lets talk about marriage
Today I want to write about marriage. Now, if you're not married (yet), this will still be helpful, so don't skip it! I want to shed some light on things we need to be aware of as we enter into a marriage or navigate our marriage.
My wife and I have been married for eight years (9years this November!). Our first two years of marriage were challenging. We argued almost every day, and we disagreed on ALMOST everything. We were stuck fighting for ourselves and not fighting for our marriage. It was rough. However, in these two years, we learned a lot about marriage. We can call it trial and error, but either way, those two years taught us how to fight for and protect marriage.
So I want to lay out a few things to look out for in your marriage! We can call them "little foxes" (Song of Solomon 2:15). If we allow these little foxes to enter into our marriage, they will begin to destroy the beautiful relationship God intended for us to have with our spouse.
We must keep the fox of "unfair expectations" out of our relationship. When my wife and I first got married, we both had a different idea of marriage. I expected her to be a certain wife; she expected me to be a certain husband. We both failed at these expectations. With unfair expectations, we want our spouse to serve us, do what we want, and be the person we need. We put unfair and unrealistic expectations on each other. So how do we avoid this? Well, we serve one another. We don't demand service, but we freely give it. We become what we expect from our spouse. We must look out for the interest of each other, not for our own.
Another little fox that will destroy our marriage is hidden sin. Anywhere sin is allowed, it will breed destruction. So if we allow it into our marriage, it will ruin it! How do we overcome hidden sin in our lives? It takes vulnerability, accountability, and spiritual responsibility. We must be vulnerable and confess to our spouse. How can any marriage be successful with hidden sin? We must bring it to the open. We need to find accountability, people we trust that can help us and help our marriage. And we need spiritual responsibility. We must be men and women of prayer and the Word. Most issues in a marriage come from the lack of time with the Lord.
The last fox we need to watch out for is the little fox of blame. We are always blaming each other for everything that goes wrong. We need to learn to take responsibility for our actions. We blame each other because we want to be the "right one" to win the argument! The thing is this, you can blame all day and never take responsibility, and you may think that you won. But in marriage, if you have one winner and one loser, you have two losers! We don't fight for our win. We fight on the same team. When we both win, our marriage wins. I don't want to win; I want my marriage to succeed.