Hey, friend! Our topic this month has been intimacy, and many of us know the challenges that can swirl around it. Tracy and I (Jennifer) shared thoughts (click on the names to read the posts). Today I am so very honored to introduce you to my very precious friend, Eliza LaBelle. She has spoken truth into my life and the lives of many women. She is brave and bold and gentle and offers truth and wisdom when she’s invited. The Facets team invited her here because we believe her thoughts on intimacy in marriage will bless you. Please welcome her to this beautiful place.
Intimacy. Yikes. What does the thought of intimacy spark in you? Does it draw your memory back to a profoundly beautiful moment with your spouse or does it make you cringe a little? Marital intimacy is a window into the soul. This window, however, is often shrouded by shame, fear and pain. What was meant to be beautiful often lends itself to heartache and disappointment.
“For he himself is our peace, who has made the two one and has destroyed the barrier, the dividing wall of hostility…” Ephesians 2:14
The dividing wall of hostility, constructed from a broken past, creates a barrier between you and your husband. Each brick a hurt, hang-up, abuse, grief or disappointment that separates you from being seen, known, and loved in the way that you long for. They inhibit you from fully giving yourself to your spouse and rob you of peace.
What if together you deconstruct the wall? Can you imagine, instead, a beautiful winding road to intimacy paved with bricks of your story? What if healing happened while wrapped in the arms of your beloved?
That’s my story.
“They will rebuild the ancient ruins and restore the places long devastated…” Isaiah 61:4
“Do you trust me? Do you trust our marriage?” This gentle question asked in the dark of night exposed a truth that my husband and I needed to talk though. Just as our relationship with God is a covenant, so is our marriage. We agreed that night to trust the covenant, which meant trusting each other with our stories, our sin, our successes and failures. While easy early on in our marriage, lack of intentionality eroded trust. There was not a big event, just time taking its toll on a tired couple. That conversation was a turning point in our marriage. There was a wall between us that needed to be dismantled with tenderness and care. We were 10 years into a lifetime, loved each other and loved being married but knew that there was more.
When God invites us to revisit the ancient ruins it is not for the purpose of preservation it is about rebuilding.
“I am making all things new.” Revelation 21:5
That promise gives me so much hope. I am making your heart new. I am making his heart new. I am making your marriage new. I am making intimacy new. Thank you, Jesus.
Sex is both exciting and scary. It is a beautiful mystery. God created sex and even said do it often. Yet the thought of it sends many women reeling. It often evokes feelings of inadequacy and shame and conjures up memories that come to bed with us, stealing peace and the joy of the moment, and adds a brick in the wall that divides your heart from his. This is certainly not God’s design. There has to be more.
I am made in the image and likeness of God, and my husband is made in the image and likeness of God—each created to be an extension of God’s love, grace, kindness, mercy and healing to the other through our marriage. We are a cord of three strands with God at the center. We believe that he takes great delight in us and desires for us to delight in each other. He created sex for us, so sex must reveal something about God and what he wants for us. Just a quick glance through Song of Solomon gives a glimpse of God’s intention. Intimacy, including sex, should satisfy a longing for connection, it should make you feel cherished, beautiful, and strong among other things. Through the touch of her husband, a woman should experience the heart of God for her. When the storm is raging around you, sex is source of comfort. When your day is joy-filled, sex is a celebration.
The difference between the two scenarios is what you do with the bricks that make up your story. At our core, I think every person longs to be seen, known, and fully loved. Can you, together with your husband, take a brick out of the wall, examine it, grieve it, and place it in the walkway that leads to the throne room of Christ? One by one, as your bricks are removed, the window to your soul is opened allowing the glory of God to shine in, around, and through you. This is the path to healing. This is where intimacy is built. In to me see. Look into my soul and love me. Know my story, complete with faults and failures, and love me. See me, naked and unashamed; and take delight, and I will delight in you.
If I could encourage you in one way, it would be to pray in earnest for your marriage and for your sex life. Turn the lights on, keep your eyes open, and pray with your husband. Link your hands and, forehead to forehead, reclaim your marital bed. Ask Holy Spirit to come and fill your space. Take back what Satan has stolen from you, Beloved. Lay your bricks down, weep, mourn, run to the cross together, and rebuild. Stand firm in your identity as a daughter of the King, chosen, sealed, redeemed and loved. Do this naked and unashamed in the arms of your lover between the sheets…God is not ashamed of you.
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