Your Sex Life Isn’t Broken, Your Marital Prayer Life Is
“The main problem with all these
solutions is God, Jesus Christ is absent.”
If you’ve been married for longer than 5mins, you know what a gift sex is and how difficult it is to cultivate a healthy sex rhythm with your spouse or repair sexual intimacy amidst brokenness. Sex is one of the big three (the other two are money and parenting) deciding variables in whether a married couple stays together or gets divorced. A constant refrain I have heard as a marriage and family counselor over the last decade from wives is, “he doesn’t pay attention to me emotionally and just wants sex.” From husbands I hear, “she doesn’t respect me, even when I do what she asks, and she withholds sex.”
The advice for married couples dealing with this problem ranges from seeking out a therapist specializing in sex, other married couples suggesting they spice things up in the bedroom, wives telling wives to just serve their husband sexually or to keep withholding, husbands telling husbands that they deserve sex because of how much they do for the family, marriage experts putting forth a 12-step guide to fixing the intimacy issues, and the list could go on.
The main problem with all these solutions is God, Jesus Christ is absent.
In any of these solutions, someone could say that Christ is the center of who they are and how they problem-solve but just saying that and it does not reflect in their actions and decision making would show that Christ is a footnote. The fundamental problem for Christian marriages struggling with sexual intimacy, I argue, is their corporate prayer life with their spouse has been neglected and abandoned.
If God created sex, then shouldn’t he be the foundation to sexual repair in a marriage? If God being the author of life created humans to worship, then shouldn’t a married couple worship God with their sexual rhythms? Would it not be a good idea to seek out God on his thoughts for what he has in mind for sexual intimacy in a marriage?
Philippians 4:6-7 says, “6 do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. 7 And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.”
The problem that Christian marriages face with sexual intimacy issues is an overfocus on what one spouse isn’t doing and the performance outcomes in the bedroom.
If a married couples financial and parental life are areas that are constantly being offered up in prayer, then why not also their sex life? Paul in Philippians doesn’t say bring everything but your sex life in prayer, he says bring EVERYTHING in prayer, supplication and thanksgiving.
“A married couple’s sex life is often broken because
corporate prayer is of little interest to them.”
American’s, when faced with a problem, tend to look for the tool that will fix it. If we have a headache, we grab some Tylenol. If our car isn’t working properly, we take it to a mechanic. If we don’t have enough money, we work harder to make more. We problem-solve without trying to gain a deeper understanding of what the issue is. If you have a headache, it could be for a myriad of reasons, but one likely reason is you’re dehydrated. If your car isn’t working properly, the deeper issue likely is you’re not taking good care of it. If you don’t have enough money, a big reason could be because of your spending habits; you spend outside your means. This tendency of finding a quick fix to problems trickle down in marital intimacy too. There isn’t a married couple on the planet that hasn’t had difficulty in the bedroom, but their understanding of this problem tends to be short-sighted.
Sexual intimacy issues are so pervasive in marriage life that there are entire disciplines in the field of psychology dedicated to understanding them. However, for most christian married couples their focus is on what mechanically isn’t working and an over-focus on emotional well-being. These areas of focus become the blueprint for how to fix a broken sex life. The husband focuses on the physical act of sex, while the wife focuses on the emotional state of the couple. Are either of them wrong for their focus? No, but does their focus lead them to a healed and renewed sex life?
No
A married couple’s sex life is often broken because corporate prayer is of little interest to them. The importance of prayer in a Christian husband and wife’s life cannot be emphasized enough. A christian couple who goes without frequent corporate prayer is like a soldier who goes into battle without any armor or weapon. Going without mutual prayer in marriage is like saying, “I don’t need to eat food or drink water today.” If fish are meant to swim and that is where they optimally function, then where a human functions the best is when they are in deep relational prayer with Christ; and this is reinforced even more within marriage. A christian husband and wife function optimally when they are in corporate prayer to Jesus and the by-product of this discipline is relational thriving in all areas of the marriage, especially sexual intimacy
Prayer does at least 3 things:
1. Prayer acknowledges being out of control
2. Prayer admits weakness and exposes vulnerability
3. Prayer increases closeness and strengthens intimacy
Prayer is one third of the spiritual life blood of a christian marriage, the other two are study of scripture and investment in a local church body. A christian husband and wife must look at their marriage and lives as one, not compartments. Both spouses coming to Christ in prayer when life is out of control is a reorientation back to the one who is in control and promotes intimacy in the marriage. Both spouses coming to Christ in prayer sharing their weakness and vulnerabilities creates fertile ground for trust to grow and intimacy to thrive. Both spouses coming to Christ in prayer unifies and increases relational closeness and what is produced is healthy intimacy.
Husbands and wives, fix your sex life through corporate prayer to Jesus.
Christian Bringolf MA LMHC