "gave up" and quit on something that has left you wondering what would have happened if you had persevered.

2. "We live in a nation of quitters," Gary Thomas writes. What do you think needs to change in the way we look at marriage for perseverance to come back into vogue, even in the church?

3. Are you and your spouse well matched in terms of perseverance? If one of you is more persevering than the other, how can you work together for success rather than drifting apart?

4. How can you make the idea of eternity and its rewards a practical motivation for perseverance in the daily grind of married life?

5. What do you see as the relationship between perseverance and personal holiness? What "messages" of modern life are hostile to perseverance and holiness?

6. Every marriage constructs its unique sacred history. What would each of these people lose if the sacred history of your marriage were interrupted: You? Your spouse? Your children (if any)?

7. What are some of the stories that need to go into the sacred history of your marriage and repeated to your children, family, and friends?

8. What do you want people to say about your marriage at your golden wedding anniversary party?

Chapter Eight

Sacred Struggle:Embracing Difficulty in Order to Build Character

These questions will aid participants in clarifying the role of suffering in character development. Couples will be asked to discuss some of their struggles. Hopefully by this point in the life of your group, interpersonal relationships can handle this.

1. Francois Fenelon wrote, "The more we fear to suffer, the more we need to do so." Jesus said, "If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me." How do you think Christians are to regard suffering so they neither run from it nor become masochistic?

2. Most of the sufferings American Christians face are not persecution for Christ's sake. They are either circumstantial difficulties arising out of living in a fallen world or the consequences of foolish or sinful behavior. How do these last two categories of suffering relate to the difficulties we face in our marriages?

3. "To be profitable, our struggle must have purpose, and it must be productive," Gary Thomas writes. For what purpose do you think God has allowed the difficulties of your marriage? What results do you think He wants to produce in you through these difficulties?

4. No one goes looking for difficulties for their marriage. Such a quest would be unhealthy. But difficulties will come. Do you tend to be a competitive person who relishes a challenge or do you tend to be a quiet person who avoids challenges? How does your spouse tend to respond to difficulties? How can you respect one another's temperament as you work together to face difficulties?

5. If you are aggressive in dealing with challenges, how will you react to difficulties that take years of patience to resolve? If you want to avoid challenge and conflict, how will you deal with difficulties that require you to confront your spouse and hold him/her accountable?

6. Read through the section of chapter eight narrating Lincoln's marital difficulties. What truths do you find in that extended illustration that bear on how you need to handle difficulties in your marriage?

7. How did Anne Morrow Lindbergh differ temperamentally from her husband? What stresses did those differences create in her life? How did she deal with them?

8. How did Anne Morrow Lindbergh find her true self through the great tragedy of her life, the kidnapping and murder of her son?

9. Identify the most difficult aspect of your marriage facing you today. What would it mean to respond "Christianly" in this situation? How might you grow through this difficulty into the person God and you both want you to become?

10. "Without the hope of heaven or the sense of the importance of a growing character and refinement, there is nothing to prepare for, nothing to look forward to; it is like practicing and practicing, but never getting to actually play a game," Gary Thomas writes. Do you find it easy or hard to be motivated to deal with difficulties in your marriage by thinking about eternity? What have you learned from Sacred Marriage about an eternal perspective that can help you draw more motivation from anticipation of heaven?

FOR GROUP DISCUSSION

1. Looking back through your life, whom do you admire for the way they handled difficulties in their life? Why do you admire that person?

2. Why are difficulties and suffering inevitable in every marriage? What happens if we run from them? What happens if we face them head on?

3. Do you and your mate face difficulties the same way? Which is more aggressive? Which is more passive? How can each of you benefit from the other's approach?

4. When you read about Abraham Lincoln and Anne Morrow Lindbergh, what ideas about growing through suffering impressed you?

5. What's the most serious crisis you've suffered through in your married life? What did God do in your life through it?

6. What difficulties are you and your mate facing right now? What do you think it will take to respond "Christianly" in this situation? How might you grow?

7. What do you think is the relationship between knowing how to suffer through bad times and knowing how to enjoy good times?

Chapter Nine

Falling Forward:Marriage Teaches Us to Forgive

These questions will assist spouses in adopting a commitment to move toward one another and to give themselves to one another. Communication and forgiveness are key terms in this discussion.

