Tag: Marriage

Categories
Marriage

When We Disagree

Unfortunately, our society has made us feel like when we disagree, we cannot love each other and we cannot work through our differences. When someone disagrees with us, we feel personally offended, like all the hard work and research that we put into our opinions were squashed by one sweeping blow of another person’s opinion. But that’s not the way that God intended us to live in community. We are all made in God’s image, and through that we each display unique attributes that all help us see God in humanity.

How do you and your spouse handle disagreements in your marriage?

Based on what I have heard from counselors and other people who have experience with disagreement (everyone but us, of course!), here are some practical tips for dealing with disagreement:

  1. Submit to one another. Ephesians 5 says that we should submit to one another.  That means that when you’re in a disagreement, one of you needs to “give up” and let your spouse win.  I’ve heard conservative couples say that the wife should always submit to the husband, but sometimes the wife has some valid points that the husband needs to consider, so he shouldn’t have the mindset that his opinion is the only one that matters.
  2. Look at the bigger picture. Prayer helps us have a better perspective on the issues that we face. Is it really life-threatening that he wants a blue rug, but she wants an orange one? Is it really going to destroy your marriage if he wants to go to Puerto Rico on vacation and she wants to go to the Bahamas? There are obviously more serious disagreements, such as where you are going to live and how you’re going to spend your money, but above everything else, you need to remember to make a decision together. There is no perfect decision, but there is always a way to make a decision that makes you both comfortable.
  3. Write a pro-con list. You can’t ignore the facts. If one person wants to move out of state and the other doesn’t, for example, look at the benefits (saving money, getting a bigger house, more work opportunities) and the threats (smaller salaries, being away from family, having to move your child out of school) of making either decision. You may think your way is better, but listen to your spouse and look at the facts together. Be open to changing your mind.
  4. Avoid trigger words. It is only natural for us to be personally offended when someone disagrees with us. But don’t let it happen. Don’t let your personal feelings get in the way of a decision that is being made.  Avoid phrases such as “What are you talking about?” “What is your problem?” and “What is wrong with you?”  I don’t care who is right in this situation.  If you talk to your spouse like that, he/she will definitely tune out and not give your idea even a second thought.

The most important thing to remember is that disagreement does not equal fighting. At least, it doesn’t have to involve fighting.  According to the Bible, when a man and a woman get married, they become one flesh.  We are called to consistently and continually become one throughout our marriage. We learn to compromise, we learn to communicate, and we learn to make decisions together. It is a practice that takes time, but must not be detrimental to the marriage.

What tips do you agree with?  What tips would you add to this list?

Photo by Luiz Hanfilaque on Unsplash

Categories
Marriage

Struggles in Marriage

When I was on my honeymoon with my husband, I knew that life could not get any better.  We were sipping piña coladas at no additional cost.  We were warm under the beautiful Bahamas sun.  We woke up at 5:40AM and went to bed at 8:00PM.  One day, we went to bed at 6PM and missed our 7:30PM dinner reservations.  But guess what?  We didn’t care!

Only fourteen months later, while the honeymoon feelings are still there (we are holding onto them as long as we can!) our lives are not as warm and fuzzy as the Bahamas sun.

Life is hard.  The money runs out, the work day is stressful, and the demands of life are more than the average person can handle.  All of those things can cause us to take out our anger on our spouses if we are not careful.

I want to offer a bit of encouragement to those who are going through a difficult season.  Regardless of where you are in life, you may be in a place where you’re tempted to fight against your spouse rather than with your spouse.  Your spouse is your life partner and journey sharer, the one who God has chosen to love you and to encourage you on your journey.  God has chosen you to do the same for your spouse.  You and your spouse are a team, a force that is more powerful together than apart.

The Bible says that two people are better than one.  That passage in Ecclesiastes talks about one person falling into a hole and another person pulling him out, and a person who is cold and has someone to keep him warm in bed.  Those are both two difficult situations that are made easier when there are two people struggling rather than one.

The same is true for marriage.

Married friends, your spouse is meant to help you through the difficult times.  Do not see your spouse as an enemy, but as a partner in crime.  Pray together and let God speak through both of you.  You will be amazed at the confirmation you receive from God as a result of what He tells you and your spouse.

