Praying for your spouse is an important way you can support and love your spouse. Going before God and lifting up your heart for your spouse and their needs is a significant responsibility and privilege for every marriage after God.
We want to encourage you to pray for each other by praying God’s word over each other! Check out this episode of Marriage After God for 10 verses you can pray over each other!
WATCH
LISTEN
READ
– Hey, we’re Aaron and Jennifer Smith with Marriage After God.
– Helping you cultivate an extraordinary marriage.
– And today we’re gonna give you 10 verses you can pray over your spouse. All right, before we get started, I just wanna invite everyone to subscribe to our channel, as usual, and that will let you get notified every single time we upload a new episode.
– So today we’re gonna give you our 10 verses that we like to pray over each other, but we want to hear from you, so be sure to leave a comment with your favorite verses that you use to pray for one another. With today’s episode being about prayer, we thought it would be so cool to remind you guys that we have these resources for you
– Shameless plug!
– Shameless plug, 31 Prayers For My Husband, and 31 Prayers For My Wife. This is just to get you in the habit of praying for each other, and there’s 31 unique, specific prayers to different areas of your spouse’s life, and there’s also journal spaces to make them personal so you can ask your spouse, “Hey, what do you need prayer for this week?” or what’s on the top of your heart and your mind that you wanna pray for your spouse so that you can make those very special and unique to you.
– Yeah, we’ve had thousands of couples go through these already, and we just wanna invite you to be one of those couples. So, thanks for joining us this week. We’re gonna get into some prayers that, some verses that we like to pray. We don’t pray them every single time, but these are, this is a way of praying that helps us get out of the rut of like, “I don’t know what to pray for,” you know, what better than going into the Word of God, and praying what the Word of God says over our spouse?
– So Aaron and I each have five verses that we’re gonna share, so we’ll kind of, we’ll popcorn, and, you do one, I do one, you do one, I do one, but these are not specific to a husband and a wife; you guys can take all 10 of these verses and, you know, get ’em prepared so that you can pray for your spouse with them. Print ’em out if you have to, write ’em down, bookmark your Bible, whatever you need. By the way, that reminds me to encourage you to get your Bibles out. This episode we’re gonna be digging through some scripture, so, get out your Bibles and
– At least 10.
– Yeah, go through them with us.
– And we just wanna encourage you that, the reason we’re doing this is this is just a spiritual practice. Not only are we to be praying daily for, in all things, and for everything, and praying for our spouse, but, you know, if we can get in the practice of just praying the Word of God, you know, which is the will of God, this is what He desires, and just, you know, learning this skill, so that we can be, you know, have our prayers be more dynamic, they can be more pointed, more directed, you know, not that the more, you know, the better we pray, the more God’s gonna hear us, but it’s just a spiritual practice and discipline of knowing the Word of God, and learning how to use it in our life, you know, and asking God, say, “God, you know, “you say this in your Word in Proverbs, or in Galatians, “and, I desire that for my spouse, and for myself”. So, this is just a spiritual practice. There’s nothing magical about this. I don’t think praying scriptures versus praying something that isn’t, you know, directly a verse is going to be any more powerful or less powerful. It’s the idea of just getting in practice of praying what the Word of God’s already said, because we know that this is the will of God.
– And desiring that for each other.
– And desiring that for each other. So, you know, take, take it as that. It’s a spiritual practice that we’re gonna be walking through today.
– So before we get started, would you just be able to share a little bit about why we wanted to talk about prayer today? Like, why is prayer impactful for marriage?
– Well, we have been, ever since the beginning, prayer has been an integral part of our marriage. Even during our dating time, we prayed. Even in the hardest season of our life, it seemed like prayer was the only thing we had.
– Yeah.
– That was the only way we kept ourselves from spiraling out of control is, you know, we would get our minds back on, okay, you know, God loves us, and He’s helping us, and He’s gonna feed us that, even though it seemed like our prayers weren’t being answered at the time, He was answering them in His own way. But, we have these books, the prayer books, and we have prayers for our children, and prayers for our future spouse books, The reason we wrote those is the same reason that we’re talking about prayer today, is that prayer is so integral to just the Christian life, and it’s so necessary for the Christian marriage. God desires us to be praying always, and for everything. And so, we just, we’re probably gonna talk about prayer in many episodes. But this is a fun one, just to be a tool, a resource, for everyone that’s watching and listening, to use in their own prayer life, their own prayer journey, to get better at praying, for your spouse, for others.
