Hoping that you’re catching up with the topic of communication that we’ve started three weeks ago, we continue today where we left off last week.

Yes, we are talking about communication, specifically communication among the Christian married couple. As we said last time, communication has three equally important pillars upon which healthy and nurturing communication can be built. Those pillars are honesty, respect and love. No communication can be healthy if one or two or three of these pillars are missing.

By the way, if you look closely at these pillars, they are actually found in the list of “the fruit of the spirit” in Galatians 5:22-23a. Listen:

“But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control;” Galatians 5:22-23aESV

This is a key point to consider. Notice: “love, faithfulness, gentleness.” As you already know the fruit of the Spirit comes in a cluster just like grapes. That is why they are not called “fruits of the Spirit,” rather; they are called “fruit of the Spirit.” That means there is no picking and choosing. They all come as one or they won’t come as one.

Jesus said,

“Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit by itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in me. I am the vine; you are the branches. Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing.” John 15:4-5ESV

Did you see that?

What fruit Jesus is talking about here?

The fruit of the Spirit! And as Jesus said, we cannot fabricate the fruit of the Spirit by ourselves. Their origin is Christ Himself, the Vine.

So, think about it for a second: If a couple, individually, “abides in” Christ, how can they have a healthy communication in their marriage, right? It is not hard but impossible to have a healthy and nurturing kind of communication in a marriage apart from Christ, apart from the couple abiding in Christ.

What does this “abide in me[Christ]” mean?

Jesus answers that question for us saying,

“If you abide in me, and my words abide in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you. . . If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commandments and abide in his love. . . This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you.” John 15:7, 10, 12ESV

Do you see how Jesus brings it into a complete circle?

“Abide in Me.” How? By “abiding in My word.” How can we abide in God’s word? By obeying His commandment. What is his commandment? To love one another “as” Jesus loved each one of us. How much did Jesus love us? He loved us to death and He loved us with eternal love.

Hmm!

Where do we find this kind of love, loving one another even to death?

Back to square one!

We find this kind of love from the Vine Himself: “the fruit of the Spirit is love, , , faithfulness, gentleness” – so we can see clearly those equally important communication pillars from the fruit of the Spirit.

What does this truth tell us?

Many things and this: When a Christian couple cannot have a healthy communication in their marriage, the first thing they need to ask themselves is this: Am I abiding in Christ and His word? Am I obeying His command?

You see, marriage is a union of one man and one woman. Unless the couple wants to blame each other as Adam blamed Eve for his disobedience (Genesis 3:12) for the breakdown of their communication, they each find his/her contributions to the problem clearly.

A wife may say,

“You know, I always pray and read the Bible but my husband doesn’t pray nor read the Bible. So, he is the one for our communication problem.”

From the surface, her blame shift looks reasonable. But when we filter her statement through the word of God, her statement miserably falls short.

What is the least expected virtue from a person who regularly prays and reads the Bible? Abiding in the word of God and living out the commandments of Jesus.

The wife here focuses on “her religious activities,” leaving out holding herself responsible for the fruit of “her religious activities.”

Instead of blaming each other, if a couple owns their individual share of the problem, they start rebuilding their marital communication by first restoring their fellowship with the word of God through genuine repentance.

You see, when we go to God, God never points to other people for our problems and struggles in life and marriage. When we avail ourselves before God and His word, God points into our innermost being, He points and deals with our evil hearts.

If a wife or a husband, for that matter, prays and then thinks how the other messes up their marriage, they must have prayed to themselves, not to God. They must have knelt down and talked to themselves.

May His name forever be praised! Our LORD when we go to Him, He helps us to see ourselves, nobody else. When He does that, we fall on our face in despair and anguish asking God to forgive our rebelliousness.

Just imagine for a second: If both a wife and a husband have individually these kinds of moments with the Holy Spirit, they will be humble when they stand before their spouse. They don’t blame each other. Rather, they each ask forgiveness and grace from the other as they already asked God to forgive them.

Yes, we’ve seen last time about honesty, how honesty plays a role in communication and in this post, what we want to touch on is in the second pillar, i.e. respect.

How can anybody respect another human being, see the dignity of another human being, without seeing themselves before the Spirit of God? Impossible!

Yes, extrinsic dignity of a human being comes from God because man is made in the image of God (human beings are God’s image bearers) and Christians are “work in progress” to take the image of Jesus Christ. But knowing these biblical facts won’t do anybody any good as the Bible says “the letter kills” (2 Corinthians 3:6). What does give life to the truth of God we know? It is the Spirit as it says, “the Spirit gives life” (same verse).

We cannot be honest and respectful apart from Christ. Period! There is nothing good in us, in all of us, apart from Christ. Reading, studying, meditating and obeying the word of God, praying and fellowshipping with other believers of Christ are our main duties as Christians, whether we are married or single. Giving due respect to a spouse shows our abiding to the Vine. If everything we try fails, we seek counseling. . . (Cont’d next week) ///