“Truly I tell you that if two of you on earth agree about anything they ask for, it will be done for them by my Father in Heaven. For where two or three gather in my name, there am I with them.” Matthew 18:19-20 (NIV)
What if there was a simple relationship tool available to all couples, one that could elevate an ordinary marriage and take it to extraordinary heights? Wouldn’t you want to try it?
Between us, Nick and I had over 70 years of marriage under our belts when we met each other in 2021. One would assume then we’d know everything there was to know about commitment, communication, and the covenant of a marriage relationship. Yet in all those years with our first spouse, we can’t recall praying with them outside of the rote prayers of our Catholic faith, at church or the dinner table, unless perhaps it was a quick prayer under duress. We’d certainly never held hands to pray out loud for our marriage or each other. We weren’t even sure how to do that kind of praying for ourselves, until the darkness of grief got us down on our knees.
We are convinced now that unified prayer would have benefited our first marriages. How could it not? Yet, many of us grew up never having observed a model of couples praying together. Praying out loud with our spouse might feel unnatural. Vulnerable.
No matter where you are in your relationship, whether newly engaged or married for fifty years, praying together as a couple is one of the most rewarding and intimate spiritual disciplines a couple can embrace in their walk with God.
On February 9, in Wheatland, Iowa, Nick and I will be sharing what we have learned and provide guidance in unlocking the key to the practice of praying together. What better gift to give yourself as a couple than a delicious five-course prime rib dinner with a program that will enrich and fortify your marriage? Cost is $75 and includes the meal for two.
I took this man to be my lawfully wedded husband nearly two years ago.
This man, who recently spent three days helping at a Christian Writers Conference I’d agreed to lead just three weeks before we met. God went before me, knowing I would need Nick’s business sense and cooking skills just as much as I needed the support of a faith-filled partner.
The moment we make the decision to follow Jesus, we become new creations and God can do his restorative work in us. He had a lot of work to do in me in the ten years before I met Nick. Widowed in 2012, I began an odyssey of faith that would lead me to a personal relationship with God. I grew stronger in faith, reading the Bible and devotionals, doing bible studies, and spending contemplative time praying and journaling.
Jeremiah 29:13You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart.
I did, indeed, find Him. By 2018, I’d learned to listen to the Holy Spirit, trusting God to guide me in every aspect of my life, including the decision to sell half my possessions to move an hour away from my adult children, grandchildren and a Bible study group that had become like family to me. I left my comfort zone and biggest support system for a job at a spirituality center. Loneliness exacerbated by the move, I turned to God all the more, which was why I knew to listen when He asked me to pray for my “future husband.” Not pray FOR a future husband, mind you, but for a specific man God had already chosen.
The woman I’d become knew to obey the command to pray for a man I did not yet know (and didn’t quite dare trust existed) who evidently was going through something that prompted an urgent request from above.
Three years later, in July 2021, I met Nick at a time in his life he was seeking his own personal relationship with God. By the beginning of our second date, I already had strong feelings for him. We’d spent the better part of two hours getting to know each other with complete ease, sharing thoughts we’d never shared with anyone else. That his wife had died shortly before my 2018 prayer did not escape me. The first time we held hands was in the prayer time we shared at the beginning of our second meeting. By the end of that nine-hour date, I was certain Nick was the man God had asked me to pray for. For the first time in three years, I uncovered the prayer in my journal and read it to Nick.
“Do you think that man was me?” he asked, in awe of the idea of a God that cared so much about him he would ask a stranger to pray for him.
Knowing God had brought us together and was in our relationship from the beginning made it easy to say “yes” to each other just six weeks later.
I’d always wondered what Nick was feeling or experiencing when the urgent request “Pray for him,” came to me. He wondered too. There was no way to know. He didn’t keep a journal like I did and had no memory of anything unusual going on in late July 2018, outside of the usual grieving one does in the months following a spouse’s death.
That we become a new person when we begin following Jesus Christ has been radically demonstrated in my life. The pre-Jesus Mary wouldn’t have known how to listen to the promptings of the Holy Spirit any more than she would have trusted God’s promise of love.
Shortly before coordinating the writer’s conference, Nick and I were scheduled to speak at church on what it means to have a praying partnership. Pre-Jesus Nick might not have imagined participating in either of these events but seemed confident God would equip him for the call of speaking publicly on faith. At least, until the day before the scheduled talk, when he admitted to some doubt.
“Lord,” I prayed the next morning before Nick woke up. “I know Nick can do this. I know you have prepared him for this, that you want us to share our story. Allow me to help strengthen his faith. Show mehow to help him.” Knowing exactly what would increase Nick’s comfort level, I dared to add “And please, Lord, let Nick have a chance to demonstrate his sense of humor.“
Look in his VA records. I wasn’t sure I understood the directive. I had access to his doctor’s records through the VA, but I’d never thought to dig through what amounted to thousands of pages of medical data.
Look in his VA records for the date when I asked you to pray for him.
It took a while to find records from late July 2018, but there it was, doctor’s notes from a visit to the emergency room. Tears streamed down my cheeks as I realized that the very day God had asked me to pray for my future husband, Nick had ended up in the ER in excruciating pain, having tripped and fallen. Experiencing physical pain on top of emotional pain, I knew Nick must have been in a very dark place when I was prompted to pray for him. When I told Nick what I’d discovered, all his doubts disappeared.