– And even though that we have all these resources, and that we are such an advocate for couples to be praying for one another, we’re not the best at it. Like, it’s been a
– I know.
– an area of struggle even though since the beginning, it has been foundational in our relationship, it’s still one of those things that we have to be reminded of ourselves, so I feel like this is a really encouraging episode even for me because I wanna hear it, I wanna be reminded, I want my heart to be encouraged and inspired to be praying for you, and to remember that you have a role of leading me, and leading our family. And of course, if you’re doing that, the enemy’s gonna wanna attack, and so, I need to be on guard as your wife to be praying for you, and encouraging you, and, you know, I just, I love the idea of praying scripture over you because these words are powerful, they are God, it’s God’s will.
– Yeah, you even, you even told me before we started this, you’re like, “Hey we need, let’s, let’s pray these today.”
– Yeah.
– You’re like, you know, cause we, we need the reminder too. You might look in at our life and say, “Oh, they’ve got prayer figured out,” or “They’re so good at prayer,” but you know what? We forget. Like, we go to bed and we’re like, “Oh, man, we, I didn’t even, like, “we need to stop and pray,” so there’s nights that we don’t, and then there’s nights that we do, and then we get into a routine of it, a habit of it. And so, that’s kind of what we’re, we wanna do, is we wanna encourage ourselves, encourage you, to get in a habit of prayer, make it a part of our life, make it a part of our marriage, and believe that what we ask from God when it’s in His will, we will receive it. Because that’s what the scriptures tell us. And so, we want to practice praying in His will. We’re gonna practice praying, for everything, for all things. Yeah, that’s why we’re doing it. It’s always been a part of our life. We believe that it’s necessary, and it is necessary. And so, we’re gonna talk about it, and I think maybe I can just jump right into my first verse, and then you can do yours next? So my first verse that I like to pray over you is in Proverbs, chapter three, and it’s verses five through six. So, it’s right here. It says “Trust in the Lord with all your heart, “and do not lean on your own understanding. “In all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make straight your paths.” And so, what’s good about this, especially you being a mom, and a wife, and, like, you know, we have three kids with one on the way, and just hormones, and the call of life and motherhood, and all the things that happen during the day. It’s good for you to be reminded just to trust in the Lord, and to rest in Him, and to, you know, how many times you’re like, “I don’t understand how, “what I’m supposed to be doing,” like, especially when it comes to our parenting, so I mean, of course this would be good for me, also, but praying that God would just give you understanding, and that you would just trust in Him so that throughout the day, when you’re doing life, when you’re walking as a mother and as a wife, and as a friend, that you would lean on Him, and not your own understanding.
– Did you know that’s one of my favorite verses?
– No, I did not know that.
– How about that?
– We’ve been married for 11 years, and I didn’t know that. But that was the first verse I came up with. And, you know, the second part of this is acknowledging Him, and it’ll make your paths straight. So those days that it feels confusing, like, what am I supposed to be doing…
– Yeah.
– –as a mom, as a wife, as, you know, just as a friend, or in life, and when we lean on God, and when we trust in Him, He just, He makes it straight, He gives us peace, and all those, all those things. So, praying this for you
– So good, yeah.
– praying that you would lean on God, is a huge thing. I can’t force you to lean on God, which is what’s amazing about prayer, is I can ask God, be like, “God, change my wife, “or turn her heart towards you. “Help her to lean on your understanding “and not her own.” And so that’s how I would pray. Instead of just reading the scripture, I would pray the things that the scripture is
– Talking about.
– Talking about. That you would trust in the Lord with all your heart, that you would lean not on your own understanding, that you would acknowledge Him so that He will make your path straight, and that you’ll recognize that. And just praying that for you daily, actually.
– So, actually, as you’re explaining this, I’m realizing that there’s been times in the morning when we get together with the kids and you’re like, “Oh, you know, mom has this day where “she’s gonna go write and work, and we wanna pray for her,” this literally just happened, like, a few days ago, and you prayed a very
– Oh yeah.
