There is a limit on how close a couple can be if they are not also close to God. Not only individually close to God, but close to Him as a couple.
In our Marriage Counseling practice most of the couples who come to us want a deeper spiritual life together. How does a couple get closer to the Lord?
The first thing to do is set aside uninterrupted time to talk. Sit down as a couple and talk about the things that have made you feel close to God in the past — or things you think would make you closer to God in the present. Do you know a couple/s who are both close to God? You can ask them to share how they dig into the Lord as a couple. Learn from others.
Getting started is the easy part. The more difficult part is to be consistent with your new goal. Not to the point of being legalistic about it! Let’s look at some things that could help you pray together as a couple. You can start with setting a specific time each day. If setting a time each day is too rigid a couple might try setting a sequence, i.e. breakfast, dress, make bed, prayer. Also a couple might arrange accountability with another couple who would like to also improve their spiritual life together.
Once you have started your new goals and practiced them for a period of time, perhaps 30 days, it will become second nature to you and it will require much less effort to sustain.
The strongest thing that you can then do as a couple is to turn outward to help other people. Volunteer at church, help out at a shelter or soup kitchen, or visit a sick friend. If your schedule is too busy to help others, then you are too busy. Purposely helping others will be a life changing experience.
Taking turns reading aloud from a book that helps you get closer to God is very effective. When you read aloud you both experience the words at the same time and can have very meaningful discussions on the content. My husband reads aloud to us each morning. We pick books that feed us spiritually. Then we talk about what we have read. Growing as a couple.
Praying for each other is an excellent tool and life changing experience. We recommend buying and using Stormy Ormartian’s Power of a Praying Husband and Power of a Praying Wife as great tools for those who are not confident at praying for each other yet.
Nothing is more important and effective than reading the Bible. My husband and I will read the same Chapter at different times of the day (because of our schedules). We highlight the verses that are the most meaningful to us and then discuss them together.
In our Christian Marriage Counseling practice we see that couples who are close to God heal the fastest even if they come to us in crisis. We also see that those couples who have not been close to God and close to each other before they came, but make the decision to change and have great success in healing their hurts and regaining a true “closeness”.