Damaging a Marriage (1)

Posted by Jim on Aug 30, 2009
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When we were married, I was naïve enough to honestly say I could foresee no future problems. Of course, for this to happen she would need to see me as perfect and I would see her the same. That didn’t happen. One person defined marriage as, “a flawed person married to a flawed person in a fallen world but with a faithful God.” It is amazing that two sinners can live under the same roof for fifty years without one or the other at least being maimed!
According to enrichment journal the divorce rate in America for first marriage is 41%, for the second 60%, and for the third 73%. (The rate of divorce in the church is NOT even close to this, contrary to some statements.) No one plans divorce when they marry. So how could such a good thing end up so bad?
It doesn’t take much research to find plenty of reasons why marriages break up. The list usually includes finances, sex, infidelity, communication breakdown, abuse, boredom, addictions, etc. But these are symptoms of deeper needs. For the world, the need is Christ. But Christians also experience lack luster marriages, not worthy of their Scriptural comparison to Christ’s relationship with the church. Let’s focus on some foundational causes of marriage problems for the next few weeks. The first is unmet expectations.
It has been said that at a marriage altar six people are being married: who the groom thinks he is, who the bride thinks he is, and who he really is, then ditto for the bride. Of course, the average newlyweds think these are all the same. They aren’t.  Too often he expects her to be the ideal he envisions and, when she isn’t, he reacts and the problems begin. The same is true, of course, of the wife. The unmet expectations can turn to bitterness and remain unresolved for years, even decades.
The answer to this problem is two fold: focus and trust. First, focus on your own responsibilities instead of your mate’s. An older couple attended one church where we were members. The man was continually prodding the pastor to preach on “wives be subject to your husbands.” I asked him what he hoped would happen if the pastor did preach on this. He, of course, expected his wife to be more submissive. I encouraged him to focus on his own role of loving her as Christ loved the church. He ignored this and soon left the church. The truth is, the wife would have found it easier to submit to a more loving husband.
Second, give your expectations to God. Psalm 62:5 states, “My soul, wait thou only upon God; for my expectation is from him.” If you both are what God wants you to be and you trust God to make your mate what he/she should be, you are headed for a happy marriage.

Courtship (3)

Posted by Jim on Aug 23, 2009
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Last time I continued the discussion of courtship by sharing my own children’s choices. Here are the next two.
Nate knew Rachelle’s family for some years and often planned fun activities together as friends. When he felt God was wanting their second born to be his wife, he talk with the parents without telling her of his intentions. In fact, when her father told her, she was surprised. Her father asked her to search the Scripture and pray as long as she wanted until she knew God’s will. No contact between the two was allowed during this time. About two months later she agreed to marry him. They set up strict courting rules to protect their purity and reputation until marriage a few months later.
We didn’t always do it right. My daughter eloped against my wishes, even though she had made a courtship commitment to me and God several years earlier. The factors that led to this were both of our faults but the hurts were deep. For nine months we had no communication as I struggled between my own wounds and Biblical forgiveness. Finally we were able to work through the issues and be reconciled. Finally I was able to give their marriage my blessing. Today we are in good fellowship.
As I said, I failed in many ways in this situation. But, no matter how faltering and failing your father or mother are, this is NOT the way to handle the marriage issue. Your parents have invested thousands of hours and dollars and prayers in raising you, and they deserve your honor as you leave home and start your own. How you start your marriage is VERY important. You need God’s blessing through your parents on your marriage. That is the right way to begin.
Here’s some practical advice: work on your own spiritual depth, and trust God to bring into your life that person who will meet you at that level and grow with you in your knowledge of Him. Marriage and the space program have this in common: if you head in the right direction in the first place, its takes fewer mid-course corrections to keep you on track.
Those of us who are older ought to be praying for the young people in our church. Marriage is life’s second most important decision. Satan loves to ruin the potential of godly young people by getting them to marry the wrong person or in the wrong way. But God is greater and will direct your life as you trust Him.

Courtship (2)

Posted by Jim on Aug 16, 2009
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The concept of courtship is designed for protection. Last time we talked about protecting a young person from making emotional decisions contrary to godly wisdom. Another purpose is the protection from emotional pain. Two people start dating and one sees potential in a lasting relationship, while the other doesn’t. Unless something changes, the result of this will often be hurt and a feeling of rejection. I have heard people say, “That’s just part of life. You just get over it.” I have also seen a number of these get over their marriage with the same thinking.
The working out of courtship is as diverse as the will of God. I will share how my oldest children met and married their spouses. All have happy, secure marriages today.
My oldest son Andrew was 27 and a youth pastor in Ontario. He felt God wanted him to marry but knew of no prospects. The summer of 1996 I spoke at a Christian camp and took my family with me for the week. We were impressed with Angela, one of the counselors, especially with her loving care of Paul, our special needs son. When we got home I told Andrew, “We found you a wife.” “Oh, thanks,” he answered sarcastically. However, in the next months he found out more about her and learned she was working that year at a Word of Life Camp just north of him. This was part of the 4 year program at the Bible school. He called me one day and asked if I would talk with her supervising professor during our next visit to the school. When I did, the professor answered, among other things, “I would be proud to have her as my daughter-in-law.” After checking with two or three others who knew her, Andrew called her and invited her out for dinner. They did two or three other things together and then Andrew contacted her parents to receive permission to court her. He invited her to visit our family at Christmas and she fit in like she was a part of us already. He also visited her parents. In the spring, Andrew wrote her parents again, stating that he would call in a week asking permission to marry their daughter. As soon as the letter arrived, her mother called gladly granting that permission. They were married 6 months later, just a year after we met her at camp.
Peter and Stephanie both worked in the graphics arts department of a Christian ministry that provided room, board, and a small salary. Though they didn’t date, their compatibility told both of them God seemed to be in their desires of future marriage. Her father advised Peter to resign that ministry to establish himself financially. He did this, moving to Texas, far from her. When the business prospered, he received raises until he was able to support a wife and family.
(more next time)