– similar prayer to what this is saying, and it wasn’t word-for-word, like, it wasn’t you read the scripture over me, but,
– It’s the same idea, it wasn’t meaning to read, pray this, but
– but it was the concept of
– being intentional to pray that I would lean on God even in my work situation, so that was really encouraging, and it’s cool to know that I’m just thinking, like, and for those listening, when we’re intentional about praying the Word of God over our spouse, it comes out all the time, it’s not like a one time thing.
– Yeah, whether I, I’m, like, thinking specifically of this verse I understand the concept of it cause I’ve read it and prayed it before.
– Right, it’s in our hearts.
– and I think that way.
– Yeah, so you’re thinking that way, and so your mind is just on that track for us, that’s so cool.
– It’s really good.
– Okay, so–
– It’s really good.
– I’m gonna go next, and my first verse is Proverbs 15:33. It says “the fear of the Lord is instruction in wisdom, “and humility comes before honor”. So this is a short, simple verse, but, essentially it’s just praying that you would have a humble, teachable spirit, that you would walk in wisdom, that you would have a heart of humility, not just with me, but with our children, with our neighbors, with our friends, in our community, and that you would just be, be a man that seeks after wisdom, that operates in wisdom, which the beginning of that is the fear of the Lord, so, you’re walking in His ways. And that you would have a humble heart.
– What benefit would that be for our kids and for you, if I walked that way?
– Well, the first thing that comes to mind is that you’d be walking in an understanding way. You would be so compassionate and gentle in the way that you respond to us, and in the way that you lead us and guide us, and so I can just see how this would make you a man after God’s own heart, a man who wants to be like Him in his character, and that would come out in the way that you interact with us.
– That’s good because, you know, it says the instruction in wisdom which is the Word of God, so you, you’re also praying that I, like, I’m in the Word
– Are in the Word, yeah.
– Because then I’m getting the wisdom from that. And then the humility part. The first thing I thought of when I heard the word humility is that the Bible tells us that pride comes before a fall. And so, like, if I fall, as your husband, technically the family falls with me, like, I’m gonna bring it down.
– It reflects all of us.
– So praying for humility for me essentially protects us. If I’m walking in a humbleness, then I’m not gonna be walking in a way that’s gonna cause me to fall, or stumble.
– One, it says humility comes before honor, which means honor’s coming.
– Right, if I’m walking in
– When you walk this way
– in humility, and humbleness, before the Lord, with wisdom and fear, so that, that’s great.
– And I want you to be an honorable man.
– Yeah, I wanna be that too.
– You are.
-Thank you. So that’s a really good one. It starts off with this idea of fear, fearing the Lord, and then comes that wisdom, and walking in humility. And so my next verse is in, also in Proverbs. It’s Proverbs 14:26, and it says “in the fear of the Lord one has strong confidence, “and his children will have a refuge”. Or, if I was to pray this, I’d say her children have a strong refuge. And so, the fear part again, the fear of the Lord. It’s funny that we, we did this together. We didn’t plan that part. But, that you would have the fear of the Lord so that you’d have strong confidence. I know that, for you, and for many women, confidence is a big issue, because when the enemy comes in and just preaches lies to us, and your confidence gets torn down, your confidence as a, as a mother, a wife, as a friend, you know, as a Christian,
– So many different ways.
– All these different levels, like, as a cook, as a, you know, as a gardener, like, when the confidence gets tore down, and you’ve been dealing with the garden
– Yeah, I know.
– You know, you feel totally weak, you know. And when you’re not confident, when you’re in that weak, same with me, our children don’t feel secure.
– That’s true.
– When they’re like, you know, “Where’s mom at?” and maybe they don’t understand exactly, like, thinking, like, “Oh, mom’s not confident right now,” but the lack of confidence comes out in every aspect of your life.
– I was gonna say, I know exactly what you’re talking about, and it affects me emotionally. And so it, I can even see how it would affect our relationship, and the way that maybe I respond to you, or interact with you, which will then affect the kids.
– So, my prayer would be that you would have a strong fear of the Lord, that would bring you a strong confidence.
– I love that.
