The Spirit can heal the cancer of discontent and criticism with His grace working through faith and thankfulness. Look to Christ and trust him to fill your heart with gratitude because, though He didn’t have to, God graciously gave you a spouse, a friend, a lover. Receive your spouse as a good gift from your heavenly Father to the glory and praise of your Father.

Thankfulness is central to your Christian life. When you received Christ by grace alone through faith alone, the Holy Spirit was also given to you to produce the fruit of thankfulness in you and from you. Thankfulness is evidence of true faith. The thankfulness that the Spirit is producing in you will help you see and experience your marriage and sex differently.

Discontent and criticism toward your spouse are cancer in marriage and the bedroom and the effective treatment is thankfulness forged by God’s grace and Holy Spirit. If you realize that you deserve no good thing from God but only condemnation,^[1] that you have Christ the greatest of gifts, and that every good thing you have is a precious and generous gift from your heavenly Father, your gratitude for God’s grace will greatly influence how you perceive and experience His good gifts. You will begin to see your marriage and sex as lavish kindnesses from your heavenly Father who loves you. This will deepen your love for God and your spouse. Discontent and criticism have never enhanced anyone’s joy in marriage, but they have diminished it. Thankfulness to God, on the other hand, has only ever enhanced believer’s joy in marriage.

Psalm 50:23 says, “The one who offers thanksgiving as his sacrifice glorifies me.” Psalm 69:30 adds, “I will magnify him with thanksgiving.” We glorify and magnify our God when we are deeply grateful for our marriage and sex and enjoy both as lavish and underserved gifts. This approach allows us to be resilient, patient, and content when marriage and sex don’t go as planned, because we are still confident in the lavish gift of Christ. This approach also allows us to be overjoyed, thrilled, and so appreciative when marriage and sex are positive experiences because our awareness of our unworthiness and God’s kindness heightens our thankfulness and joy and motivates us to honor marriage even more (Heb. 13:4).

Heidelberg Catechism 86 asks, “Since we have been delivered from our misery by grace alone through Christ, without any merit of our own, why must we yet do good works?” Apply that to marriage. God saved us by His sovereign grace alone. We contributed nothing. Why, then, must we serve our spouse selflessly? Why must we treat our spouses with kindness, gentleness, love, respect, and utmost care? Why must we selflessly give ourselves sexually to our spouses? The Heidelberg answers:

Because Christ, having redeemed us by His blood, also renews us by His Holy Spirit to be His image, so that with our whole life we may show ourselves thankful to God for His benefits, and He may be praised by us. Further, that we ourselves may be assured of our faith by its fruits, and that by our godly walk of life we may win our neighbors for Christ.

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