Occasional Enemies

This past Saturday night in our Family Life Married Couples Meeting we had the privilege of having our own Dave Harvey speak to our married and engaged couples from his book When Sinners Say, “I Do”.

Dave was drawing on some thoughts in our meeting from Chapter 5, “Mercy Triumphs Over Judgment”. He was working out of Luke 6, where Jesus calls his disciples to, among other things, ‘love your enemies’. In his book Dave points out something that I find both challenging and helpful. Jesus takes the holy call to love and applies it to the most difficult people to love – our enemies – those who ‘hate, curse and abuse you’ (Luke 6:27-28). What does this have to do with marriage? Dave writes, “Everything. Because Christ is showing the comprehensive reach of mercy.” (p. 83)

We think of mercy and loving our enemies as something for those who are set to do us harm. But did you ever think of your conflicts making you and your spouse (as Dave says on p. 83) ‘occasional enemies’? Occasional enemies are usually friends. Occasional enemies say things in anger that they regret saying after the fact. Occasional enemies can pull each other’s past failures out of the memory trunk and ignore change that has taken place in more recent times. Occasional enemies sometimes argue for the sake of arguing, even common sense tells them it’s not going to resolve anything. But occasional enemies have the opportunity to break through conflict with mercy. Mercy is essential to turn occasional enemies back into usual friends. As Tim Lane writes in his excellent book, Relationships – A Mess Worth Making, “Mercy is my commitment to live along side you in this broken world even though I will suffer with you, for you, and because of you.”

Do you want to grow in mercy in your marriage? Ask the following questions:

· Of yourself: Is there anything that my spouse does that tempts me to think they are against me? What inordinate desire might this reveal in me?

· To your spouse: Is there anything I do regularly in our conflicts that makes it seem that we are more enemies at war, than friends working toward peace?

· Before the Lord: How can I understand better the mercy that has come to me through the cross, so that I can better offer mercy to my occasional enemies?

Let’s look for ways we can apply the ‘comprehensive reach of mercy’ this week in our marriages.