1. Mary Anne McPherson Oliver wrote, "Individuals might contemplate suicide, but they rarely forget to eat, whereas couples often forget to nourish their relationships." Gary Thomas adds, "One researcher found that the average married couple actively communicates on the average just twenty-seven minutes a week." What values and priorities might you need to reexamine to improve the amount of intentional relationship building that occurs in your marriage?

2. What do you understand Gary Thomas to mean when he says we need to determine to fall toward our spouse rather than away from him/her in times of conflict or stress?

3. For men: How can you become more responsive to your wife's desire for verbal communication and for touch that isn't foreplay? How can you increase the pleasure you take in giving your wife pleasure?

4. For women: How can you become more responsive to your husband's sexual desires? Are there relational barriers blocking your desire for sexual intimacy you need to address with your husband?

5. Often one partner in a marriage regularly gives more than the other as they move toward one another in relational compromise. Often one partner isn't very interested in spiritual growth. What do you think you should do if these things were true of you in your marriage?

6. Christian marriage expects that you give "a gift of self" to your mate. What are some of ways in which you think your spouse truly wants to receive you? How can you give more of yourself in these ways?

7. Fellowship is fostered by three spiritual practices: learning not to run from conflict, learning how to compromise, and learning to accept others. Which of these disciplines is your strongest? Which is your weakest? How does your marriage give you opportunities to improve in the latter important discipline?

8. In handling conflict, some people err on the side of verbally clobbering their spouse; others gloss over problems and pretend they aren't there. Which extreme do you tend toward? What bad results come from this approach? How should you improve your conflict skills?

9. Give examples of matters of principle which shouldn't be compromised and matters of preference which should be subject to compromise within a marriage.

10. Whitehead wrote, "The challenge is not to keep on loving the person we thought we were marrying, but to love the person we did marry." How do the weaknesses you have discovered in your spouse through the course of your marriage present you with an opportunity to give yourself to her/him?

11. To what degree are you the type of spouse who uses "law" to try and prove how wrong your spouse is? What personal issues interfere with your efforts to offer forgiveness and to pursue reconciliation?

12. When Heather Campos' husband left her, her first concern was finding out what she had to do to stay right with God. Usually when your spouse has wronged you, your first concern is the hurt you feel. How can you reorient your motivation so you are concerned primarily with responding in the way God desires you to respond, and only secondarily with your distress?

13. Would you say that in the past you have been a "falling toward" or a "pulling away" spouse when you were offended? Based on the truth you found in chapter nine, what should you do to be better at falling toward your partner in forgiveness?

FOR GROUP DISCUSSION

1. Gary Thomas writes, "The opposite of biblical love isn't hate, it's apathy." What is your reaction to that quotation: Agree? Disagree? Don't care? Why?

2. Why do we tend to pull away from our spouse when conflict erupts? What do we need to do to make ourselves draw toward our spouse instead?

3. When one marriage partner regularly does more of the giving and compromising than the other, how can that person remain a giver without becoming a doormat?

4. Men, what did Sacred Marriage give you to think about relative to verbal communication and touch that isn't foreplay?

5. Women, what did Sacred Marriage give you to think about relative to your husband's sexual desires?

6. Gary Taylor says marital fellowship depends on three skills: learning to face conflict, learning to compromise, and learning to accept others. Which of these do you need to work on most? How would you like to improve?

7. When you offend your spouse, do you tend to ask forgiveness or try to shift blame? How can you get better at accepting responsibility for what you do?

8. When your mate offends you, do you tend to forgive or "make the rat pay?" How can you get better at accepting the responsibility to forgive?

9. What do you think are the long-term benefits of learning to fall toward your spouse in all aspects of your marriage?

Chapter Ten

Make Me a Servant: Marriage Can Build in Us a Servant's Heart

These questions will help marriage partners choose the Christian virtue of service over such worldly values as power and self-fulfillment. They will see that servant marriages are strong marriages while selfish marriages are destructive.

1. When you got married, which expectation was dominant: I will meet my spouse's needs or my spouse will meet my needs? How has this aided or interfered with your ability to approach marriage with a servant's heart?