– So you’d say, “You know what, “all this stuff that I don’t feel confident in, “I know I am confident in the Lord, “and He loves me. “And He takes care of me, and He believes in me, “and He’s making me better every single day, “and He’s transforming me, and renewing me,” so that you would be confident. Because I know that confidence affects everyone, lack of confidence. But for you, I want you to be confident. I want you to, you know, stand firm where you are with God, and with us, and so that you can serve our home and walk confidently, and that our kids, they would have a refuge in our home. So of course I’d be praying this for myself as well, but
-Yeah, both.
– But I think confidence was it, when I was thinking of scripture I was thinking of confidence for you. And whether I pray this exact verse, or you pray this exact verse for your spouse, praying for confidence is a Biblical thing that we would have confidence, but it comes from a fear of the Lord. So, that was my number two.
– Awesome, well my number two is found in Psalms 118:5. It says “out of my distress I called on the Lord, “the Lord answered me and set me free”. When I read this, I thought about sin, and I thought about, you know, all the struggles of life, and things that come our way. But you kind of having to take the lead in that, in addressing issues, or confronting problems, or having your own sin that you’re dealing with, you know, in the first half of our marriage, there was a really big sin of pornography in your life, and I wanted it so badly to see you set free from that. And so, my prayer for you in Psalm 118:5 is that in any of your distress, in any hardship or struggle, or temptation of sin, you would first call out to the Lord and that you would be set free, that you would receive that freedom.
– Right, I love that, the freedom side of it, there’s many verses on the idea of freedom, we should do an episode on that, actually.
– That would be cool.
– Praying that over me, and for me, and yeah, I feel like you have consistently prayed that for me, since the beginning of our marriage. Even before our marriage, because you knew about
– Yeah, I did.
– some of my circumstances before then. It didn’t happen right when you wanted it to happen, but it did happen.
– Yeah.
– God did set me free. I finally in my mind was renewed in the understanding of what the Bible’s already said about me. And so, the fact that you consistently prayed freedom over me, and then also prayed that I would seek the Lord.
– Yeah.
– Cause that, I did, and I cried out, I was like, “Okay, Lord, I’m not doing something right. “I need your help,” It’s good, so there’s many areas. It was, it’s not just pornography, for many people it could be,
– Oh, yeah, there’s so many
– [Aaron] it could be,
– so many different areas.
– [Aaron] It could be food, you know, alcohol, drugs, it could be anger. It could be bitterness. It could be those strongholds that we have, and just praying for freedom for those people, and praying also that they realize that they’re already free, for the believer. Which is amazing, and that’s what our, that’s what our freedom episode should be about.
– That’d be really cool.
– So, you touch a little bit on how I was consistent in praying that you would be set free from certain things, and they didn’t happen overnight, it wasn’t like, you know, one prayer did the job. It was, it was a heart of prayer that, yep, carried me through
– A fervent and carried you through,
– continual, yeah,
– [Jennifer] that time period, and so, that I just want that to be an encouragement to all of those listening, that sometimes our prayers are years-long. Sometimes they’re months long, sometimes, sometimes it happens the first time, which is awesome, and God, you know, gives us that, but there’s other times where we just need to be faithful, to be praying for one another, and to have that hope that we will receive that prayer.
– Yeah, I think of that verse that says, “Do not grow weary in doing good.”
– Yeah.
– Like, don’t grow weary in praying. Praying is a good thing. Like, asking the Lord, and His will for someone’s life, that’s truly loving that person. Saying, “You know what God, “I love this person, I desire to see your will “be done in their life, in these areas.”
– I just had to, I had to chime in and just say, like, if you are already, have been praying for years about a specific thing, don’t stop, you know, be faithful to that prayer, and that God is going to answer it.
– Pray harder! Like, pray more!
– Yeah.
– Like, step it up notch, and say, “Lord, I’m gonna keep coming after you,and asking”
– Don’t give up.
– Yeah, don’t give up in your prayer. That’s good. So, my number three verse, my third verse. This is on Ephesians 5:22. Ephesians 5:22 through 33 is the, like, definitive–
– Husband and wife verse?
– [Aaron] husband and wife verses. And the reason I pray this verse, and I’m gonna read it to you first, it’s Ephesians 5:22. It says “Wives, submit to your own husbands, as to the Lord. “For the husband is the head of the wife “even as Christ is the head of the church, his body, “and is himself its Savior. “Now, as the church submits to Christ, “so also wives should submit “in everything to their husbands.” So, the reason I pray this, you know, our pastor always says when it comes to verses like this, where it’s saying, it’s speaking to the wives, right? It’s not speaking to me, it’s speaking to the wives. He says, “Read your own mail.”
