This week, Pastor Mark preached out of Genesis 3, I Timothy 2 and 3, and Ephesians 5 on complementarian theology and God's intent for men and women in his sermon "Where Are You?" the third in the God’s Work, Our Witness series. In this post, Jeremy and Michele, members of Mars Hill Church Portland, tell about how the gospel of Jesus Christ has changed their marriage. God calls people often. But that calling rarely involves a life of comfort. Jeremy and Michele's life and marriage were comfortable, cozy, even quiet. Married for 20 years with two college-age sons, Jeremy was an elder at a solid church just outside Portland's city limits, and Michele played the dutiful wife role well. "[Everyone] just assumed we were doing pretty good," says Jeremy. Besides, there wasn't any indication otherwise, "We looked like we had it all together." The couple believed it, too. "I would have told you we had dialed into the sweet spot," says Michele. "We’d have marriage stuff come up, but nothing that was detrimental. I felt like we had dealt with that in the first decade or so … I didn’t really think we had any big growth to do." This past spring, though, God started to shake things up. Jeremy told his wife he was feeling called to leave their church and join Mars Hill Portland, and she recognized the call. He went to his fellow elders, who affirmed this and commissioned the couple to join the church plant. "It sounded like a good idea," says Jeremy. "Until it actually happened."

"I had been fighting with God and I was taking it out on Jeremy. I wanted it on my terms and my way." –Michele

The couple joined the early core group for the Portland church, leading one of the first Community Groups. And immediately God started to reveal their hearts.

"We were encouraged early on to be transparent, to reveal ourselves, and that was really weird," says Jeremy. "Crap started to come up in our own life. We were just frustrated at each other." While the call grew stronger for her husband, Michele started tugging at the reins and doubting the call to change churches. "I started building a case [of] all the reasons we shouldn’t go," she says. "I just felt like [our old church] was our family … we were comfortable there." The discord was a joint effort. "I didn’t lead well," says Jeremy. "I was relying on my old tactics of trying to be the one to fix this … trying to fix my wife." Sin of self-sufficiency, as he calls it. "I try to baptize people into the knowledge of Jeremy and my knowledge and my righteousness and my goodness, as opposed to saying Jesus is the one. … [But] the moment I let go, she started to totally come around." Seeing Jesus at the center of the struggle was a crucial turning point for Michele, too. "All these years I’d been kidding myself about what it truly means to submit. It’s not just submitting to him, but I also had been fighting with God and I was taking it out on [Jeremy]," she says. "I wanted it on my terms and my way."

"The reconciliation that happens in relationship with Jesus is what we’re after." –Jeremy

One night, in a long, battle-worn conversation, the couple hammered out their core convictions: yes, this was a church that belonged to God, the leaders were called and gifted by his Holy Spirit to lead it, and they were committed to serving God through this church together. Not being resolved in the commitment resolved all the problems, but comfort was no longer the idol it had been. "Being willing to accept the conflict and tension that comes from growing," says Jeremy, "It’s uncomfortable, but uncomfortable isn’t bad." Now, he says, it's about "moving past that to a point where we’re able to walk in unity behind Christ." "We’re on mission together," says Michele. "We’re a team. What God’s calling us to do here in the city, we both know God’s called us here." And it's a partnership that grounds itself in the gospel. "'It’s all about Jesus' had always seemed like just a line," says Jeremy. "But the reality is that Jesus died for all of this stuff that needs fixing—and the reconciliation that happens in relationship with him is what we’re after." Pastor Tim Smith leads Mars Hill Portland, which meets at 3210 SE Taylor St on Sundays at 10 a.m. You can follow the Oregon church, which will officially launch on January 15, on Facebook and Twitter.