DAY 6 — REJECTING UNGODLY COUNSEL AND SEEKING GODLY WISDOM FOR YOUR MARRIAGE
14 Days of Prayer and Fasting for Marriages | A Powerful Life Ministries
Key Scriptures: Proverbs 11:14; Proverbs 15:22; James 1:5 (ESV)
Who Is Influencing Your Marriage?
Not every voice speaking into your marriage is leading you in the right direction.
Sometimes, the advice that causes the greatest damage comes from people who genuinely care about us. A friend may encourage us to retaliate. A relative may interfere in our relationship. Someone who has experienced a painful divorce may project their wounds onto our marriage. Even a spiritual leader may offer advice that lacks wisdom, accountability, or a proper understanding of our situation.
The voices you allow to influence your marriage can either strengthen your covenant or contribute to its destruction.
Welcome to Day 6 of our 14 Days of Prayer and Fasting for Marriages! Today, we are praying against ungodly counsel and asking the Lord to surround our marriages with wisdom, discernment, and trustworthy guidance.
As believers, we must learn to recognize which voices align with God's Word and which encourage attitudes and behaviors that undermine His principles for marriage.
1. Recognize the Power of Godly Counsel
Proverbs 11:14 teaches:
“Where there is no guidance, a people falls, but in an abundance of counselors there is safety.” — Proverbs 11:14 (ESV)
God's Word reminds us that wise counsel matters. Marriage was never meant to be navigated through our own understanding alone. There are seasons when we need the wisdom, experience, and perspective of mature believers and qualified professionals.
However, the goal is not simply to gather opinions. It is to seek guidance that helps us make decisions consistent with truth, wisdom, integrity, and godly character.
Consider the advice you might receive when you share a marital struggle:
A friend says, “Make your spouse suffer the way you suffered.”
A relative says, “You should never forgive someone who hurts you.”
Someone encourages you to hide your actions rather than address them honestly.
A trusted mentor encourages you to examine your own heart, communicate honestly, establish healthy boundaries, and seek reconciliation where appropriate.
Each voice offers a different direction. One encourages retaliation, resentment, or dishonesty. The other encourages accountability, wisdom, and growth.
The question is not simply, “Who is giving me advice?” The question is, “Is this advice wise, truthful, and consistent with God's principles?”
Do not assume that advice is godly simply because it comes from a Christian, a family member, or someone you have known for years. Evaluate the counsel carefully and prayerfully.
2. Test the Advice Before You Follow It
Proverbs 15:22 says:
“Without counsel plans fail, but with many advisers they succeed.” — Proverbs 15:22 (ESV)
Wise counsel can help us recognize blind spots, consider consequences, and make better decisions. But discernment is essential.
Before following someone's advice about your marriage, ask yourself:
Does this counsel align with Scripture?
God's wisdom will never require us to embrace dishonesty, revenge, manipulation, or deliberate cruelty. Biblical counsel should encourage truth, righteousness, humility, and love.
Does this person have the maturity and experience to guide me?
Someone may love you deeply but lack the knowledge or emotional maturity to advise you about a complex marital problem. Good intentions do not automatically make someone a wise counselor.
Is this advice helping me take responsibility, or simply blaming my spouse?
Healthy counsel helps you examine your own choices while recognizing your spouse's responsibility for theirs. It does not excuse harmful behavior, but neither does it encourage you to avoid personal accountability.
Is this advice promoting healing or increasing division?
Be cautious when someone repeatedly encourages hostility, feeds resentment, shares your private marital struggles unnecessarily, or pressures you to make major decisions without carefully considering the circumstances.
This does not mean every recommendation to separate or establish distance is ungodly. In situations involving abuse, threats, coercion, or violence, creating distance and seeking safety may be necessary. Wise counsel recognizes the difference between ordinary marital conflict and situations that require immediate protection.
Discernment means examining the substance of the advice, the character and qualifications of the person offering it, and the consequences of following it.
3. Ask God for Wisdom
James 1:5 offers an encouraging promise:
“If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask God, who gives generously to all without reproach, and it will be given him.” — James 1:5 (ESV)
What a powerful reminder! You do not have to navigate every marital challenge with your own understanding.
You can ask God for wisdom.
Pray before making major decisions. Ask the Holy Spirit to help you recognize unhealthy influences, examine your motives, and respond with grace and truth. Ask God to guide you toward people who can provide honest, compassionate, and competent counsel.
Sometimes, godly wisdom will challenge you to apologize. At other times, it may require you to establish boundaries, confront a serious problem, or seek professional support. Wisdom does not always tell us what we want to hear, but it helps us pursue what is right.
Remember, seeking God's guidance does not mean waiting passively for a supernatural sign before taking action. God can work through Scripture, prayer, mature spiritual mentors, qualified marriage counselors, and practical resources.