– Oh.
– So, instead of me looking at this and reading, you know, verse 22 through 24, and saying, “Jennifer, this is, like, “this is what you should do,” I should read my mail, which is 25 through 33. And I should, and I should read and be like, “Oh, this is what God wants me to do.” And that’s how it should work. But, praying God’s will for my wife, and say, and asking the Lord, “Lord, teach my wife, and give her, give her joy “in walking in the role, and the order “that you’ve called her to.” Would you not, as a wife, want, or would you not as a husband, want your wife to pray, you know, verses 25 to 33 over you? And as a wife, wouldn’t it be good to be like, “God, teach my husband to love me “as Christ loves the church.”
– It’s all good.
– It’s, it’s so good. So, instead of me trying to, like, lord it over you and say, “No, you need to do this, “you need to submit to me,” I’d much rather have the Holy Spirit teach you that. And I’d much rather say, “Lord, this my heart. “I pray that my wife would, “would have a joy, “and a peace, “and a security in walking “in what you have called her to walk in,” and you know what happens when I pray that? I often feel like, “Okay, am I being the guy, “the man that God’s called me to be?” It just immediately switches my mind to that. But, this is something that I think it’s good for us to be praying over people. Or, over our spouses. You know, me praying for my wife, what God would desire for you to walk in as a, it’s gonna benefit you, because you’re gonna be obedient to the Word of God, and it’s gonna benefit me because you’re walking in your role. And I would desire that you would pray my mail over me.
– Yep.
– That you would ask God to change me, that I would love you as Christ loves the church, so, yeah, this is something I do pray.
– I think it’s really great, especially now, in, nowadays culture where it doesn’t really advocate for, you know, a woman to be submissive to a man, her husband, or even for a husband to love and cherish his wife, like we just don’t get those positive influences like we should. We don’t get those messages sent, you know, and so, for you to be praying this over me, I like it, and I’ll be honest, I struggle with submission sometimes. I don’t always have a heart that has yielded to you, or to God, and so I think it’s important that you are praying this over me, that I would step into those roles and enjoy them, and serve God in that way, and so yeah.
– Well, as we talked about a couple of episodes ago, about our marriage being a ministry, this is a part of our ministry. Walking in these roles, cause it’s saying, “Submit to your husbands as, “as the Church submits to Christ,” which is the head of the church. You know, you’re representing the church. You’re a picture, a symbol, a spiritual symbol of the church, and I’m a spiritual symbol of Christ, and our relationship together is a spiritual symbol of the Gospel.
– Yeah, that’s powerful.
– And so, why would I not want to pray that you’re walking in the ministry that God’s given you, and that you’d be praying that I’m walking in the ministry that I’m to be called to? So that we can be a ministry to the world. And an accurate symbol of the Gospel. That’s our hearts, you know, that’s what, the whole idea of Marriage After God is about, is walking in this ministry
– Yeah. of our marriage as being ministries to the world. And to each other, and to our children. For the sake of the Kingdom of Heaven. So yeah, that’s something that, as husbands, I think we should be praying for our wives, is that they would find a joy, and a peace, and a security, in their roles that God’s given them. And, I’m just gonna go on, and we should be praying that we, ourselves, are walking in what the Bible tells us to, that we would read our own mail. Because when we read it, when we walk in what the Bible’s told us to walk in, we create an environment that is safe for our wives to walk in there.
– That’s true.
– Now, we don’t not walk in our roles if the spouse isn’t. But, we can be praying that our spouse is, you know, walking in what this says.
– Okay, so for my next verse, it’s found in Isaiah 41:10. It’s another one of my favorite verses in the Bible, I just love this, and I think that’s because I struggle with fear. You don’t really struggle with fear as much, but I still like to pray this over you because there can be times when I sense that you’re stressed.
– Maybe that’s why I don’t struggle with fear, cause you pray it for me so much.