2. Which of your attitudes toward marriage in general and your mate in particular need to be discarded or adjusted for you to become a servant in you marriage?

3. On a scale of one to ten, how would you rate yourself as a servant to your spouse? Discuss some of the ways your spouse would like to be served, and what makes it difficult for you to have the attitude of a servant.

4. Borrowing a question from C.J. Mahaney, what are you currently doing for your spouse that is costing you something?

5. With reference to both Passover and Easter, the Harts refer to the "paschal mystery" of marriage -- the process of dying and rising as a pattern of life for married people. What does your own marriage call you to die to? What might it call you to rise to?

6. What things make the mail-order bride racket described in chapter 10 so "offensive to the spirit of Christianity and Christian marriage?"

7. For men: To what extent do you approach the sexual aspects of your marriage as a selfish taker? To what extent do you approach it as a serving giver?

8. For women: To what extent do you think contemporary culture has encouraged you "to become as self-serving and self-absorbed as men"? How can you assert yourself properly and still maintain a servant spirit in your marriage?

9. What would it take for you to change your attitudes so you respond to your spouse more on the basis of your spouse's needs than your own desires?

10. To what extent do you have a hard time letting someone serve you because of past training or pride? How do you resist offers of service? How can you open yourself to let others serve you?

11. What are some of the petty power games married couples play when they argue about money, whose time is more important, or sex? What are they trying to prove?

12. There may be serious issues involved in these quarrels that require professional help. But in most cases how should a servant attitude change the way we disagree about money, time, and sex?

13. When only one spouse in a marriage desires to be a servant, what unique problems does he/she face? How will adopting a servant attitude benefit that spouse in spite of the difficulties?

14. What is the lesson from chapter ten that you think the Holy Spirit is going to keep after you to apply? How do you see yourself getting started on it?

FOR GROUP DISCUSSION

1. When you got married, were you more interested in what you would get out of the marriage or what you would give to it? How has that initial attitude affected your development of a servant heart?

2. The chapter suggests a death-resurrection rhythm in marriage. What does marriage call you to die to? To rise to?

3. What makes the mail-order bride racket described in the book so offensive? How can you keep those same attitudes from creeping into your approach to your marriage?

4. What are some of the world's "messages" to men that keep them from serving their wives? What are some of the world's "messages" to women that keep them from serving their husbands? How can you counter those messages in your marriage?

5. What do you think married couples are trying to prove when they argue about money, time, or sex? How can a servant spirit assist them in handling these issues?

6. When only one spouse in a marriage wants to be a servant, what problems will he or she face? What benefits will he or she receive in spite of the problems?

7. What do you think would be the greatest improvement in your marriage if you and your spouse became better servants of one another? What is the most significant change you would have to make to see this happen?

Chapter Eleven

Sexual Saints: Marital Sexuality Can Provide Spiritual Insights and Character Development

These questions will aid couples in exploring how to become a better servant and giver in the sexual dimension of their marriages. Couples should become more understanding and accepting of their spouses.

1. Our expressions of sexuality are often burdened with conscious or subconscious guilt. What problems do you think real or unwarranted guilt about sex cause married people? How do you think we should deal with this guilt?

2. In what ways has your religious background or training hindered or helped you in developing your attitude toward marital sexuality?

3. In what ways do you think "our restlessness for the sexual experience mirrors our restlessness for God?"

4. Marriage leads us into seasons of sexual experience that the Whiteheads call "feasting and fasting." "We fast regularly in our erotic lives. When our spouse is ill, we learn to forgo intercourse for a time. We are sexually attracted to someone, but we fast from this delightful arousal because of other goods we have chosen." In your own love life with your spouse, are you more predisposed toward fasting or feasting? How does this affect your marriage?

5. How much do you think selfishness affects the average married couple with regard to their sex life? In what ways can an attitude of service transform our experience of marital sexuality?

6. "God made flesh, and when God made flesh, he created some amazing sensations," Gary Thomas writes. How do you think the exhilaration of sex is meant by God to enrich marriage and to glorify Himself?

