Your spiritual intimacy will be enhanced when you learn to pray as a couple. Praying together is a profound experience, as it joins your hearts in the midst of the concerns of your shared life and invites God into the challenges. Praying for your children can help unite you as you ask God for wisdom about each one’s unique needs and personalities. Acknowledging your shortcomings to God as you pray together can help soften your heart toward each other and enable you to offer forgiveness more quickly. Praying for family members, work pressures, and life’s challenges can help you trust God with the realities of your lives and notice together any ways in which you see him at work.
Praying together consistently connects you at a deep level that keeps your relationship focused on what is important. There is no need to impress your spouse with your words as you pray. Keep it simple and sincere.
You may also find it helpful to read a spiritually enriching book or couples devotional together. Devotions for a Sacred Marriage by Gary Thomas or The One Year Love Language Minute Devotional by Gary Chapman may provide inspiration for your marriage.[i] Tim Keller’s The Meaning of Marriage is another excellent resource for understanding Christian marriage.[ii] You could also read the Bible together. The book of John is a good place to start.
To further grow in your relationship with God and your spouse, find others who are seeking to grow in the same way. You may have been disappointed in organized churches, but finding a Christian community that stimulates you to grow and provides an environment where you can learn and pray with others will be a valuable support to your marriage and your faith.
Another way to nurture your spiritual life is to serve others together. Offering to do the yard work of a senior citizen who lives nearby, starting a Kids Against Hunger group in your community or connecting with an organization that takes meals to the needy are a few of many ways you could reach outside yourselves, bless others and nourish your marriage bond.
For more on how to grow spiritually as a couple check out Homeword Couples Devotional or Fierce Marriage Devotionals.
[i] Gary Thomas, Devotions for a Sacred Marriage (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2005); Gary Chapman, The One Year Love Language Minute Devotional (Carol Stream, IL: Tyndale, 2009).
[ii] Tim Keller, The Meaning of Marriage (New York: Dutton, 2011).