– Okay, so it’s Isaiah 41:10, and it says “fear not, for I am with you; “be not dismayed, for I am your God; “I will strengthen you, I will help you, “I will uphold you with my righteous right hand”. And even though this says, “You,” and it’s kind of directing the message, I feel like, when I read it, it’s for me. I like to just pray it over you and say, you know, “God, I want you to help him, “I want you to walk with him, “I want you to uphold him with your hands”. So again, I know that you don’t struggle with fear very much, but it’s still something that I like to pray over you and pray that you wouldn’t struggle with insecurities, or doubt, or fear, or any of those kind of, like, negative emotions that can bombard people all the time.
– Well, you don’t know this, but I do, maybe not fear, like I’m afraid, but definitely when I hear this, you know, the dismayed, or being strengthened. There’s oftentimes I don’t feel strong enough to, you know, disciple my children well, or to love you well, or to do all of the jobs, you know, that we have. Or to take care of the home. So there’s, there’s plenty of times I may not say it or look like it, but I definitely, I’m fearful sometimes. Like, okay, Lord, what are we doing? Is this gonna keep working, are we gonna, you know, be able to make it? Are things gonna keep going the way they’ve been going? Or are we gonna have to change, so.
– That’s good to know, now I know how to pray for you even better.
– Yeah.
– Yeah, I’m not, I look stronger than I am.
– Well, even the way that you talk and act sometimes with us, even though we’re like, we communicate pretty deeply, but there’s still things that I’m learning about you even after 11 years of marriage.
– Yeah, so I appreciate that you would, that I would always love that you would pray over me for not being afraid, and that I would have strength, and that God would uphold me, because I get the weakest when I’m doing it in my own strength.
– Yeah.
– And, so, that I would be reminded to do it in His strength, and not mine, so that I could, you know, rest in His goodness and what He’s able to do, not what I’m able to do.
– And I hope this is an encouragement for those wives whose husbands struggle with, like, anxiety, or fear, and maybe you know right off the bat, you like, my husband needs this verse. You can write this verse out and encourage him with it. I had a friend do that for me one time, and it was super encouraging for that time period that I was wrestling with fear. But, wives, you can do that for your husbands.
– Awesome. Okay, so, my fourth verse is Ephesians 6:10. And it says this. “Finally, be strong in the Lord “and in the strength of his might.” So, going back to that confidence thing, the next level is that strength, and it’s funny that you just
-I know.
– Prayed for strength for me. We didn’t plan this, I swear.
– We didn’t, I know, he picked his and I picked mine, and we just got them.
– But you do so much in this home. You know, teaching our kids, feeding our kids, you know, taking care of the house. Doing your ministry online. Talking to women. The role you play at our church, just everything you do. I want you to be strong. And I want you to remember where your strength comes from. That you’re strong in the Lord, not in your own strength. So why don’t you now give me your number four verse?
– Okay, so my number four, I hope it’s not cheating, I tried lumping a lot into one.
– No, it’s efficient. When you do it, yeah.
– So it’s found in Galatians 5:22 through 24, and it says “but the fruit of the spirit is love, “joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; “against such things there is no law. “And those who belong to Christ Jesus “have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.” So again, this is a lot in one, but it’s precise, it’s to the point, and something that we always encourage each other with is hey, walk in the Spirit. I feel like you, you say it to me and the kids more than anything, but it’s good.
– I say it to us.
– You say it to us as a family, I, like, you encourage us–
– Let’s walk in the Spirit today.
– That’s how you lead us, and I love that, because you remind us, okay, let’s walk in the Spirit today. But, all of these things are, it’s fruitfulness that I wanna see in your life. I want you to be a husband who walks in love with me, who is a joy to be around, and enjoys being around me, who’s patient and kind.
– Yeah, I need the patience one,often.
– You’ve grown a lot in patience over the years. Thank goodness I’ve been praying this for you. Just kidding. But kindness, and goodness, and faithfulness, and self-control, all these things are so vital, not just to your life and your character, because you’re a reflection of who God is to the world, you know, you’re a beacon of hope and light and love, and you have this ministry of reconciling the world to God, right, and so I’m encouraged to see this kind of fruitfulness in your life, that you would walk in the Spirit, and that, like, at the end it says, “you would crucify the flesh “with its passions and desires,” that you’d be willing to lay those things down to lead us as a family, to lead me as a wife, and to walk and follow God.
