When elephants wrestle or fight they never forget about the “incident or problem” and it’s only the grass that suffers because the elephants move on and never look back. When children witness their parents wrestle through something, and they don’t see forgiveness, the grass never grows back. “An African Proverb”

Sharing life with so many couples, a common theme we see is how people or things interrupt the sweet flow of a blessed marriage. These “things” are intrusions that take the lead and wreak havoc on homes. They become interlopers in the relationship!

What do you do when you have an interloper in your marriage?
Maybe you don’t recognize it, but it’s there.

We’ve all had them. If allowed to do so, “she” will intrude on every part of your lives!

How do I know this? We’ve got an interloper living with us!

She’s included in almost every single one of our conversations…our kids know about her… my close friends know about her.

She controls what we eat, how we eat and often, where we eat!

She throws these screaming fits in public places like the mall and in really quiet places like in weddings or funerals.

She wines and screams at me sometimes dozens of times a day! She’s even sleeping with us!

I am always very aware of her presence and if I try just for a few moments to pretend she doesn’t exist she plots my demise!

We MUST pay attention to her! She’s sometimes seriously exhausting!

A good friend asked recently if our interloper makes me mad? And how am I dealing with her?

Honestly, the real truth is…

I can’t be mad when God chooses to allow something into my life that changes my life…

I don’t have TIME to be mad. I’m too busy dealing with the fall-out or consequences of the interloper and so I just daily plan to hand her over to Christ.

Is this my natural, instinctive response? Absolutely not.

In many ways MY interloper has helped me rely more on Christ!

How can that be? Why would a God that loves me, loves my marriage even MORE than me, allow this intrusion into our home? Why would He allow this home wrecker into MY world?

Maybe it’s to point me back to Him! Maybe it’s to remind me that I am NOT The one in control! Only He can control all things!

My interloper isn’t to divide my family or kill my marriage.. maybe… just maybe, if I look at all of the ways He has protected me from other interlopers BECAUSE of this one, I will understand Jesus more!

Interlopers in our marriages can take on many different forms. It can be another person that gets much of our attention. It can be our jobs or kids. Sometimes interlopers are just the straight up busyness of life. Or it could be like ours. A lifelong diagnosis of something that you won’t ever be able to fully control, but will learn to manage.

No interloper ever just turned and ran away because we ignored her.

Whatever the interloper in your home is…she needs to be dealt with.

The people around us…those in our circles of influence, our children, our friends and loved ones, NEED to see us rely on Christ to handle life’s interruptions.

When WE see an interloper in someones marriage…stepping up and committing to yourself and God to intercede on behalf of them in prayer is the BEST thing you an do. Prayer is not a small thing or just an excuse…unless you are seeing it as that.

Our loved ones need to know that when an interloper invades their life, that they can be confident in the knowledge that…

His plans are better than ours, even when they don’t make that much sense to us!

While we may not like these interlopers…in fact sometimes we may hate them…when we hand them over to Him, He makes all things beautiful in His time.

Rejoice always, pray without ceasing, give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you. Do not quench the Spirit.

1Thessalonians 5:16-19