Today marks the end of a long era.  We’ve had the privilege since 1989 of editing and publishing Family Talk / MarriageWorks magazine.  For most of that time it was a printed hard copy magazine of twelve, then twenty four pages. For the past four years it has been an eMagazine, and that’s where we have intersected with most of you.

At this stage of our lives we are involved in other areas of ministry, and of course, getting older. So we feel it is time to pass the baton of MarriageWorks on to a younger couple.  There is such a couple seriously considering taking on the editorship, but their decision is not yet final. By the time the next issue is ready to go online you will know who it is!

The flavour may change, but the basic recipe will remain exactly the same:  God has designed marriage to be a wonderfully blessed relationship that reflects His own goodness and wonder.  The three-into-One principle of the Godhead is hard for us to understand, so the two-into-one of marriage is an illustration that we can better get our heads around. And actually, in the ideal, it too is a three-into-one, when God is included as the uniting and binding force in our marriage.  That’s what makes it so tragic when marriages flounder and break.  It smashes that image that we are meant to reflect to the world around us.

So, we encourage you to keep learning, keep practicing loving, keep growing in your loving relationship together.  If you hit a rough  patch, get help.  Quickly, before destructive thinking and behaviour patterns get too set in cement.  There is help available in every area – principles from Scripture, and practical application of those by those who are specially trained in those fields. Because our spiritual / social / sexual selves are so closely intertwined, we believe it is absolutely essential that the children of God get their counsel from other children of God who know how to integrate their knowledge of human behaviour with their understanding and application of the Word of God. That’s what “Christian Counselling” has to be.

It will be interesting to see what new ideas appear in future issues of MarriageWorks, and we really do encourage you to suggest that your friends make use of it, too. May our Lord richly bless you and your marriage and family as you seek to reflect His glory in this world we live in.

Blessings, - and our love,

Jim and Grace Vine
retiring editors