– Well, and as the Bible tells us, like, that our flesh wages war against the Spirit, but the way we let the Spirit win is that we walk in the Spirit, and not the flesh. So that’s a good, it says walk this way, and crucify your flesh.
– Yeah.
– So thank you for praying for that for me
– Yeah.
– [Aaron] To remind me, daily, that I do need to crucify my flesh. You know, as Jesus says, “Take up your cross and follow me.” And walk in the Spirit. And I think this is the thing that we pray the most is that we as a family would walk in the Spirit.
– Yeah. Okay, so, why don’t you read your last verse?
– Okay, my last verse is Philippians four, verses four through eight. Its kinda like your last verse it’s a big lump.
– Hey.
– [Aaron] And it says this, it says “Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, rejoice. “Let your reasonableness be known to everyone. “The Lord is at hand; do not be anxious about anything, “but in everything by prayer and supplication “with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. “And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, “will guard your hearts, and your minds in Christ Jesus. “Finally brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, “whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, “whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, “if there is anything worthy of praise, “think about these things.” And so I wanted to just do the first part of it, but I felt like the second part was the solution.
– You kept reading.
– Yeah, I just kept reading, I was like, “I’m gonna just, this is a good, good verse.” So, this idea, like, you’ve struggled with anxiety a lot, in your life.
– Yeah.
– Especially within seasons of being pregnant, or post-partum
– Post-partum, yeah.
– And so, my prayer for you is that not only would you not be anxious, but that you would learn to pray when you’re anxious. That you would give your anxieties to the Lord.
– Going to God first.
– And that you would accept His peace that surpasses all understanding. So, instead of living in the anxieties, you would live in the peace. By giving Him your anxieties. And then, not only praying when you’re anxious, and giving those anxieties to God, but also, learning to think about the good things. So, you’re over here with the fears and the anxieties, and the things that are, like, just, ohh! That you would, instead, you know, whatever’s true, honorable, pure, lovely, commendable, praiseworthy, that you would learn to, to think on those things. So not just give God your fears, but also, think on the good things.
– I love this, I think that you should have to pray this over me every day for the rest of my life. If I could just walk in this way, I think things would be awesome. And, sometimes I do, but, there’s a lot of times that I don’t, and so, I think that the thoughtfulness, as you’re reading this, and I know that you’re praying this for me, I think the thoughtfulness, knowing that you know me so well that you know that I struggle with anxiety, that you would have a heart to pray this over me is really important. And I just wanted to point that out, cause I think, for those listening, it’s important to know your spouse, and to know the things that they’re going through, and, as you’re reading scripture, or if verses come to your mind when a specific circumstance is happening, or your spouse is just wrestling in a certain way, it’s really cool that the Word of God can comfort us in this way. That we can be praying specifically for our spouse to help these kinds of areas.
– Yeah, and I was thinking, you know, a little tip for you, when you go to sit down and pray about what scriptures you’d like to begin to pray over your spouse, ask God, say, “God, what does my husband, what does my wife need?” You know, “What’s gonna bless them? “What’s gonna benefit them? “What’s your will for their life?” So that when you open this up, you’re gonna look for it and be like, “Hey, you know, my wife needs peace. “You know, she struggles with anxiety. “I’m gonna pray this over my wife.” So, ask God to show you. Ask God to reveal to you what His will is for them. What He desires for them, so that you can pray that for them. Because what God wants, is He doesn’t want us to just pray for anything. He desires us to pray what He wants, and so, ask Him. Say, “What do you want, God? “For my spouse?” and then, and ask Him just to guide you, and when you’re reading, like you said, you know, write down, “Man, like, oh, “my husband would totally, I’m gonna pray this for him.” And as you’re reading, maybe just pray right then.
– Yeah.
– You know, when you’re inspired to do so. So, that was my number five. So now, what’s your number five?
– Okay, my last one. Here we go, it’s found in first Corinthians 16, 13 through 14. And it says “be watchful, stand firm in the faith, “act like men, be strong. “Let all that you do be done in love.” And, it’s a simple verse, again, straightforward and to the point.
– To act like men.
– I want you to act like a man.
– Yeah, no it’s true, though.
-I think that
– That’s a good prayer for me, to act like a man.
– Well, I think that you know, again, going back to today’s culture and the kind of messages that are being sent, it is really important that we encourage our men to be the man that God desires them to be. That He created them to be.