7. How can gratitude for sex within marriage help us overcome guilt over previous sexual experience apart from marriage?

8. What do you think is the significance for marriage that the delights of sexual pleasure involve two bodies in which the Holy Spirit dwells?

9. How might the give and take of married sexual experience teach us to serve, respect, and give preference to our mate?

10. For men: Gary Thomas writes, "Sight will always matter to men -- that's how God wired us -- but we can become mature in what we long to see." When you got married, what was your standard of feminine beauty? What is it now? What would you like it to be?

11. For women: What are your struggles in dealing with cultural attitudes and biblical statements about beauty? How could your husband make you feel more valued as an attractive woman?

12. "Marriage teaches us to give what we have. God has given us one body. He has commanded our spouse to delight in that one body -- and that body alone," Gary Thomas writes. How do you react to that statement? What motivation to share yourself, to fall forward toward your spouse, and to value yourself do you find in it?

13. How have you found your desire for sexual intimacy with your mate a motive to resolve conflict? How was that good for your marriage?

14. "Abstinence is not a cul-de-sac or dead end; it is a long on ramp. . . . I am not truly saying no, but rather, wait," Gary Thomas writes. What can you learn from the rhythm of denial and enjoyment inherent in married sexual expression and other aspects of married life? Of life in general?

15. How are you growing in the spiritual side of your sexuality -- generosity and service? What would you like to become more true of you? What would you like to stop being true of you?

FOR GROUP DISCUSSION

1. Where did you learn your first lessons about sex: The barnyard? The schoolyard? The back yard? A birds-and-bees talk? Other? What was good or bad about your first lessons?

2. How did your religious training help or hinder you in developing healthy attitudes toward marital sexuality?

3. How do you think gratitude for sex within marriage can help people overcome guilt caused by sexual experiences apart from marriage?

4. How do you think the exhilaration of sex is meant by God to enrich marriage and glorify Him?

5. How should the rhythm of feasting and fasting in married sexual experience teach us to respect and serve our mate?

6. "Marriage teaches us to give what we have. God has given us one body. He has commanded our spouse to delight in that one body -- and that body alone," Gary Thomas writes. What are the implications of that statement for taking care of your body? For appreciating your spouse's body?

7. How do you want to grow in the spiritual side of your sexuality, that is, in generosity and service?

Chapter Twelve

Sacred Presence: How Marriage Can Make Us More Aware of God's Presence

These questions will assist group participants in exploring how their particular marriages give them unique opportunities to draw near to God. They will consider intimacy, communication, the image of God, children, and purposefulness as approaches to God.

1. Gary Thomas insists that Christian spirituality ultimately is the search for and maintenance of a personal relationship with God. What can a good marriage teach us about that kind of spirituality?

2. Spirituality often is described in terms of turning -- turning from the needs of the world to face God, talk with Him, and find what is needed in the world. "How can we, as married saints, use the daily rush of activities and the seeming chaos of family life as reminders of God's presence?" Gary Thomas asked. How would you reply?

3. "The family that will enjoy Jesus' presence as a customary part of their union is a family that is joined precisely because husband and wife want to invite Jesus into the deeper parts of their marriage," Gary Thomas insists. What are some of the deeper parts of your marriage that you've never thought about asking Jesus into? How would you go about inviting Him into these? What would be the implications of such a step?

4. Gary Thomas imagines the presence of God between the cherubim facing each other on the mercy seat of the ark as a picture of the sacred presence uniting a wife and husband as they face one another in marriage. How has the presence of God united you and your spouse? How do times of disunity affect the presence of God in your marriage?

5. Consider your current home environment. Is it a place where God is found in the joining of two souls, or is it a place of chaos and confusion? Why do you think this is so?

6. How could you improve the way you love your spouse with words? How could you improve the way you listen to your spouse?

7. In what ways do you use words to hurt your spouse? How have you used silence maliciously in your marriage? What do these practices say about you?

8. What characteristics of your marriage leave you disappointed at times? How can these unavoidable disappointments serve to remind you that only God can ultimately meet your deepest relational needs?

9. In what ways does your spouse act as a God-mirror? How might even a non-believing spouse perform this function?

10. What aspects of the character of God does your spouse reflect more clearly than you do? What aspects of the character of God do you think you reflect more clearly than your spouse? In what ways would you be less balanced in understanding God without your spouse?

