Galatians 6:2 // Summer of Scripture

Welcome to Summer of Scripture on the Naked marriage podcast. For 66 days in a row, we're releasing a short daily devotional for your marriage. Over these 66 days, we'll be sharing one scripture from each of the 66 books of the Bible and talking about how it applies to your life and marriage. Listen to all 66 episodes of these, and you'll have a better understanding of God's Word and his perfect plan for your marriage. Let's dive in to today's scripture.

Welcome to day 48, guys. We're in the book of Galatians, another letter written by the Apostle Paul through, of course, the inspiration of the Holy Spirit and man. It's a shorter book, but packed with power. And there's so much in here, and I love, love this, this verse. Galatians, chapter 6, verse 2, especially as it relates to your marriage, carry each other's burdens, and in this way, you fulfill the law of Christ. So we should never, ever have our spouse carry a burden alone. We should carry it together. And whether it's. Even if it's a sin issue, it's an issue that you bear the burden of that together. And we've done that for each other in different ways. I know early on in our marriage, we've talked about a lot. I had a real struggle with pornography that was at first a secret struggle carried in from my teenage years that I'd never dealt with in a healthy way. And when that finally came out into the light, not because I'd had the courage to confess it, but because Ashley found where I'd been looking on our old, clunky computer, it dragged that into the light in a really messy way. And it started a journey of us bearing that burden together. And the way she responded with so much grace and strength in helping me, even while she herself was wounded because of me, I think really set a wonderful precedent in our marriage for how we should. How I wanted to respond, with grace. And we've tried to be there for each other in different ways through the years. I mean, with Ashley's issue, it's rarely been any kind of, like, sin issue. But even if it was something completely out of her control, like anxiety and depression, we've had health issues. And life will just throw things like that your way sometimes, and you bear it together. And when you bear it together, you find the load gets much lighter.

You really do. You know, like we said on here before, it's never his problem or her problem. It's always our problem in marriage. And this is just A huge principle that when we really put it into practice, we really are fulfilling the law of Christ. It's essentially saying you bear each other's burdens, right? Whether you brought it on yourself or they brought it on themselves, or whether it just happened to you guys, you bear it together. And you know, I think sometimes as Christians, brothers and sisters in Christ, we do this. Like, we might do this for our friends at the church, for the neighbor down the street. Like, we're like, oh, we need to be there. You know, Cindy's going through cancer diagnosis, or oh, Tom, you know, lost everything in a fire, let's go help him. Those are all awesome things. And we should do those things. That's really obviously helping to bear a burden for someone else. But I think we get really shortsighted when it comes to our spouse. And I think it's because we see the good, the bad and the ugly. And for some reason we sometimes hold back from offering that burden bearing to our spouse when we, we really need to be very quick to do that for our spouse. They should be the first person that we're eager to help. And, and again, I think that sometimes we hard hearted because of maybe things that we know about our spouse or that they did to us that hurt us in the past and we forget, oh my goodness, like it's an honor, like it should be an honor to be there to serve one another and bear the burden whenever that time of need comes up. And so if you feel like you and your spouse are kind of in that season where you haven't been bearing the burden together and maybe you're at fault, like maybe you've gotten a little hard hearted and you're just kind of, you cut yourself off emotionally from your spouse. Encourage you to have a conversation today with your spouse and say, listen, I'm so sorry, but I've been really hurt in the past by you. And because of that, I kind of close myself off from you. And I just want to apologize for my part in that and be honest about whatever, you know, your spouse did to hurt you 100% and describe that to them. But then say, listen, I don't want us to be in this relationship alone. I don't want to be married only in name. Like, I want to live out this marriage. I want to have a unified, beautiful, thriving marriage. And I want to bear our burdens together because this isn't the last time that I'm gonna have a, you know, a hard time or that we're gonna have a hard time. So let's let's fare better in the future. And how can we do that? Like, ask your spouse, what can I do to lift any burdens in your life right now? And then hopefully your spouse will ask you the very same question and you can tell them what they can do to help lift any burdens in your life right now and then be willing to do those things.

Yeah. It starts with communication. You know, your spouse can't carry a burden that they don't know about.

Oh, yeah.

And so talk about it. You know, say like, I could use your help in this. And then be so willing to jump in and to be looking for those burdens that maybe your spouse hasn't voiced. Maybe they don't even. Maybe it's a blind spot for them. They don't even see it as a burden yet. Yeah, but you see, like, I see you carrying this extra weight and I want to come alongside you and carrying it, you know, and sometimes it's simple things. It's not even these big issues. Sometimes it's a simple thing. It's just doing more around the house.

Picking up the kids.

Yeah. Like just stepping in and saying, you know, you've been doing so much running around. Let me do this chore that you normally do. Let me step in and do that. Take that off your plate. And that's something I want to get better at. That Ashley Carey, she does so much. I mean, she's the hardest working person I know by far. And I'm not just saying that and so inspires and challenges me, but I want to remove some of that burden.

You do a great job of that.

Because right now she's doing a seminary program. We have the same job. But then in addition to that, she's doing a seminary program on top of it. And so I just want to. In this season where you have more of a burden and I can't do that work for you because you're way smarter than me. I couldn't do it. I want to come alongside and lighten your load in other ways if I can.

You do. You do. And I think that just realizing in marriage that we're partners, like we should never be abundant any kind of task that needs to happen. And when we have that kind of posture of heart and mind and willingness to serve, then it's just there's so much more peace in the relationship. And so that should be our goal, is to be burden bearers together. And you know, again, we're called to do this as brothers and sisters in Christ. But even more so in marriage. You know, we need to live that out.

Yeah, absolutely.

Thank you guys so much for joining us. I hope you got a lot out of today's episode. I hope you join us tomorrow for day 49 when we will be in the book of Ephesians. You.