– Well, real quick, I just wanna say something to this, the act like a man thing? Because if we think about the curses in the Garden of Eden, it said that the wife is gonna have, that Eve was gonna have increased child pains, and then it says that the man’s gonna, you know, have to work the ground with his hands.
– Yeah.
– Our natural flesh is to go against that. That I wanna be lazy, that I wanna just relax, I just wanna, like, flip on the TV, I just wanna, I don’t want to do those things. So, I think it’s an awesome prayer, that I would be a man. And that I would take the responsibilities, I mean, like, no, I can’t be lazy right now, I gotta, I wanna go, you know, disciple my children. I wanna go play with my kids, which, you know, those are the things that men do. I need to love you, I need to, like, so, I think that’s an awesome thing. And it goes against our flesh, and it goes against the current world.
– It does, and I think it’s just a call to maturity, I think it’s just, as we go throughout our years together that I would see you as a man of maturity that I can see the growth,
– That’s what I want, yeah.
– in your life, that I can see you pressing into God and reading His Word, and understanding it, and–
– Acting like a man.
– –acting like a, yeah, acting like a Biblical man.
– Yeah.
– And it says, “Stand firm in the faith,” you know, a man that stands firm, that you’re not wavering and tossed back and forth by theology or ideology–
– Yes.
– –or anything else that this world can throw at you, but that you’re gonna stand firm in the faith, and then, lastly, that everything that you do is done in love, so that you’re a man of love. I just love that.
– Yeah, cause naturally I wanna do things with, like, an iron fist, or with, like, harshness.
– Sometimes there’s a bit of harshness, but yeah, I think that both of us can walk in love, just like we talk about walking in the Spirit, more often, and just again, that’s a call for maturity. That’s for us to understand what God’s will is for both of us, and that we would be intentional to walk in that way in our relationship.
– Yeah, and so, I think the last thought I’d like to give before we close out is we have an enemy. And of course, my enemy, our enemy’s gonna not want me to be watchful. He’s not gonna want me to be standing firm. He’s gonna want me to be weak, and, like, you know, wishy-washy. He’s not gonna want me to act like a man, or be strong. He’s gonna want me to be weak. Right? He’s gonna want you to be full of anxiety. And the reason he wants this is because he wants us to be ineffective for the ministry God has for us as Marriages After God. And so, the prayer, this, what we’re doing when we pray like this, is it’s protection, it’s safety, it’s us being empowered and allowing God to be here, and allowing our Spirits to be strengthened, and so that we can walk the way God wants us to walk, so that we can do what God wants us to do. And be who He wants us to be. And so, I think it’s good, like, you know, you praying that for me. It helps me not be susceptible to the enemy, it helps me to walk that way, especially when we’re together doing this.
– Yeah.
– You know?
– Well, and, as we’re praying these scriptures, I feel like it’s impossible to not, then, be reflective in your own heart and say, “Well, am I walking this way as well?” And so, I think that that’s important, too, that as we pray scripture that we are actually praying the same prayers over ourselves.
– Amen.
– It’s true. Not that I would act like a man, but that, you know, I would act like a–
– A woman. A Biblical woman, yeah, we, we might not be able to pray these verses verbatim, but we can definitely pray the principles and the ideas, and the Spiritual connotations over our spouses.
– Yeah.
– So.
– The last thing that we wanted to share with you guys is just a reminder that we have these resources for you. 31 Prayers for My Husband, and 31 Prayers for My Wife. We call it the Marriage Prayer Challenge because it takes a month to get through. You pray these prayers every day for a month.
– You write your own prayer in the journal line.
– Yep, it’s really encouraging, and there’s some challenges in there along the way. And, we’ve heard, and seen the reviews from people that have walked through these. Some of them have gone through them multiple times, and it’s just been an encouragement, and a stimulant for them to have a good habit of prayer for each other in marriage. And so, we just wanted to extend that invitation to you. You can get those at marriageaftergod.com/challenge.
– Thanks for joining us this week for our episode on verses to pray over your spouse. And we look forward to seeing you next week. Did you enjoy today’s show? Find many more encouraging stories and resources at marriageaftergod.com. And let us help you cultivate an extraordinary marriage.
