Why Your Marriage (Desperately) Needs Community
Why Your Marriage (Desperately) Needs Community
By Bradley Bennett
Living within community is a core part of the Christian life; naturally, it should also extend to our marriage. It’s one of God’s greatest gifts and we deprive ourselves of so many good things when we choose to ignore it.
Community is supposed to be a good and pleasant thing according to Psalms,
“How good and pleasant it is when God’s people live together in unity!” ~Psalm 133:1
Yet, in our culture, it’s more popular than ever to simply get married and isolate from the rest of the world. This is not a recipe for a flourishing marriage, but a faltering one. Our marriage desperately needs what only community with others can offer.
3 Common Questions About Community In Marriage
The idea of “community” is not a priority for our culture. Due to this, it can be a complicated concept to grasp. When I explain it to people, there are usually three main questions they ask.
Q: What Is “Community” Exactly?
A: Community is a group of people that invest in each other for a common purpose.
Let me give you an example. For about a year, Amanda and I were a part of a group of couples that would get together to play games on Sunday evenings. We’d play all different types of games ranging from Pictionary to Monopoly.
What we had was a “couple’s gaming community”. Our common purpose for gather was to play games. We each loved to play games and we invested into creating the experience for others that loved what we did too!
In a marriage community, this looks like a group of people gathering together to intentionally support and encourage each other’s marriages.
It can be a formal small group or an informal gathering like our game group. Everyone in the community has a desire for a common purpose and is willing to invest each other.
Q: We Have Lots Of Friends And Go To Church, Isn’t That Community?
A: Community is not the same as friendship or church, they serve different purposes.
It’s easy to confuse community with having lots of friends, but it’s not the same. It’s possible to have many friends but have little community. Friendships are people who simply enjoy each other and have a relationship. That doesn’t mean they are there to support you in specific ways. Sometimes they do, but friendships primarily exist for the enjoyment of both people.
A community is a little different. It exists primarily to encourage and strengthen its members, even when it may not be enjoyable. It’s more intentional. This doesn’t mean there isn’t friendship inside of community, though. Some of my best friends have come out of small groups I’ve been a part of!
Going to church is also not the same as having community. A church is when people gather to learn, serve, and worship God together regularly. The main purpose is corporate worship.
The people inside a church will often make for a great community, but that happens outside of the four walls of the building on Sunday morning.
Q: Why Does My Marriage “Need” Community?
A: Your marriage was not designed to operate on an island. Community offers specific solutions for some very big needs your marriage has. When we isolate ourselves, we deprive our marriage of having them met.
There are plenty of benefits that come from being in community, but here are three important ones:
Community Provides Encouragement
“Bear one another’s burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ.” ~Galatians 6:2
Building a fulfilling marriage is hard enough when things are going well. Life isn’t easy and we each have our own “load” that we need to carry, things like the mortgage, loving our spouse, and being healthy.
But there are times when life throws a curveball and we enter an extremely difficult season that’s out of the norm. This can happen due to a sudden job loss, health crisis, or death in the family.
When these things happen, it can feel like we have this huge “burden” that’s threatening to crush us and our marriage. It’s in these moments that a strong community comes to our aid and helps us carry that burden through encouragement.
They remind us that we are not alone. They cheer us up and cheer us on until the season has passed and we can carry our own load again.
Community Provides Accountability
“And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near.” ~Hebrews 10:24-25
Have you ever been to a barbecue where they were grilling with coals? When I’m at one I like to go over to the grill, take one of the coals and set it to the side.
It amazes me how quickly it turns cold.
Maintaining a thriving, “hot” marriage requires constant dedication. It’s so easy to get comfortable, let our guard down, and “cool off”.
When we’re outside of community, we are fighting a losing battle. Remaining ever vigilant requires us to have other “hot” coals around us that will speak the truth and let us know when we’re dropping our guard.
No matter how “hot” a marriage may be right now, if it’s not in a “hot” community that speaks the truth and holds it accountable to a higher standard, then it will turn cold quickly.
Community Provides Growth
“Likewise, teach the older women to be reverent in the way they live, not to be slanderers or addicted to much wine, but to teach what is good. Then they can urge the younger women to love their husbands and children.” ~Titus 2:3-4
Growth happens in the context of community. We need people who are a step ahead of us and can show us the way, people who will be our “marital mentors”.
Amanda and I have been incredibly blessed by the people in our community that show us how they have gotten to where they are. They’ve taken us by the hand and walked us through tough topics ranging from finances to sex.
We may think we know it all, but we really don’t. My father used to tell me that there are two ways a person can grow.
- They can go through the pain of experiencing things themselves and slowly grow that way.
or
- They can learn from others that have been there before and don’t have to experience the pain themselves.
Even at a young age, I knew the second choice was the way to go! The only way we can learn from others though is when we are in community with them. If we’re isolated, we don’t even have the option.
Amanda and I realize that our marriage (not perfect by any means) is where it is because we are standing on the shoulders of our community. They are showing us the way by letting us learn from their mistakes and victories.
A Marriage Supported By Community
You were not designed to go through life alone and neither was your marriage. Without it, your marriage is like a flower without sunshine. It won’t have all the nutrients needed to fully blossom!
Amanda and I have been incredibly blessed by the community that surrounds us, even if it hasn’t always been easy. We’re often tired and realize it would be easier to stay some and not make the effort.
But we’ve learned that what’s easier is rarely what’s better.
We’ve gotten the most out of community when it’s felt the hardest.
It’s a gift that’s been given to help us have a healthy marriage. Our marriage is support by community through encouragement, accountability, and growth.
I encourage you, open the gift of community. Desire a marriage supported by it. You may find, as we have, that your marriage desperately needed it in order to fully bloom.