Pray for wisdom, test the counsel you receive, and have the courage to follow truth even when it challenges your preferences.
4. Choose Your Marriage Support System Wisely
You do not need to share every detail of your marriage with everyone in your circle. At the same time, you should not isolate yourself from appropriate support.
Healthy support systems protect confidentiality, respect appropriate boundaries, and encourage responsibility and growth.
Consider identifying at least one trustworthy source of guidance for your marriage, such as:
A mature Christian mentor: Someone whose life demonstrates integrity, humility, faithfulness, and wisdom.
A qualified marriage counselor: A trained professional who can help you address communication problems, conflict, trust, and other relational challenges.
A trusted pastoral leader: Someone who provides biblical guidance, respects confidentiality, recognizes personal limitations, and knows when to recommend professional assistance.
A supportive, trustworthy couple: A couple whose relationship demonstrates healthy communication, mutual respect, and a willingness to learn and grow.
You may need more than one source of support, depending on your circumstances.
Be cautious about involving relatives or friends who have difficulty maintaining boundaries or who become so emotionally invested that they cannot offer balanced guidance. Protecting your marriage does not require secrecy about serious problems, but it does require wisdom about whom you trust with sensitive information.
And remember: seeking professional counseling is not a failure of faith. It can be a wise and responsible step toward healing.
5. Your Day 6 Practical Challenge: Identify a Trustworthy Source of Guidance
Today, take a few minutes to evaluate the voices influencing your marriage.
Step 1: Identify the people whose advice you regularly seek about your relationship.
Step 2: Ask whether their counsel encourages biblical principles, honesty, accountability, healthy boundaries, and constructive solutions.
Step 3: Identify one trustworthy person or qualified professional you could approach when your marriage needs guidance.
Step 4: Pray for discernment before accepting or acting on advice.
Step 5: Commit to seeking counsel that promotes truth and healing rather than retaliation, manipulation, or unnecessary division.
If you are married, consider discussing together what healthy outside support should look like for your relationship. Agree, when possible, on appropriate boundaries for sharing private marital matters and on the people you can trust to guide you.
You do not have to accept every opinion. You do not have to follow every recommendation. You are responsible for prayerfully evaluating the counsel you receive.
Day 6 Prayer: Rejecting Ungodly Counsel and Seeking Godly Wisdom
Heavenly Father,
In the name of Jesus, we surrender our marriages to You. We acknowledge that we need Your wisdom, discernment, and guidance in every area of our relationships.
Lord, surround our marriage with wise counsel and give us discernment to follow Your truth.
Expose advice that encourages dishonesty, pride, resentment, manipulation, or unnecessary division. Protect our hearts and minds from influences that would lead us away from Your principles. Help us recognize the difference between advice that feeds our emotions and counsel that leads us toward truth, healing, and righteousness.
Father, teach us to seek Your wisdom before making decisions. Give us humility to receive correction, courage to confront difficult issues, and discernment to recognize when we need additional support.
Bring trustworthy, mature, and wise people into our lives. Lead us to mentors and qualified professionals who can help us strengthen our marriage and navigate difficult seasons with integrity.
Help us establish healthy boundaries with family members, friends, and outside influences. Teach us to protect our marriage without isolating ourselves from the support and guidance we genuinely need.
Above all, help us become people who offer wise and godly counsel to others. May our words bring encouragement rather than division, truth rather than deception, and hope rather than despair.
We ask You to guide our decisions, guard our hearts, and strengthen our commitment to honor You in our marriage.
In Jesus' mighty name, Amen.
Reflection Questions
Whose advice has the greatest influence on my perspective about my marriage?
Have I accepted counsel that has increased resentment, division, or distrust?
Am I willing to receive correction and examine my own contribution to marital challenges?
Who can provide trustworthy, mature, and qualified guidance when we need help?
What boundaries should we establish to protect our marriage while remaining connected to healthy support systems?
Declaration of Faith
Today, I commit to seeking God's wisdom for my marriage. I will not blindly follow every voice or allow ungodly counsel to shape my decisions. I will test the advice I receive, seek trustworthy guidance, and remain open to correction. I will pursue truth, wisdom, and healing rather than resentment, manipulation, or division. Lord, surround our marriage with wise counsel and give us discernment to follow Your truth. In Jesus' name, Amen.
Continue with Day 7!
As we continue our 14 Days of Prayer and Fasting for Marriages, remember that the voices surrounding your marriage matter. Choose wisdom. Establish healthy boundaries. Seek godly counsel. Above all, remain sensitive to the direction of the Holy Spirit.
Invite your spouse, family, and friends to join you in prayer as we continue believing God for stronger, healthier, and Christ-centered marriages.
Keep praying. Keep seeking wisdom. Keep building your marriage on God's truth.
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