Marriage matters

My parents celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary this week and it impresses me no end that they have been married so long. it also makes me feel old but that is another blog altogether!

It got me thinking though that a happy marriage is one of the most amazing things on planet earth and to be able to spend life with a friend who knows you so intimately is a cause for absolute joy. When I think of all the other relationships we have and the shallowness of them I begin to appreciate more fully the love that lasts. the love that lingers, the love that simply says, "I'm here".

In the world in which we live there is so little we can depend on, our once secure jobs are a distant memory. Our finances can be gone in an instant. and even those insignificant things that we love can be fleeting and change over night. Having a partner who walks through all the changes in our life is so amazing, who's there through the pain, through the trials, through the joys and excitement of success. just having them share with us in this life is so wonderful and something so many never get to appreciate.

Don't take it for granted. good marriages take effort and adjustment, they take compromise and flexibility. but they are so worth it. I've got about 22 years to go till my 50th. I hope Kerry and I can be as happy and in love then as we are now and that if we grow in love as much as we have since we were married then it should be pretty amazing.

have a great day. Richard

Tough theology.

I read this recently, it is a statement made by mark Driscoll. it sums up beautifully, some of how I feel about Christ and the way Christians have been portrayed. I realise that much of my own walk has been down the limp wristed version of Christianity, and I realise how often the wider community and the church tries to manipulate me into staying weak and insipid. I hate being challenged by Christ but I love it at the same time. I desperately need to be challenged more to be a fighter for the things I value rather than always being a doormat for peoples opinions.

See what you think.

"There is a strong drift toward the hard theological left. Some emergent types [want] to recast Jesus as a limp-wrist hippie in a dress with a lot of product in His hair, who drank decaf and made pithy Zen statements about life while shopping for the perfect pair of shoes. In Revelation, Jesus is a prize fighter with a tattoo down His leg, a sword in His hand and the commitment to make someone bleed. That is a guy I can worship. I cannot worship the hippie, diaper, halo Christ because I cannot worship a guy I can beat up. I fear some are becoming more cultural than Christian, and without a big Jesus who has authority and hates sin as revealed in the Bible, we will have less and less Christians, and more and more confused, spiritually self-righteous blogger critics of Christianity".
—Mark Driscoll, Relevant Magazine[10]