As imperfect humans, there are lots of tasks we’d like to be better at: folding fitted bedsheets; figuring out online meetings; finding time to rest and socialise on the weekend. For imperfect Christians, there are the additional joys and responsibilities that come with our faith: regularly meeting with our church family; being accountable to fellow believers; spending personal time in Bible reading and prayer.
The effort to carry out these tasks ebbs and flows as seasons of life change. However, like salvation itself, they all require a willingness and action on our part.
Being disciplined enough to pray can be particularly hard—hence books like Michael and Melissa Kruger’s 5 Things to Pray for Your Spouse.
5 Things to Pray for Your Spouse
Michael & Melissa Kruger
A happy and healthy marriage is one of God’s sweetest gifts to us. And one of the best ways to nurture that is through the power of prayer.
This guide will help you to pray bold, Scripture-based prayers for your husband or wife that will strengthen and enrich your marriage. It covers 21 prayer themes, with each one including five prayer prompts from a particular passage of Scripture. You’ll be equipped to pray deep and effective prayers for your spouse’s character and spiritual walk, for your life together as a couple and through challenging seasons.
The more I read (and prayed), the more it grew on me.
I thought it would be an easy read—“5 things” sounds fairly straightforward. Little did I suspect it would be 5 things to pray, per chapter, for 21 chapters! “105 Things to Pray for your Spouse” just doesn’t have the same allure. But the more I read (and prayed), the more it grew on me.
Structure Worth Following
Each chapter is topical, based on a larger passage of Scripture. The five points within each chapter are accompanied by a verse and a little paragraph to pray verbatim or to use as a platform for further prayer.
Chapter 13 is a great example: “I pray that my spouse will be wise (Prov 13) … in their work (v4), in their money (v11), in their judgements (v15), in their friendships (v15), and in their parenting (v24).”
There’s both breadth and nuance to the topics covered. Spiritual fruit, protection, hospitality, conflict, money, sexual purity, and delight in scripture are all discussed. I appreciated the fact that parenthood is not assumed, nor is it ignored. It has its own chapter near the end, plus one other daily prayer.
There’s an acknowledgement first-up that not all readers will have a Christian spouse. That’s a really important encouragement to those who are the only Christian adult in their household. It’s lonely and tough. No matter how sincere and grace-filled human love can be, God’s salvation-giving love is irreplaceable in its perfection. However, as the book continues, the spouse’s faith does become assumed “… so that they may become a more mature Christian, ready for whatever may come …” (69).
Gems Worth Mining
There were many little nuggets of wisdom to be found in 5 Things to Pray for Your Spouse. I reached the chapter regarding illness as my husband experienced a bout of COVID—that was God’s own grace delivered with a dash of dry humour. Directing me to James 5, it encouraged me to not be surprised, offer up prayers, ask for help, trust in the Lord, and confess my sins. Solid and sound biblical practice when tempted with self-pity!
I reached the chapter regarding illness as my husband experienced a bout of COVID … God’s grace delivered with a dash of dry humour.
When encouraged to speak truthfully (Eph 4:25), I considered what “speaking the truth in love” to my family actually looked like and prayed I would not be hurtful in truth-telling. Elsewhere, I reflected on whether rejoicing was intentional or spontaneous, and concluded it can and should be both. In another section, I was convicted: I don’t “consider [my] spouse’s needs as more significant than [my] own”—that’s easy to forget at home when one doesn’t need to be on one’s best behaviour.
5 Things to Pray for your Spouse not only uncovered sin and shaped my thinking, it directed me to pray about these things for myself and my husband. Its scriptural grounding caused me to consider and pray for my husband’s character, spiritual practice, work, leadership, and parenting. We were also able to discuss things we wouldn’t have otherwise considered because they were outside our habitual weekly routines. If the other books in the 5 Things to Pray series are like this, I look forward to discovering them.
Prayers Worth Pursuing
Of course, structured or habitual prayer will never be perfect. We sinful humans are very good at corruption, no matter how noble our intent. When we read books like this one, we run the gamut of insincerity, all the way through to a works-based mindset, where missing a session constitutes spiritual failure.
However, the benefits of consistent, persistent prayer are countless. Heroes from the Old and New Testaments alike commend it to us by their example and instruction—so do members of the early church and believers from the Reformation era.
We can be encouraged, knowing God’s Spirit makes our imperfect prayers an acceptable offering before his holy throne (Rev 5:8). We can be emboldened because “The prayer of a righteous man is powerful and effective” (Js 5:16, NIV). And we can be spurred on since God promises to hear and answer our prayers according to his good and perfect will (1 Jn 5:14).