Yesterday, when I was at work, I had a lot of time to think about the situation we are currently facing.  For several months, we have been praying about a specific problem that we have been having.  An idea popped into my head and wouldn’t stop nagging me. It seemed like a good idea, but it was completely against what we have been planning all this time.  To convince my husband to get on board with my idea, after I spent all this time trying to convince him otherwise, would have been difficult and would have made me look fickle.  I prayed that God would give me wisdom.

At home, while we were talking about our situation, I proposed my idea to him.  He smirked when I finished talking.  “It’s amazing that I was thinking the same exact thing today,” he said.  God spoke to both of us about an idea that we were completely against a few days ago.

Through this struggle we’ve been having, I have never seen my husband pray more.  I have never seen my husband have more faith in God’s plan and God’s timing.  My husband has done such an incredible job of encouraging me in our struggle.  And I’ll admit that I haven’t been as positive as I usually am, but I pray that God has grown me through this and that the growth is evident in my life!

Let’s face it: Life is not a beautiful trip to the Bahamas.  Instead of asking God to take away your struggle, ask God to use this struggle to bring you closer to Him.  When you trust God and trust your spouse in the midst of struggle, God will grow you and your marriage.  You will look back on this difficult season and know that God used it to fulfill His plan and purpose in you and your spouse’s lives.

Photo by Zoriana Stakhniv on Unsplash

Categories
Marriage

Women Need Women

Before I got married, I lived in a house full of women. The only man in the house was our male cat, Tyler. Given the fact that my mom, my sister, and I lived in close quarters together, we would talk about everything. My mom was a nurse and had a lot of unique experiences, so I felt comfortable asking her for advice about pretty much everything. My sister knows a lot about fashion, and she loves to encourage people, so I always send her pictures when I’m shopping to see what she thinks of my outfit. I’m a great listener, and I like going deep with people emotionally, so both my mom and my sister have had great chats with me about their feelings, their faith, and how to resolve conflict. We were a great team, and we worked together really well.

My mom was the first one to get a man and cause a shift in this woman-only house. Not even six months later is when I met my husband, and a few months after my sister started dating her now fiance. While in the honeymoon stage, we all focused very seriously on our partners like we were supposed to do. Although we were close before, and still were close while we were focusing on our relationships, we made boundaries of not sharing our personal problems with each other.

My mom started dating her boyfriend in August 2014. I started dating my boyfriend in June 2015. My sister met her boyfriend in August 2015.

My mom got engaged in April 2015. We got engaged in December 2016. My sister got engaged in December 2017.

My mom got married in September 2017. We got married in November 2016. My sister is planning her wedding now but is getting married soon.

After being married for about a year and a half, I’ve learned one thing: I still need my mom and my sister. I still need to ask my mom advice or even just vent to her. I still send my sisters pictures of my outfits that I’m trying on at in the fitting room. I still call them all the time and catch up with them.

As much as I love my husband, he wasn’t meant to be my everything. God gave him to me to be my life partner and journey sharer. But God also gave me such lovely friends and family members that have made my journey easier as well.

My husband craves time with his guy friends, so I know this is not just a woman thing. He enjoys going over his friend’s house and spending time with them. As a woman, I expect to have the same type of relationship with my female friends. I love calling one of my friends from college who lives out of state but knows just what to say to make me feel better. I love talking to my friends who are walking through life with me; I’m able to go on adventures with them and laugh about our struggles, knowing that we are not alone in our battles.

Every relationship has a place. Without stepping on your husband’s toes and on your marriage, invest in the other relationships in your life. I warn you: do not gossip to your friends/family members about your husband, but talk about how you’re feeling. Whether the world wants to believe it or not, women and men are different and have different needs. While men want to help, they’re not always able to meet our every need. Even if the women in your life can’t fix the problem, they can walk through it with you while you figure it out in time.

It’s important to build that relationship with your husband, but don’t forget about the other people in your lives. If you have friends that are married, do not gather around and bash your husbands together. Instead, share your struggles with each other so that you can all discover that you are not alone. And enjoy the bond that God has given all of you as women!

Photo by Joseph Pearson on Unsplash

Categories
Marriage

Your Spouse’s Spiritual Journey

I have to make a confession that I cringe every time I hear the term “unequally yoked.”  The Bible is clear against marrying unbelievers.  However, we have also swung to the other side of the pendulum, where people expect their potential partners to know the Bible inside and out and to actually be flawless.  Women want men who are going to be the spiritual leaders of the household, and what that actually means is that they want their men to be responsible for the women’s relationships with God.  I’m here to share that my husband and I weren’t “equally yoked” in that sense of the word when we first started dating.

