Marriage Communication

Many couples have found that the marriage years slip past with increasing and alarming rapidity. Oftentimes, young couples on their honeymoon assume that they will have an entire lifetime to spend in each other’s company. But the realities of life soon crowd in. Career and home pressures consume time and attention. Friends and family make their demands upon a couple’s time. Even church events, as good and edifying as they might be, can encroach upon valuable time that a couple might spend together.

Often marriage problems don’t come from a couple’s issues with each other — the root cause is a breakdown in an individual spouse’s personal relationship with God!

Each one of us can fulfill five basic roles throughout our lives. We can also help others fulfill these roles in their lives. These life roles include being a mature person, a skilled provider, a loving marriage partner, a wise parent, and an effective proclaimer.

Human authorities are accountable for how they exercise their authority. . . . Those under authority are accountable to God for their responses to authority.

The enemy will do all he can to keep us from being open with our spouse about our sexual failures. Satan will convince us that confessing them will only bring hurt and confusion, that God has already forgiven us, and that they are sins of the past that have been dealt with. However, until we are open with our marriage partner regarding all failures—past and present—we will remain in bondage.

Somehow the most important thing I learned from this setting was that looking good on the outside was what really counted. The standard we measured everything by was, “What will people think?” No one shared openly about past or present sins and struggles. Thus, when I began to experience struggles and failures of my own, I didn’t dare tell anyone.