Reforming Marriage

The title of this post is the title of a very good book that I read last week.
I say toss most of your silly marriage self-help books and get more marriage books with the Scriptures as its base!
With that in mind, here are some quotes from the book:

"John Bunyan once exhorted husbands to be 'such a believing husband to your believing wife that she may say, "God has not only given me a husband, but such a husband as preaches to me every day the way of Christ to His church."'" pg. 10

"God will not patch His grace onto some humanistic psychological nonsense-even if that nonsense is couched and buried in Christian terminology. It proceeds from an obedient heart, and the greatest desire of an obedient heart is the glory of God, not the happiness of the household. If we might paraphrase the words of the catechism, the chief end of marriage is to glorify God and enjoy Him forever. The reaon we are miserable in our marriages is because we have idolized them. But the glory of God is more important that our domestic happiness." pg. 11-12

"In the verses (he's speaking of Ephesians 5) following we find a very basic imperative indeed-husbands are commanded to love their wives as Christ loved the church. But nowhere is the husband commanded to be a head to his wife. This is because he already is the head of his wife, by the very nature of marriage. If he does not love her, he is a poor head, but a head nonetheless." pg. 24

"A man may not be a vocational theologian, but in his home he must be the resident theologian." pg. 40

"Romantic love, as it is commonly understood, is a modern idol of the mind, emotions, and heart...Idolatry occurs whenever we look to a created thing with the expectation that it be and do what only the living God can be and do. " pg. 63

All quotes from "Reforming Marriage" by Douglas Wilson