LOVE ISLAND - WEEK TWO - DAY ONE
Hello and welcome to your Daily Devos following our Love Island messages at 29:11! Take some time today to read through the scriptures provided, meditate on the lessons learned that are applicable for all of us from this week and journal your prayers. Have an amazing week 29:11 Church!
THEME SCRIPTURE:
The Lord God said, “It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper suitable for him.
19 Now the Lord God had formed out of the ground all the wild animals and all the birds in the sky. He brought them to the man to see what he would name them; and whatever the man called each living creature, that was its name. 20 So the man gave names to all the livestock, the birds in the sky and all the wild animals. But for Adam no suitable helper was found. 21 So the Lord God caused the man to fall into a deep sleep; and while he was sleeping, he took one of the man’s ribs and then closed up the place with flesh. 22 Then the Lord God made a woman from the rib he had taken out of the man, and he brought her to the man. 23 The man said,
“This is now bone of my bones
and flesh of my flesh;
she shall be called ‘woman,’
for she was taken out of man.”
24 That is why a man leaves his father and mother and is united to his wife, and they become one flesh.
Genesis 2:18-24 NIV
TODAY’S PASSAGE:
The Lord God said, “It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper suitable for him.
Genesis 2:18 NIV
REFLECTION:
Our theme verse for this week gives us the model for marriage. One man and one woman come together united as one. God revealed himself through mankind using both male and female - TWO SYMBOLIC HALVES - Both Divine reflections of him coming together in unity. That is what marriage is and there are no other versions of marriage in God’s eyes.
Now in today’s passage we see God use the term “helper” to describe the woman in regards to how she relates to man. This word can be hard for us to wrap our heads around. That’s because in English the word “help” has a broad range of connotations. “Help” can refer to a simplest act, or it can refer to something much more vital and significant.
In Hebrew, the word for “helper” used in Genesis 2:18 and 20 is EZER (pronounced “ay-zer”), and it is consistently used in the Old Testament in the context of vitally important and powerful acts of rescue and support.
Ezer is used twenty-one times in the Hebrew Old Testament:
Twice it is used in the context of Eve.
Three times it describes nations to whom Israel appeals for military help.
Sixteen times it is used in reference to God himself as a helper to his people.
If the Bible uses that term to describe God almighty, then it certainly isn’t a term wives should see as insignificant, demeaning or to mean less than. You can read through proverbs 31 as the ideal example of a wife and it’s clear that she kept her home. The majority of her tasks was caring for her family and home. But yet, she also bought land and plants a vineyard, and sold things at market. But she didn’t do those things to advance herself, even in the business outside the home, it was always to bless her family.
She is a good steward of what God has entrusted to her
The way I like to think about it, she DID WHAT WAS NEEDED FOR HER FAMILY.
Sometimes that means leaning into your strengths and using them, sometimes that means pushing through your weakness and learning something new even if it makes us uncomfortable, if that means giving up something, give it up. If it means taking on something, take it on.
It’s doing what is needed.
THOUGHTS TO PONDER:
The dictionary definition of HELP is to do something that makes it easier on the person you are helping.
Listen wives, helping your husbands isn’t meant to make his life easier and your life harder. Wives help their husbands so that they can help carry the load so that together you can go farther and do more for the kingdom of God.
That means wives do what is needed.
How does understanding God’s definition of a wife as a helper shape your perception of the role they play in a marriage? Does this understanding challenge or encourage your way of thinking when it comes to roles in a marriage? Has there been a time, a situation or opportunity, where you have experienced the wife stepping up to do what was needed for the family? Has there been a time, a situation or opportunity, where you have experienced the wife take on an unhealthy workload? How did that play a factor in the overall health of the marriage?
