What if Your Spouse was a Catalyst in Your Walk with God?
Photo by Foto Pettine via Unsplash
What if your spouse was a catalyst in your walk with God?
If you read my last post introducing spiritual formation in marriage, you saw this quote from A.W. Tozer and got a glimpse of the role it played in mine and Rachel’s life:
“[Our regeneration] is, however, not an end but an inception, for now begins the glorious pursuit, the heart's happy exploration of the infinite riches of the Godhead. That is where we begin, I say, but where we stop no man has yet discovered, for there is in the awful and mysterious depths of the Triune God neither limit nor end” (The Pursuit of God, p. 14).
I have read Tozer’s The Pursuit of God many times, most recently last year. As I read it last spring, I was reminded of just how formative that book has been for my thinking and my life over the last 20 years. (You can check out some of my reflections from that recent reading here.)
Tozer played an enormous role in my early formation. I was encouraged by multiple people to read The Pursuit of God and Knowledge of the Holy when I was in high school and at the beginning of my intentional pursuit of Him. I didn’t understand half of those books at the time, but I wanted what Tozer articulated. Tozer was held out in my church and youth group circles as a model of what could be and someone to emulate. More than the content, though, his books made me want to pray.
I was a little jarred a few years later when I began working for the Christian and Missionary Alliance and met people who didn’t like Tozer. But Tozer was part of the C&MA, and one of their posterchildren. How could someone in the denomination not like him?, I wondered. I came to learn that he wasn’t a very attentive or present husband and father. He wasn’t abusive, but he was certainly neglectful. His interactions with his family weren’t extensive, and perhaps even rare. He spent hours and days in prayer, prioritizing his relationship with God over his relationship with his family. Years after Tozer passed away and his wife remarried, she told someone that while Aiden (A.W.) loved God, her current husband loved her. (I was reminded of this part of Tozer’s story when I read Krispin Mayfield’s recent book, Attached to God.) For Tozer, his wife and family were more of a hindrance and distraction in his ‘holier’ pursuit of God.
I was disheartened by this insight into his life and tempted toward the same disillusionment that my colleagues had exhibited. I also had wondered if you had to shun everything, even good things like marriage and family, in the same way he did in order to encounter the fullness of God. That scared me because I wanted the fullness of God, but I also wanted to be married. I wanted to chase God unhindered, but I struggled to agree with a faith hero’s choices to neglect his family in his own pursuit of God. As the shock wore off from learning this part of Tozer’s life, I arrived at a place where I could appreciate his pursuit but didn’t have to accept everything about him. I can be inspired by his radical pursuit of God and still be attentive to my wife and family.
As Rachel and I have journeyed together, that quote above still holds a special place in my heart, and in hers. Through our years together, though, I’ve learned that my pursuit of God doesn’t have to be, and even shouldn’t be, a solo one. I’ve held this question recently: What if there was a real ceiling on Tozer’s depth with God because he excluded his family? He may have had a deeper relationship with God than most have had throughout history, but what if he could have experienced even more of God? What would have happened if he had seen his wife and family as a help in his pursuit instead of a hindrance?
Tozer may have seen himself encountering the fullness of God in spite of his responsibilities to his family. But, what if we are invited into richer, deeper experiences and understanding of God because of our spouses and kids?
Each Sunday night for the last eight weeks, Rachel and I have sat down together to offer spiritual direction and accompaniment to each other as we pray through the St. Ignatius Retreat in Every Day Life, a 9-month journey of daily prayer and scripture reading focused around Jesus and our life in him. Many Sunday nights, we are bone tired. But each week, we sit down, spend a few minutes reviewing what stood out to us as we prayed throughout the week, and then take turns listening to each other. And it’s making a significant impact in my own life with God. I’ve experienced more of God in my prayer because of the way Rachel has drawn out what was within me. I’ve been more motivated to seek God, because I know she is with me and encouraging me. I’ve come to a greater place of awareness and vulnerability because of the way she offers me attention and compassion. And I have been inspired as she prays for me, and as we hold the desire for more of God for one another. I can say with confidence that I have experienced more of God because we have pursued him together. She has truly been a catalyst for spiritual depth and growth, rather than a hindrance.
What about you? If you’re married, what are ways that your spouse has been a catalyst in your pursuit of Christ?
*A note to those who are not married. So often in our evangelical culture marriage and having kids is viewed as the highest possible attainment, nevermind the fact Jesus and Paul and several other apostles and saints throughout history were single. Marriage is not the highest attainment. Our goal isn’t to promote it as such, but rather to say “if you’re married, we want to see you walk together toward the fullness of Christ. And if you’re not married, we want to see you walk toward the fullness of Christ.” We believe that, regardless of marital status, experiencing the fullness of Christ is exponentially expanded through community and relationship with others. You’re welcome here with us, married or single, in that pursuit.