Is your marriage good enough?

The trend is the same nowadays, you see a happily married couple today and in less than a year, they are not happy and filing for a divorce. What really happens in such situations? CHEU MITA seeks answers.

Indeed, we have all heard it said at bridal showers or other similar gatherings, as men and women who met after we had grown all our teeth there are bound to be differences.

Spiritual marriage counsellor Pastor Constance Masamba advises that young couples date for at least six months before finally agreeing to live under the same roof.

“Most importantly, the engagement period should be a time when the couple learns to communicate and develop the habit of communicating with each other,” she says adding that it is during this stage that roots of a healthy marriage are established.

Paul Amato, PhD, professor of sociology, demography, and family studies at Penn State, conducted a 20-year study on couples. He discovered that most divorced people say they continue to love their betrothed ,but are bored with the relationship or feel it hasn’t lived up to their expectations.

“It’s important to recognise that many of these marriages would improve over time,” Amato says, “and most of them could be strengthened through marital counselling and enrichment programmes.”

So, how do you know if you have one of those fixable marriages? Do some soul -searching. The following are questions provided on Oprah.com:

1. Are you exaggerating the negatives? For the next two months, mark the good and bad days on your calendar to get a reality check.

2. Have you already left the marriage by emotionally withdrawing? Or by giving up all attempts to make the relationship better? If so, can you find a way to re-engage?

3. Do you get so angry that you hit each other or throw things at least once a month? If the answer is yes, are you hanging on to a terrible relationship because you’re afraid of being alone? Or because you’re convinced it’s the best you can do?

4. If you’re frustrated because your husband won’t change (you’d like him to be more forceful or manly, for example), is it really necessary that he does? Is there anything in your family history that may be driving your need to transform him? (Your father never stood up for you when you needed him.)

5. Have you been teaching your husband the wrong lessons by not challenging his hurtful behaviour? (You don’t say anything when he criticises you in public. He never washes the dishes, so you just do them, resentfully.)

6. Do you have fun together? Even when things are tough, do you make jokes about it? (A good sign.) If not, can you make time in your marriage for more play?

7. Are there conflicts that you’ve avoided in the relationship? What do you fear would happen if you confronted them?

8. Do you simply need more time alone? A weekend on your own every so often to make the heart grow fonder?

9. Has something occurred—a death, a big birthday, a job loss—that’s throwing off your relationship and needs to be addressed?

10. Have you done everything you possibly can to make this marriage work? Are you certain he has heard your complaints? Have you tried a marriage-education class or couples therapy? If he won’t go to counseling, have you gone yourself to see how you might save the relationship?

Spiritual family -part 1

The second role of husbands is to love their wives unconditionally

Ephesians 5: 25-26 “Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the Church and gave himself up for her, to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the Word and to present her to himself as a radiant church, without stain and wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless”.

The love of a husband towards his wife should not be determined by what the wife does.

Whether she is a faithful and trustworthy or vice versa; the husband is commanded to love her all the same.

Whether the wife is lazy and arrogant, she still deserves to be loved by the husband. The husband has to consider the welfare of his wife and do all in his power to love her.

A Christian husband has to love his wife unconditionally. Situations surrounding the wife should not determine whether she gets the love from her husband or not.

The wife might be found in tough situations, and this should be the more reason to love her more and sympathise with her, encourage and always be there for her.

Genesis 2:24 says; “For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife and they will become one flesh”.

The “reason” referred to in this context is about love. Once that love is expressed and brought before God to bless it in a marital set-up, that love shall stand and remain till death does the two apart.

—To be continued