You see, when I first met my husband, he wasn’t what I would call “more spiritual” than I am.  He didn’t know the Bible as well as I did.  He didn’t even know his testimony!  Over time, I thought that I had made a mistake and was wondering what to do about the situation.

However, after spending more time with him, I realized that he had such great faith.  He served faithfully in the choir.  He made the decision himself to be baptized.  He prayed with me and helped me in ways that I couldn’t help myself grow closer to the Lord.  He served as a leader in the College Ministry.  Love exuded from his spirit as he served and interacted with others.  It was like he had the faith, but he didn’t have the resources to express his faith until recently.  Since I’ve been with my husband, I have watched him grow in ways that have just been beautiful and miraculous.  I’ve seen God answer our prayers together, as well as our prayers separately.

I would have never been involved in God’s miracles if I had believed that we were unequally yoked.

Instead of expecting your husband to be the spiritual leader, I first want to challenge you to think of what that really looks like.  What if you are equally yoked?  What if you expect your husband/future husband to read the Bible every day, and you haven’t touched yours in months?  Before playing the blame game, I want you to take the focus off of the other person and put it right back on yourself.  Just as it says in Luke 6:37, the judgment that you use to judge others will be used to judge you in the same measure.  Make sure that you are right with the Lord before you accuse your current or potential spouse of being spiritually weak.

Second, I want you to understand that spiritually mature looks different for everyone.  I mean, there are some people that you know are not quite right, and that’s because the Holy Spirit is telling you to stay away.  You must see evidence of the fruit that God has produced in their lives, especially through love.  My husband has always been incredibly generous, which demonstrates humility and kindness, and that’s how I see his spiritual maturity.  A spiritually mature person doesn’t have to be a pastor.  A spiritually mature person doesn’t have to lead worship every Sunday.  A spiritually mature person doesn’t even have to talk all that much.  We all have different spiritual gifts, and while some are amazing prayer warriors, and some are wonderful teachers, and some are songwriters for the Lord, there are some who have gifts that aren’t as noticeable.

For those who are married and are waiting for their spouses to spiritually “grow up,” I challenge you to look at your own heart.  Where are you lacking in your faith?  What are some ways where you can grow in your walk with the Lord?  Are you really spiritually mature?  Because if we’re honest, we are never fully matured.  We still have much to learn.  So learn to appreciate the growth that you see in your spouse, and use your faith to pray that he/she grows to be the person that God created him/her to be.

Photo by Mantas Hesthaven on Unsplash

Categories
Books Marriage

How to Pray for Your Husband

This is actually a book review for the book The Power of a Praying Wife by Stormie Omartian.  This book was recommended to me by several people, especially those who saw me reading it.  I’ll admit that because of the high expectation that I had of the book based on the high praises I received about it, I did not find the book to match up to my expectations.  Overall, it had a lot of great ideas for how to pray for my husband, and it was formatted in a way that made it easy for me to plan my prayers.  But it sort of seemed like the author had her own way of dealing with her husband, in terms of how she presented herself and what pleased her husband, that she portrayed as necessary for all women to have to do.  All men are different, and while they might have similarities, they do not all have the same needs and there is no textbook answer of how to meet our husband’s needs.

Nevertheless,  I did learn some good points that I believe will strengthen my marriage and help me to be more strategic in my prayers.  One thing I learned is to “shut up and pray.”  I’ve learned from experience that when my husband is struggling with something, he gets upset at me if I tell him what to do.  He does not want me to belittle him; he wants me to trust him.  When I can’t trust him, I pray, because I can trust God to intervene.  Either God will change my husband’s mind, or He will soften my heart to the issue.  It is better to pray for my husband and to let God be the one to tell him what to do.  Instead of criticizing everything he does wrong, when I see him doing something I don’t like, I should let God speak.  What he is doing may be totally wrong, or it might be exactly what God wants him to do, but I have to let God make that decision, not me.

