Romance at its best - Marriage, church, life ROMANCE how do they all feed each other

It probably would be diligent to write a small article on romance. We have written so much and talk almost daily with people about God romance. One of the things that comes through so clearly is that many have never experienced true romance. So let’s discover a few facts and give some examples about romance.

But lets start by starting with a potentially inflammatory statement. Our relationship with our married partner is a DIRECT reflection of our relationship with God. How the romance is in our marriage is a direct reflection of our romance with the Spirit of God. Sound weird read on and you will understand a little maybe.

Firstly romance is not anything that can be taught or understood. If we understand romance then we have never had it. If we demand romance from anyone then we have no idea what romance is. If we crave romance we have missed it. Romance just flows when we allow life itself to ignite us in undiscovered love. Also if romance needs anything sexual to survive then it is not romance.

So we can never understand romance I think it is a movement of God through His holy Spirit to bring people together as an example of what He is to us and what church should be. Romance is completely about me while not being about me in the slightest. It is in true romance I can never say my needs are not being met as there is no psychopathic tinge in romance. It is completely about the other person and at the same time is completely about me. Not as a conscious act but rather as a flow of romantic love from within.

Romance gives no heed to consequences of time location or action. Inside romance we feel invincible and truly the love found inside romance is invincible. The Hollywood version of romance is completely psychopathic and greedy. It could not be more about me and my needs being met. Yes of course we want to meet the partners needs but only if my needs are being recognized. If I see me in the relationship I do not have romance I have infatuation. Infatuation is a greedy self motivated lust of desire that will always gravitate to the sexual as ultimately any lust based relationship will. Romance blossoms its best without sexual areas being involved. If sex is mistaken to add romance the romance is not present. Sexual areas do not bring romance but rather the contrary, so if sex is introduced at the wrong time it degenerates romance and makes it impossible to exist short of an act of God. Notice I said at the wrong time. Romance draws together and marriage is the height of romance. The marriage the bible says causes the two to become one flesh. Romance leading to marriage merges two individuals into one. The still are very much individual but are one. As marriage unifies as one, sexual union brings together to seal that union of intimacy. If romance is not allowed to mature into marriage then problems occur. If sex is used outside of marriage to try and bring union it tears apart it can never unite as those acting in such fail to grasp the spiritual side of intercourse. Sex outside of marriage is always about instant gratification for self at someone elses expense. Is it any wonder sex is such a powerful tool of control and manipulation. In the wrong context outside of romantic marriage all it will bring is guilt, fear, shame, self consciousness, everything that is the opposite to romance. Sex outside of marriage brings a quick counterfeit feeling of romance but in reality rapes the individual of romance.

Probably the best example is my wife and I. When we first discovered each other we were delirious with romance. A young couple oblivious to the world around. Now sexual areas at no time motivated us as we both married as virgins. In those early days we would wake early to go swimming. At 6am my now wife would drive to my house and pick me up and we would exercise together. Then often we would go home get cleaned up and spend the day together. Maybe for 6 or 7 hours we would go with other friends riding motorbikes in the mountains or whatever it was. She would go home and after dinner we would talk for hours on the phone. One day her father asked rather frustrated “what can you talk about?” you just spent 7 hours with him and now another 3 on the phone”

I remember the day clearly when I knew I was to marry Lara. I watched her get in her car to drive home and could not bear it. For us marriage was not to fulfill sexual desires it was not to meet any personal needs. There was not a second of fear or a doubtful wondering if she was the one. Lara was 18 and I was 22 and I knew I wanted to wake up next to Lara and have her so close she would be me and I would be her. To be away from each other overnight was to be away for eternity it seemed. Now in over 25 years of marriage we are virtually never away from each other. One friend commented he has never met a couple like us if we are away from each other for longer than an hour we are calling as we miss each other so. We married as we complete each other in romance. We have traveled the world together, cried together, laughed together and loved together and we still do, thanks to Jesus in our lives.

Yes we still need to allow romance as it can be so easy to allow life to turn into a labor of love busy working for each other missing the fact romance needs to stay fertile. Now with seven kids and the crazy busy life that follows it can be easy to be so tired and distracted we could fail to stop and enjoy the trees and birds together. But does this same problem not present itself to us with God. I am certain as the bible talks about Jesus returning it says He is returning for His bride. That bride is not made up of denominations who have been separated from each other and God through knowledge that causes division. That bride is united in romantic movement and just as Lara and I had to be together such is Christ and His bride. One day He will look and say I cant bear to be away from this complete bride, come and be with Me. Jesus will not return for the motive to condemn and destroy. He came the bible says that we may have life abundantly. Nothing better than romance to feel alive.

So I am certain people reading this will say I missed it or I don’t have romance or it was not like that for me. But praise God all is not lost. Romance is still alive it just waits for us to enter. We don’t feel worthy we feel inadequate and have no idea what to do or how to respond and here is the heart of it. There is no correct way to respond to romance. To try and be romantic kills romance. Just be you and respond. Let me assure you romance begins and ends in Jesus. The day of Pentecost in the bible was about romance and man made it about religion and set up church. Men who have no idea of true romance bring people in to churches every Sunday and give people knowledge of love devoid of romance. In the book of Acts the God romance caused people to meet daily in each other’s homes. But can we teach romance? ABSOLUTLY NOT! If I teach romance all I have is Hollywood replacing romance with infatuation and lust. Romance begins by responding to the romantic wooing of God Himself towards you. Yes those wooing are there we just fail to see them as such. Yes true Holy Spirit inspired church is me being me. As I live romance sin drops from my life struggles with this world disappear and LOVE is romantic love is not a labor of love. Just be you and let Jesus love you by being with Him in thought deed and presence. Not inside a church building but in life. Let God romance blossom around your life and watch life become true life.

