During the study of Exodus that I am doing, I discovered a beautiful overlap between the starting of the new nation of Israel and parallels about how to start a good marriage.  I wish I had heard this when I was young and stupid.  Now, I am only stupid.

To pick up the story, the Jews had just now left the tyranny of Egypt and had crossed through the dry land in the middle of the Red Sea.  When they were on the other side, God gives them three events that I think every couple can glean from.

Point 1:  A routine for food. 

God saw that they were in the desert and need to eat.  For a new couple, starting life is like being in the desert in some senses.  The man and woman’s life of being alone is over, and the two must integrate into a single flesh.  Too often, we think that becoming one flesh is exclusively related to sex.  If you agree with the adage, “You are what you eat,” then you can see why God chose food as  the first item to help them with identity.  He could have taught them many other things, but he started with food-related issues.

Let’s look at the details.  He provided manna and meat for them at predictable intervals, and he made provisions to address their tendency to overindulge.  If the Jews tried to save the manna for a “midnight snack” or “lunch the next day,” the leftovers were rotten and ghastly.    God was teaching them to synchronize their eating, as he knew that how they ate, specifically how they ate together would define their potential to do both things of pleasure and things of ministry.  He also knew that asynchronous eating or overeating would impact their health, which is a later topic in the chapter.

I have had instances in my life when I have seen a couple get married, and a year later when I see pictures meant to illicit warm feelings of “what a happy couple,” I see the opposite.  One or both of them are obese, and there is no synchronicity in their food.  At a time when there were meant to be active, they are falling short of potential much like the story of the man with one talent.  They missed the lesson of Exodus.  Certainly, the church owns some of the blame for not pointing this out, and this couple has failed to learn from the most basic of biblical stories about overeating.   Of all the big preventable diseases in this country (heart disease, cancer, diabetes), obesity is a risk factor and a very preventable one at that!  God started this nation with food in mind.  We should start our marriages with healthy eating, as well.

Point 2: A need for administration

In the story, Moses is overwhelmed by all the tasks he feels he must do as the Jews cross into the desert.  His father-in-law, Jethro, tells him that he needs to delegate and allows others to do tasks he used to do by himself.  What a great lesson, but most people miss how that applies to a healthy marriage.  Although not nearly as important as the first point, it is still important enough for God to talk about early in the story.

When we get married, most of us are used to doing everything our way.  We eat, add gas to our cars, pay rent, repair our clothing, etc., without a partner’s consideration.  And when we get married, much of those habits come over into the birthing of the new family, just like his way of listening to everyone came over when Moses was leading the people out of Egypt.  We, too, need to delegate in marriage.  The first and easiest one is simple.  You don’t need two bank accounts.  Sorry.

You can, in fact, have one person own all the car maintenance or laundry or vacuuming.  I know some folks who start their marriage with two vacuum cleaners-that is how far removed we are from the teaching of Exodus.  In the story, we get no clear sense of how Moses felt after he did as instructed, but we also know that each of us has a Jethro person in our lives who knows what is best for us.  But we have to listen to them.  They will suggest “profound” ideas that are often simple to implement.  We need a Jethro, especially early on when we think we know what is best because it worked for us when we were single.

Point 3: Come together to fight the real enemy

God takes time teaching this one, and the story continues into the New Testament at least as much as it does in the Old Testament. However, it certainly starts here.

You might think this is a story about the Amalekites, the first enemies the Jews faced when they left Egypt.  It isn’t.

The most fundamental screw-up comes from short-sighted definitions of the word enemy.  Most marriages perceive the single greatest element preventing them from being happy as all the people out there telling them what to do.  We are, after all, a new family and a new marriage, and we want to do things our own way.  However, it doesn’t take long for the disagreements to start, and it evolves into our spouse being the enemy.  We never express it like that.  We bundle it with phrases like, “your behavior makes me feel….” Or “When you do….”  Soon, fighting the enemy evolves into some form of couples therapy, and the real enemy skirts around our field of focus unobstructed.  Soon, habits form, and we are no longer doing what we are called to do to make the world a better place.  We are just “following our hearts” or some other paganistic idea of happiness.

We need to come together and identify the real enemy as Satan.  He wants to destroy and kill.  He wants us to focus on something other than God.  To make a joke from Genesis, your spouse’s poor behavior is low-hanging fruit.  He wants to stand between husband and wife.  The real enemy is him, and focusing on combatting him is what we should do.

How?  Do stuff that God loves and Satan hates.  Pray together.  Go to church together.  Pray for the other person when they aren’t around.  Make sacrifices for them.  Do stuff you don’t need or want to broadcast on social media.

I can’t recommend studying Exodus if you want to get to the heart of the worst in people and the best.  It is all there, on display.