Love Because: Devotions for In-Law RelationshipsSýnishorn

Love Them as a Good Work

What does “choosing” mean in the Christian life? To choose is to prioritize one thing over another. This is why Scripture says we are dead to sin and its desires—they no longer seem appealing to us. The wrongs done to us and the offenses we face are the trials that shape and refine us. Criticism, injustice, offense, false accusation, mistreatment, and unkindness—all of these fall within God’s sovereign plan and purpose for our lives.

We were created for good, enduring works, just like our in-laws were. And this relationship that we share with them through marriage, and later through grandchildren, may be one of those good works. God certainly desires it to be, having crafted marriage, and with it the family, before the Fall into sin.

Many of us will transition from the seasons of newlyweds to new parents, to seasoned parents, and then to in-laws ourselves. What do we wish for? Hope for? Expect? Maybe our in-law relationship with the young man or woman our daughter or son marries will be wonderful from day one, but what is far more likely is that it will be a love that is acted on daily as a choice. Our in-laws may be far from our first choice as our extra set of parents, but that doesn’t mean that God is not doing a great work in us through them, oftentimes beginning with our own hearts.

Application: Pray today deeply, fully, and wholeheartedly for your in-laws. Pray over your relationship, over your future, and over their influence on their grandchildren. Pray for a family legacy that, above all else, honors the Lord.

Was this Plan helpful? We adapted this Plan from Love Because: 30 Devotions for In-Law Relationships.