God's Marriage and Speed Friending--April 19th Meeting Recap

At the beginning of her talk, our speaker, Melissa Dueul, asked us to think about three questions:

1.) What is your dream or desire for your marriage?

2.) What is God's design for your marriage?

3.) What is the reality of your relationship right now?

After pondering those three questions individually, Melissa talked a little more about God's design for marriage.

In 1 Peter, we learn that wives are commanded to respect their husbands and husbands are commanded to love their wives.  I had always read this with thoughts swirling in my head.  Why would we not be told to both love and respect eachother?  Why this seemingly "unequal" treatment?  Melissa helped explain the passage with the help of a book called Love and Respect, by Dr. Emerson Eggerichs.  In the book, Dr. Eggerichs explains that we need to show love to our spouse in a way that makes sense to them. As Melissa said in her talk, "Speak respect to your husband--he'll get it.  Your husband should speak love to you--you'll get it."

This portion of the talk reminded me of another book that we have heard about before at MOPS--The Five Love Languages, by Gary Chapman. If you're not familiar with it, the idea is that there are 5 different ways that we can communicate love to others.  (Quality Time, Words of Affirmation, Physical Touch, Gifts, and Acts of Service) We each have one or more languages that we "speak" and gestures of love that fit our primary language make us feel more loved than others.  We must learn the language of our spouse and strive to show them love in the way that makes the most sense to them.

Melissa offered recommendations of several other books relating to the topic of marriage during her talk.  Here are all of them with links to Amazon if you would like to read more about them.

Love and Respect, Dr. Emerson Eggerichs 

The Five Love Languages, Gary Chapman  

The Marriage Project, Kathi Lipp

Better Love Now, Tommy Nelson and David Delk

Love & War, John and Stasi Eldredge

Mystery of Marriage, Mike Mason

Sacred Marriage, Gary L. Thomas

After the speaker, we had the opportunity to branch out from our tables and get to meet some new people through Speed Friending!  Half the group was given a sheet of paper with questions.  The people with papers paired up with someone else without one. Then, each person took turns asking and answering questions.  When time was up, it was time to find another partner.  We hope you were able to make some fun new connections!

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Our "Silver Spoon Award" winner for the week is Holly Dodds! (She was really excited.) :)  Here is the recipe for her winning dish:

Easy Cream Cheese Danishes

Makes 24 pastries

Ingredients

2 cans Pillsbury Grands Crescent Rolls (big & flaky)
1 can pie filling (I like cherry)

8 oz cream cheese
1 tsp vanilla
1/3 cup sugar

powdered sugar
milk

Directions
Place crescent roll cans in the freezer for about 30 minutes.
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees and line baking sheets with silicon mats or parchment paper.
Beat cream cheese, vanilla and sugar with an electric mixer until smooth and fluffy.
Open the cans and slice each into 12 pieces, approximately 1/2″ slices. (Don’t unroll them, pretend they’re slice and bake cookies.)
Place six slices on a cookie sheet, flattening the centers to create an indent. (I used a large spice container dipped in flour, plus my fingers for a little extra flattening in the middle.)
Fill the indent half with the cream cheese mixture and half with the pie filling.
Bake until edges are golden brown, about 15 minutes.
Cool completely on a wire rack.
In a small bowl, mix a large spoonful of powdered sugar with a little milk until liquid but still thick. Spoon into a pastry bag or Ziploc, cut off the tip, and drizzle over the pastries