11. For those with children: How do you need to become more intentional in developing a family atmosphere that will "create" children who are mature in the Lord?

12. For those without children: What are your most important outlooks for creativity at this time? What are your thoughts about "creating" children?

13. Which aspect of inviting God's presence is most difficult for you (and which is most difficult for your spouse): communicating, dealing with the transcendent ache; beholding the image of God; or creating?

14. In what ways do you tend to be lackadaisical in maintaining your focus on the presence of God in your marriage? How can you become more intentional about cultivating the sacred presence between you and your spouse?

15. What one thing can you focus on in the coming weeks to more fully invite God's presence into your life through your marriage?

FOR GROUP DISCUSSION

1. When did you first turn to God in faith? What was it about yourself that drove you to Him? What was it about God that drew you to Him?

2. What are some of the deep parts of your marriage that you would like Christ to be more at home in? What would change if He took over these aspects of your relationship?

3. How can married people use the rush of their schedules and chaos of family life as reminders of God's presence?

4. When you and your spouse worship God together, what happens to your unity with one another? What happens to your ability to sense God's presence when you and your spouse are upset with one another?

5. How could you improve the way you love your spouse with words? How could you improve the way you listen to your spouse?

6. What aspects of the character of God does your spouse reflect better than you do? What aspects of the character of God do you reflect better than your spouse does? How is it good that you are together in knowing God?

7. What do you think is the greatest challenge for parents in "creating" children who are mature in the Lord?

8. Why do most Christian couples fail to put much effort into seeking God through their marriages? How do you intend to become more purposeful in seeking His presence?

Chapter Thirteen

Sacred Mission: Marriage Can Develop Our Spiritual Calling, Mission, and Purpose and Epilogue: The Holy Couple

These questions will help married couples evaluate the outward ministries they have together or as individuals. They will assess the purpose of their ministries and the value of those ministries to the spiritual vitality of their marriages.

1. In your own marriage, which mission has tended to dominate: doing God's work or growing in character? How can you achieve a better balance?

2. What ambitions has marriage held you back from pursuing? What ambitions has marriage held your spouse back from pursuing? If one partner is sacrificing ambition much more than the other, what should be done about that?

3. Do you think of your marriage as self-focused or others focused? Why do you say that?

4. Do you think you and your spouse both have a clear sense of mission before God? Why or why not?

5. What is your individual mission before God? What is your spouse's? What mission do you share as a couple?

6. How can you and your spouse better encourage each other in your service to God's Kingdom?

7. Gary Thomas writes, "Marriage becomes an essential element of our mission -- . . . the front lines from which our mission is launched." How has your marriage prepared you for ministry and shaped the way you do it?

8. How have you observed or how would you imagine that outward ministry is affected by these stages of family life: before children, while children are at home, after children are grown? What are the advantages of each of these phases of life?

9. What do you think would happen in a marriage if a couple focused on building up their relationship to the exclusion of any involvement with service to God's Kingdom?

10. What appeals to you about Gary Thomas' challenge to become a "couple-saint" with your spouse? What concerns you about the challenge to become a "couple-saint" with your spouse?

11. All told, what will be the major lessons you learned and applications you need to make from your reading of Sacred Marriage? How have your aspirations and goals changed? How do you pray differently?

FOR GROUP DISCUSSION

1. In hindsight, what do you think your parents' goal was for their married life? What do you think their goal was for their children? Do you suppose they talked much about goals?

2. Before you got married, what did you sense God wanted you to do with your life? What was your mate's life mission before marriage? How has marriage affected those life missions? How do you feel about that?

3. What ministries at church or in your community are you engaged in? What ministries is your spouse engaged in? Which do you share? How is your marriage better because you serve God outside it?

4. How has being married shaped and strengthened the way you engage in ministry?

5. How do you think ministry is affected by each of these stages of married life: Before kids? During kids? After kids? What are the advantages of each stage?

6. What appeals to you about Gary Thomas' challenge in the Epilogue to become a "couple-saint?" What reservations might you have about such a serious undertaking?

7. As you look back over this long study of Sacred Marriage, what are the lessons you want to remember and keep working on?

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