Courtship (1)

Posted by Jim on Aug 09, 2009
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I used to listen to J. Vernon McGee each morning on the way to work and enjoyed his Texas twang expositions. However, I didn’t always agree with him. For example, I felt that he missed the story of Ruth fundamentally by imposing western dating thinking into the text. He called it the story of “love at first sight.” Actually the word ‘love’ is only given once in the story and that was speaking of the love of Ruth for her mother-in-law. (Ruth 4:15). Instead, it seems to me to be a story of courtship and of growing attraction as character and godliness are revealed.
Notice, for example, how many times it mentions that Boaz was impressed with Ruth’s looks. That’s right, not one. Notice instead his awareness of her character. He noted that she was sacrificial, diligent, loyal, selfless, etc. For this he rewarded her and her humble, godly response obviously impressed him. The relationship developed from there.
Though the Bible does say that love covers a multitude of sins (1 Peter 4:8), it never says love is the basis of marriage. It is, instead, the basis of Christian fellowship between all believers. (1 John 1:6-7; John 13:34-35) Marriage is built on a mutual commitment for each other’s good in the will of God. That commitment is called a covenant in Malachi 2:14 and makes marriage an unconditional vow before God.
Christians who understand the Bible and themselves ought to be glad that marriage is not based on love. That’s because it is easy to misunderstand what love is. A week after meeting my wife, I told her, “I think I’m falling in love with you.” Looking back, I would have been more accurate to say, “I am infatuated with you and I think I’m falling in love with the idea of being in love.” This failure to understand love led to years of damaged relationships because she didn’t (couldn’t) measure up to the ideal I had painted of her, the ideal I had really loved.
Herein is one of the great benefits of a courtship commitment. Dating sets us up for falling in love with love. Courtship works through the authorities of the two people involved. Those authorities, usually their fathers, are not emotionally involved in the relationship. They have the great advantage, hopefully, of the wisdom of years, the wisdom of Scripture, and a love and desire for the best for their children. When a young person entrusts his or her future into the hands of the parents in this matter, they are declaring several things. First, they are stating that they believe God will work through their authority to bring His best into their lives. Second, they are trusting the authority that they do know them, love them, and want their best. Third, they are submitting their own feelings to the wise counsel of an elder. God delights to honor such trust. (2 Chron. 16:9a)

Modeling

Posted by Jim on Aug 02, 2009
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Give me a lump of clay, tell me to make a model of a picture, and when I am done, you will probably say, “That’s nice. What is it?” Not with Alonzo Clemons. As a child, Alonzo was dropped on his head and suffered brain ‘damage’ that left him unable to read, write, calculate, or even to speak much. However, he has an insatiable drive to make clay models. If he sees the picture of an animal once, he can make an exact image of it every time without looking again.
When I read about Alonzo, I thought of parenting. You and I are models for our children in a thousand ways, for good or bad.
When I first taught 5th grade in a Christian school, we had a parent-teacher meeting several weeks into the year. As the parents lined up to talk with me, I was struck by the physical likeness of the children to their parents. But as we talked, I was more struck by the mannerisms, accents, even eye movements that were modeled in their child. If children pick up such detail, like Alonzo, without instruction, how much more will they imitate our values, character, and responses to life in the same way!
Jesus told Thomas, “He that hath seen me hath seen the Father.” Paul said that Jesus was in the form of God and took on the form of a servant. (Phil. 2:6-7) This Greek word is morphe, from which we get metamorphosis, to change in form as a caterpillar to a butterfly. The word denotes the exact essence of a person’s nature. Jesus was the essence of the Father and became the essence of a bondslave. Frankly, to the extent we as parents are the morphe of Christ we will see Jesus Christ modeled in our children.
One of the hardest parts of parenting to me has been seeing revealed in my very young children the secret sins I thought I had covered so well! In our children, the hidden things are truly shouted from the housetop! I remember with deep regret the day I taught my son to respond to frustrations with anger. Things weren’t going well in a project we were working on together. He looked at me to see how I would respond. I failed. He is still modeling my response now, years later.
Our response to these truths could be twofold. We could rent our garments in anguish because of our own lack of Christlikeness for our children to model. Better is to humbly admit to them that we fail and are still growing. Ask them to pray for us, as we do for them. Then let’s get alone daily and tell God we realize that what they see of God will largely be seen in us, whether right or wrong. Let’s ask God to help us be a worthy model of Jesus Christ for them to imitate.