I Want a Better Marriage
Gracious and Loving God,
You created us to love one another and for marriage to be a special bond of love, trust, and mutual respect between a husband and wife.
I love my spouse, but I see far too many ways that we fall short of what You have planned for us. Both of us have failed to express the love, the kindness, the respect, and the words that foster a wonderful relationship. As I call to You for help to turn my marriage around, O God, I don’t bring grievances and judgment against my spouse, but lay my own sins and shortcomings before You. I confess that I don’t have the words, thoughts, attitude, and deeds to make my marriage better in my own strength. I need You to fill me with your grace and wisdom that I may extend that grace and wisdom to my spouse.
With Your help, I promise to do all that is in my power to improve my marriage. I ask that You give me patience when problems don’t disappear instantly or I don’t get the immediate response from my spouse I was looking for. Most of all I ask that You help me love and respect my spouse as you taught us through Your love of the church.
I affirm my faith that You make all things new—and that You can transform my marriage into a relationship of love and respect and joy. Continue to bless me as I bless my spouse and marriage.
I pray all this in the blessed name of Jesus.
Let all bitterness, and wrath, and anger, and clamour, and evil speaking, be put away from you, with all malice. And be ye kind one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God for Christ’s sake hath forgiven you. —Ephesians 4:31–32 nkjv