Let me give you an example. When I first noticed Lara I would wait for her to come out from the place she worked and I would bump into her to offer her a ride home. At that time we were just meeting and she would say no. She was oblivious to romance but as time went on she noticed me and romance blossomed. My wooing penetrated her life and romance sparked. So to it is with God He constantly is wooing us and we are oblivious to it. In church they turn the manifestations that are wooings into lust and infatuation to market God and miss the romance of the wooing. In life we all get gifts and the bible says every good gift comes down from above. Gifts in our life are God wooing us and how foolish we are when we turn these gifts into self righteous greed. Like a business person with a gift for business thinking he or she has skill and not seeing the skill comes from God wanting to get his or her attention. God wants to gift our lives and have us live in the gifts but we must enter the romance and then as we enter romance with God, romance will flow right through our lives into our marriages or potential marriages. Romance begins with God and is fulfilled in Him. Is it any wonder the attacks on marriage and relationships are so rampant. The world motivated by demonic culture wants to steal intimacy as inside intimacy is security and peace . The peace of God!

So no matter what mistakes we have made, no matter if we have never had romance. I can assure you right now God has romanced you and when you respond to Him romantic natural life will follow. God is crazy about you just the way you are! Problem is we don’t see how that can ever be. Just relax talk to Jesus and let life BE!

Many times people end up with a concept of marriage that is more like a partnership. They are married by name but partners in life. Their family is often run as a business with decisions being made that are like business decisions. They make decisions based on knowledge of an end result. I guess in such a situation a lot can be achieved but it is always at the expense of intimacy and romance. You see when romance is present anything is possible and I like how the bible talks about this when talking of synergy. It says if one can put a thousand to flight two can put ten thousand to flight.

It is inside romance I don’t want independence it is inside romance I make myself totally vulnerable and not by a conscious act but rather by a merging of two people into one. If I expose my weakness then inside romantic marriage I expose my partners weakness as while having total individuality I have no individuality. This really is the nearest description or manifestation we will ever see of the Godhead on earth and truly what we are when in Holy Spirit church. People go to places of worship to try and fabricate intimacy or fertilize intimacy as they crave it but in reality it is only as we understand Pentecost and what happened there that we realize “I am church” and all who enter romance with God merge together to become what the bible calls the bride of Christ. If that bride is not romantically inspired through the pure and unadulterated love of God then it is a harlot bride a counterfeit from true God intimacy. What a travesty that our man created systems attempt to replace romantic intimacy. I would call such another Jesus. The bible talks about people following another Jesus and through romantic Jesus love we can catch a glimpse that a Jesus of taught love is a fraud for Spirit life.

The Godhead comprising of God the father God the son and God the Holy Spirit are three total individuals who have no individuality as they submit identity to each other they are each other. They are married in a spiritual way man can never understand in his head. Is it any wonder God said he hates divorce as God knows the broken intimacy is suffered from the abuse of the world devoid of romance. Is it any wonder people struggle to grasp Holy Spirit church from Acts in the bible when their natural marriage has issues with being partnerships rather than marriages. They run separate bank accounts and separate lives to maintain independence. In such a case there are always trust issues from the past and a complete lack of romantic love. It may have begun with romance and may still have flashes of it but the romance will always be subject to self. Sounds a lot like modern day religion, always having a motive and can never get enough. God romances us and we add it to the partnership we have with God. The manifestations are about validation and justification of self not romantic intimacy. Such people will never understand statements like "We do not prophecy we are prophecy" manifestations are not about actions they are about identity. They will always "be from their do" not "do from their BE" Just like in natural marriage we chase manifestations of love craving for romance and miss the fact it is not what we do it is who we are. Romance is not what we do it is who we are, we just need distractions of carnality removed so we can relax and BE. We don't remove the distractions by religious works we just allow romantic distraction. In marriage just be distracted and let romance have life, remember romance is not about sex it is about "being."

So yes life has a way of stealing intimate romance but in reality only if we let it. As I worship God like the bible say in spirit and in truth it is not about a conscious act once or twice a week it is a flow of romance and let me say this when romance flows it spreads to ever area of your life and every relationship. Granted many relationships are scared of what they sense in you as they cannot categorize it according to the systems of this world and cannot control it. The romance born of God in the spirit of a person is the fulfillment of the bible verse that describes believers in saying “in honor preferring one another” Not as a religious act but as a flow of who we are.

What a shame we turn romance into sex as it steals intimacy and pollutes us with a fear of intimacy. Romance in a married relationship has a physical dimension for sure but Holy Spirit romance is both horizontal to man and vertical to God. Nothing weird about it, what is born of God is pure and not according to this world. It is church and as mentioned we see why the believers in the book of Acts met daily as the romantic God blew them away with romantic love they had to come together to bask in who He is in them and who they are in each other through the Spirit of God. The bible called this manifestation of church KOINONIA!