Southern Baptist Holy Man Dave Miller affirms that Jesus has to have first dibs on your life.
Permit me to start with the obvious – a biblical foundation. It is not just a requirement of ministry, but of discipleship itself, that Jesus take a place of priority over anything in your life. Jesus said these words.
“If anyone comes to me and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes, and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple.”
Obviously, Jesus was not talking about visceral, emotional hate here. He is talking about priority. When God says “Jacob I loved and Esau I hated” it doesn’t mean that God despised Esau it meant he chose the younger over the elder. Jesus was demanding that he be the first choice in our lives always. Pleasing and obeying him must be my highest priority, more than pleasing my wife or children or anyone else. Jesus comes first.
Obviously? I see no justification for that characterization, but never mind. I say again: If the pleasure of an invisible friend is more important to you than your actual flesh-and-blood spouse then — psychologically, at least — you aren’t married at all.