Luke Smallbone of For King and Country told ChristianHeadlines he was nearly five when his parents -- David and Helen Smallbone -- traveled from Australia to the United States with big dreams but were forced to chase odd jobs when David's job fell through. Their story is retold in the upcoming movie Unsung Hero, which is scheduled to release in theaters on April 26.
Some shout from the rooftops that they are in marriage counseling and, because of their good experience, encourage all married couples to follow suit. Others take a more private approach and prefer to keep their season of counseling to themselves. Wherever you fall on that spectrum, please be assured that seeking and receiving biblical marriage counseling is nothing to be ashamed of or embarrassed about.
In heaven, we will perfectly live out our role as the bride of Christ. But sadly, on earth, our marriages are tainted by sin and are undoubtedly imperfect. Seeking help to make your marriage as strong and God-honoring as possible is a sign of strength, not weakness.
No two marriages look the same, even within the church. Therefore, the signs pointing to a need for marriage counseling might look different for different couples. However, some basic signs apply to everyone. Let's look at some of these together.
A recent article in the New York Times detailed a deeply disturbing phenomenon. Titled “A Marketplace of Girl Influencers Managed by Moms and Stalked by Men,” it ran the following sub-heading: “Seeking social media stardom for their underage daughters, mothers post images of them on Instagram. The accounts draw men sexually attracted to children, and they sometimes pay to see more.”
Parenting teens in today's world can feel beyond overwhelming - kind of like trying to stay cool when you're a piece of dry wood tossed into a dumpster fire. Many of us elder Millennials and Gen X'ers have parented teens through the evolution of smartphones, Snap Chat, and X-box Live. We have no earthly idea what we're doing. Yet, we're meant to serve as master-class-level digital police, culture war moderators, and spiritual warfare ninjas in an increasingly ludicrous world. Deep. Breaths.
It's so difficult to keep the faith and remain optimistic while dealing with teenage mood swings, unforeseen drama, evolving personalities, and all the other magic that keeps our therapists equally horrified and entertained on the regular. However, just today, I had a God thought. It happened while spacing out at the kitchen sink, listening to my 14 and 16-year-old boys roam through the house, chattering away on their Air pods, leaving a trail of snack wrappers in their wake. The voice simply said, "They're both amazing. and they're both going to be okay." Admittedly, I was pretty caffeinated and high off a fresh Maverick City worship set, but my mind was heavily flooded with some assurances and truths I wanted to share with every mom of teens because, frankly, we never (ever) hear enough edification or comfort. We probably need to remind ourselves of these truths daily, but I hope this helps, even for today.
Children challenge the secular, hyper-individualist worldview to its core. They present an immediate, shared responsibility that directs us beyond material gain and personal fulfillment to higher ideals.
"Seventy-one percent of people are still married to their first spouse," Feldhahn explained, which leaves 29 percent, but "that's not the true story either. Because that includes everybody who was married for 50 years and their spouse died."
A new research paper has found that there is not enough support for the core ideas in author and pastor Gary Chapman's best-selling book, The Five Love Languages.