Our presentation was flawless, our natural rapport evident to the group of couples present. I was slightly disappointed that the serious topic of prayer didn’t really allow for Nick’s natural humor to shine as I’d prayed for. Then someone asked a question.
I picked up the microphone again, not realizing Nick had already turned it off. I began talking before the realization hit me.
“You turned me off,” I said.
“If only it were that easy,” he quipped. The room erupted in laughter.
Thank you, God, for the gift of Nick and a marriage centered on You. Thank you for answering prayers in your unique and wondrous ways.
Some of you are aware that I’ve chosen a word for the year ever since I read Debbie Macomber’s One Perfect Word in 2011. For those who are new to the idea, it’s basically a meditative practice. By asking God to reveal the perfect word, we then spend 365 days pondering its meaning in our life, a form of Lectio Divina that we can employ as we study, listen, ponder and pray while also delving into God’s Word. I take this process seriously, as I have seen the difference in my life since I began the practice. For instance, when I chose the word Possibilities at the beginning of 2021, I had no idea two seemingly “impossible” things would become a reality for me that year. I was finally able to write the children’s book on grief that I’d be unable to pen in the previous nine years and I met and married the man God had asked me to pray for in 2018.
For whatever reason, I failed to choose a word last year. I’m not sure what one might have been fitting. The first half of the year could have been AWE as we took several trips. Not only was I in awe of the beauty of God’s creation as we traveled, but I also basked in the companionship and love of the man at my side. The second half could hardly have qualified for that same word as our summer plans for golfing and hiking trails were sidelined by weeks of debilitating arthritis pain for Nick when he went off a medication that may have been affecting his kidneys. In August, we were hit hard by Covid, spending our first anniversary next to each other on the couch in mutual misery. Mid-September brought my cancer diagnosis, followed by an October surgery that eradicated the disease. I barely had time to heal before holiday preparations. At 3:00 a.m. on Christmas morning, I woke up coughing so hard I couldn’t sleep. The cough is still with me, along with an overwhelming fatigue.
Imagine my distress and consternation then, when I repeatedly felt led to the word REST during prayer last week. REST? This is a word both Nick and I resisted. Hasn’t there been enough “rest” for both of us? Weren’t we eager to plan more trips for 2023? To add an exercise regimen that would increase our stamina and improve our health? Yet the word rest implies couch time instead. I didn’t want the word REST to be my word for 2023, and Nick wasn’t interested in hearing it either. Neither one of us had previously led a “restful” life. Was that part of the problem? Was God trying to tell me something?
Instead of concentrating on healing from surgery in October, I’d been determined to be prolific in my writing, working on my next book. I was certain God was on the same page, having helped me write the most difficult chapter the week before surgery.
I was wrong. Post-surgery, I found myself tired, unable to string coherent sentences together. I looked to my second go-to; reading. Except instead of enjoying mindless fiction, I found myself reading books about God’s design for marriage. In between cancer diagnosis and surgery, I’d filled a book of prayers for my husband, discovering how praying for him helped me. I picked up another book about blessing your husband. And then another. Soon, I realized I was studying God’s design for marriage. You’d think having previously been married for 34 years I would already know everything there was to know about marriage. Yet it pains me to admit I had not been the most Biblical wife in my first marriage. It was only after developing a personal relationship with God in 2012, I discovered just how much I didn’t know about being a Godly wife. I’d vowed that if God ever brought someone else into my life, I would pray with him, cherish him, and we’d grow in faith together. I would strive to be the Proverbs 31 wife. Both Nick and I have been in AWE of the difference a God-centered relationship makes.
It does make sense that God would guide me to study marriage, since he is leading Nick and I to co-write a book about having a praying partnership with your spouse. This is what I do before I write non-fiction books; study the topic. I read more than sixty books on creativity before writing mine, three dozen on grief before my grief book.
What then to make of that arthritis pain and shared illness? What might God be trying to tell us through all of it? How could he use illness and pain for his good? It was during the time of forced rest that Nick and I added a daily Bible study to our morning prayer time. We’ve gone through several Max Lucado studies, currently Traveling Light: Releasing the Burdens You Were Never Intended to Bear, based on Psalm 23.
Why REST as my word? Had we not already learned enough about being still? Does that mean another year marked by illness? I wondered these things in the middle of the night, sitting on the couch, coughing too much to sleep.
REST.
REST IN ME.
I went to the Bible then, searching for verses with the word “rest” in them.
God will give you rest. Exodus 33:14 “And he said, ‘My presence will go with you, and I will give you rest.'” Mathew 11:28-30 “Come to me all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.”
We are to be still before the Lord. Psalm 46:10 “Be still and know that I am God. I will be exalted among the nations; I will be exalted in the earth.”
We are to rest through faith and obedience. Proverbs 19:23 “The fear of the Lord leads to life and whoever has it rests satisfied; he will not be visited by harm.” Jeremiah 6:16 “Thus says the Lord ‘Stand by the roads, and look, and ask for the ancient paths, where the good way is; and walk in it and find rest for your souls.
It seems then, rest seems to have less to do about a physical call to the couch and more about an action to deepen our relationship with God, to find rest in Him. Resting in Him restores our souls. Wasn’t that exactly what Nick and I had done during the forced rest of Covid, when we began studying the Bible? With this word, God calls me to trust him, to follow Him. To rest in Him.
Mary Potter Kenyon 