Chapter Summaries for What God Has Joined Together

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What God Has Joined Together is a book written for the purpose of strengthening marriages.  Putting together this resource was such a daunting yet rewarding assignment.

The book contains 31 succinct chapters on 31 potential marriage separators.

Listed below are the chapter titles and a summary statement for each one.  I pray that it can help marriages strengthen according to the principles present in God’s Word.

  1. Let Nothing Separate – When an eternal God puts something together, it should last forever.
  2. Let No Misalignment Separate – If you still want to be with your spouse at the end of your life, you must be heading in the same direction now.
  3. Let No Selfishness Separate – Every single one of your marital disagreements is because one or both of you are behaving selfishly.
  4. Let No Conflict Separate – The person who knows you the closest is often able to hurt you the deepest.
  5. Let No Miscommunication Separate – Effective communication in marriage is when two people learn to talk with one another rather than just to one another.
  6. Let No Disrespect Separate – Since men need significance in their lives, God calls wives to submit to their husbands.
  7. Let No Indifference Separate – The level of a man’s sacrifice for his wife determines the amount of security she feels in their marriage.
  8. Let No Expectation Separate – Unrealistic or unclear expectations in marriage can lead to unforgiving and unwilling spouses.
  9. Let No Past Separate – Couples who cannot reconcile their pasts will never be able to enjoy their future.
  10. Let No Parents Separate – If you are not careful, your relationship with your parents can threaten your relationship with your spouse.
  11. Let No In-Laws Separate – You must learn to prioritize your marriage without idolizing your side of the family or demonizing your spouse’s side of the family.
  12. Let No Child Separate – Prioritizing your children can lead to neglecting your spouse.
  13. Let No Friendship Separate – Any relationship that detracts from your marriage is an unhealthy friendship.
  14. Let No Sexual Struggle Separate – The lack of prioritized passion in a marriage leads to a dangerous disconnect between spouses.
  15. Let No Secrets Separate – Keeping secrets from your spouse threatens the oneness that marriage was uniquely intended to provide.
  16. Let No Career Separate – Some couples get married to their work and merely work on their marriage.
  17. Let No Busyness Separate – Romance, nurture, and communication take time.
  18. Let No Finances Separate – Mishandling money can rob you of marital maturity.
  19. Let No Hobby Separate – A good thing can become a bad thing when it becomes the one thing to the neglect of the important things.
  20. Let No Fox Separate – Sometimes the most dangerous nuisances in your marriage are not the ones that are glaringly obvious.
  21. Let No Addiction Separate – If something influences, alters, or controls your actions, the reality is that the Holy Spirit is no longer fully guiding you.
  22. Let No Adultery Separate – The fun of adultery will last for a moment, but the pain of adultery will last for a lifetime.
  23. Let No Pornography Separate – Pornography seeks to convince you that what is God-given is insufficient to meet your desires.
  24. Let No Technology Separate – Without moderation, technology will distract and disconnect you from your spouse.
  25. Let No Password Separate – In a time of increased connectivity with others, you must learn how to maintain transparency with your spouse.
  26. Let No Midlife Crisis Separate – The only way to survive a midlife crisis is by focusing on what you have rather than what you don’t have.
  27. Let No Incompatibility Separate – Marital conflict does not imply that you are hopelessly incompatible but that you are relentlessly sinful.
  28. Let No Hardship Separate – The strongest couples are the ones who refuse to allow the hardships that come against their marriage to come in between their marriage.
  29. Let No Spiritual Apathy Separate – Don’t allow your spouse’s spiritual apathy to dilute your own personal devotion.
  30. Let No Pride Separate – Your marriage will never heal until you view your pride as part of the sickness.
  31. Let No Sin Separate – You cannot give your spouse a love that you have not received.