Every Monday, my family has a devotional. Since we do not have children, we are currently focused on building our marriage. Someone recommended a great book to us, so our next ten devotionals are going to come from it.

I tend towards acronyms to structure things, so forgive me if that offends you.

Otherness
This devotional will allow us to explore our differences so that we may build up our marriage.

Homework:
This section provides a focus for the week leading up to the actual devotional time. You’d be surprised how giving homework allows for the topic to come up during the week. In some ways, my wife and I use this to ‘season our speech with salt’.

1. Find one example of God using marriage as a metaphor to describe his relationship with his people.
2. Read Genesis 2
3. Read chapter 1 – Otherness in The Mystery of Marriage by Mike Mason.

Explore:
This is a great time to hear and learn how your spouse sees God. Remember that this is a time of exploration, not a time to arrive at the answer. It is also okay at this point to diverge away from the objective, if necessary. For my wife and I, she needs to explore ideas and work them out verbally. I, on the other hand, want to find the solution or the answer. This section is specifically for her while the final section is for me, though we both benefit from every section.

• Share the metaphor of marriage with each other from your homework.
• Read Proverbs 27:17 together.
• What does otherness mean to you? How does this relate to us?

Mason defines otherness as:

…that strange encounter of separate identities as one person rubs against another to produce an edge, to produce the flashing keeness of love.

Listen:
At this point, it’s good to read a passage of the Bible to give some grounding to our exploration.
1 Corinthians 3:1 – 17

• v. 1 – 4: Our differences can separate us.
• v. 5 – 9: Our differences can build something great.
• v. 10 – 17: Therefore, we should build carefully.

Practice:
This is the section to get down to the nitty-gritty. Be specific and be honest. This is the time to be really concrete, especially when you discuss what happened during the previous week and what can happen in the coming week.

• How have our differences torn each other down or somehow limited each of us this week? How can we avoid this in the future?
• Considering Proverbs 27:17, what is the biggest area of our marriage that needs sharpening?
• Where have are differences build each other up or somehow enabled each of us this week? How can we continue to build on this in the future?

Pray. Go have fun – too much thinking can be hard on the mind.

My wife and I have a ceremony we do every night. We celebrate the victories and celebrate the defeats of the day. Sometimes we do this in the form of a toast, sometimes with kisses. It makes it easier to discuss strengths and weaknesses, because both are celebrated.