Advice Christian Marriage
When someone types in the term ‘advice Christian marriage’ … what are they searching for?
Is it premarital advice? How to save your Christian marriage? Whether there are differences folks from another religion planning on marrying a Christian need to be aware of? Is it about the role of marital sex?
My feeling is – and please, correct me if I’m wrong by entering your thoughts in the Comments section below! – that advice Christian marriage is a plea for understanding.
The Bible is replete with references to purity and sanctity of marriage, punishments for wrong-doers, the need for commitment from both partners to the other and to God. In fact, the overarching guidance, the ultimate advice Christian marriage, is in Gen 2:18-24 – ‘Marriage was instituted in Paradise when man was in innocence’.
That quote is perhaps the defining one for why Chistians feel disoriented when their own marriage turns out to be anything but ‘made in paradise’. And why they seek advice from a Christian perspective.
If fidelity, respect, love, submission, commitment, honor and acceptance are the cornerstones of what a marriage is supposed to be about ‘as long as you both shall live’, how can a right-thinking Christian make sense of events in their own life that differ wildly from that?
The answer lies in that cornerstone quote – ‘when man was in innocence’ – and times have changed. While those values are the essence of happy marriage, the institution has been corrupted over time. From the original lifelong monogamy through polygamy, concubinage and various forms of bride-price through to current community acceptance of divorce, bliss is not guaranteed as part of the marriage licence.
In fact, the US Statistician says Christians actually have a higher than average rate of divorce. Which means there is a lot anguish, guilt and soul-searching among those searching on a phrase such as [tag]advice christian marriage[/tag].
Rev. Lee H. Baucom, in his book Save Your Christian Marriage accepts the situation and says simply that Christians caught in such a bind have only three options:
- You can live with things the way they are. . . Suffer
- You can just get out of the whole thing. . . Divorce
- You can change the marriage for the better.
“Let’s face it,” he says. “Marriage is a challenge! There is no way around that. But it is a challenge with enormous payoffs in the end. That is God’s plan. Marriages teach us to be better Christians, if we allow it.”
Marriage counselors universally agree that the biggest obstacle to getting wonky marriages back on track is that couples – or, the one who identifies the problem and is desperate to do something about it – is too willing to suffer. They keep putting off ‘doing something about it’ through procrastination, maintaining appearances, waitng for the ‘right time’… a hundred different reasons.
Like anything, early intervention can save a lot of pain. It can also create a satisfactory outcome that could not possibly eventuate if we simply hung in and toughed it out.
There are lessons to be learned in adversity. But no-one said you have to suffer to learn them. Your Christian duty is to learn them quickly, and move yourself and your partner into more fertile, joyous ground.
The best advice Christian marriage is to acknowledge reality, and then find ways of changing first your own attitude to achieving a solution, and then finding a solution to the problems.
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