The book is formatted with information about an area of life to pray for your husband, an example prayer, and finally key verses that can help guide your own personal prayers.  The book contains thirty chapters of areas to pray for your husband, one for each day of the month.  The first chapter, the longest chapter, is a prayer for his wife.  That’s me.  We often want to change our spouses, but it turns out that God is stirring in our hearts the desire to change.  We might get frustrated that our husbands do things we don’t like, especially if they did not do those things when we were dating.  But maybe the problem is not with our husbands.  Maybe it’s our perception of what he is doing that is wrong.  We should pray for ourselves first, to have an attitude that reflects Christ and a submissive heart that encourages our husband and does not tear him down.  We should also be reading the Word of God and praying the Scriptures over our husbands.  God’s Word can help guide and direct our prayers.

I believe that the point of the book is to develop a discipline of spending time in prayer with the Lord.  When your first priority is your husband, you are not inclined to make time for God.  But when your husband starts to do things that annoy you or worry you, that’s when God starts to grab your attention.  That’s when you turn to Him again.  And you can try as hard as you want to make your husband change, but only God can do that.

After reading this book, my plan is to see what my husband struggles with and pray for something new each day.  If I have to confront my husband on something, I will bring it to the Lord first.  It may involve simply praying about it.  But, with the Lord’s guiding, it may also involve having a graceful conversation about the issue.

I pray for unity in your marriage, and for God to speak to your heart as you pray on behalf of your husband.  Whether you want to change your husband’s habits, or you genuinely care about his salvation and his obedience to the Lord, God hears you and He is able to answer your prayer in such  a perfect way.

Photo by Diana Simumpande on Unsplash

Categories
Marriage

Marriage Monday (on Tuesday)- What to Expect in Marriage

“One winter a Farmer found a Snake stiff and frozen with cold. He had compassion on it, and taking it up, placed it under his coat. The Snake was quickly revived by the warmth, and resuming its natural instincts, bit its benefactor, inflicting on him a mortal wound.” (Aesop’s Fables, Eliot/Jacobs Version)

Just like the snake, humans have natural tendencies toward specific behaviors because of the influences of this world.  Because of the Fall, we have tendencies to sin and to fall short of perfection.  However, we expect people to look a certain way, act a certain way, and say certain things.  We get annoyed that people don’t fit into our molds of what the perfect husband, the perfect parent, or the perfect child looks like.  But when we actually try to control them, we find out that there’s nothing we can do to change them.  Some people are just the way they are, and we can’t fix them.

I tend to be a control freak. I really like perfection, whatever that is.  And most often, my lack of perfection and the lack of perfection in others leaves me pretty dissatisfied with relationships.  I keep having the same conflicts with the same people and I keep doing the same thing to try to fix it.  Doesn’t Einstein define that as insanity?

For those who want to change their spouses, remember the analogy of the snake.  If he has been trained his entire life to run away from conflict, then don’t get mad at him when he fears you raising your voice.  If she has been influenced to clean when she’s stressed, then don’t be surprised when she can’t sit still.  We have all been influenced by the way we’ve grown up, the people we’ve met, and the experiences we have undergone.  The patterns we have developed are not going to change overnight.  If they change, they will take time.  And they will take grace.

My advice to you today is from my dear friend, Elsa: let it go.  My husband would not be happy, because he has vowed never to see this movie.  But the simplicity of the lyrics and the sweetness in Idina Menzel’s voice as she sings these words reminds me that it truly is that simple.  You can’t control when your husband likes to check his phone every night before bed, thus shining the light in your face?  Let it go.  You can’t control that your wife likes to talk a lot right before bed, thus keeping you from precious sleep?  Let it go.  Just take a deep breath and walk away.  Don’t bring it up.  Just…let it go.

If it’s really an issue that makes your blood boil, pray about it.  God can intervene, and He will either change the habit or change your heart about it.  Be open to both.

I must add that there are expectations in marriage that are normal and healthy.  You expect your husband to remain faithful to you.  You expect your wife to honor the budget that you created together.  I know gender roles have changed a little bit over the years, but either spouse or both are expected to do their share of cleaning the house, shopping, raising the kids, and keeping the romance alive.  Your spouse is supposed make you feel safe.  Your spouse is expected to seek reconciliation and peace in your marriage, not to tear you down or talk bad about you.

Just like the snake analogy, people who are abusive, unfaithful, and lazy have also been shaped by their natural tendencies and by their environments.  Jealousy may also ensue from people who have been abused, cheated on, or neglected in past relationships, and this jealousy can manifest in anger, controlling behavior, or the silent treatment.  Knowing this, it is easy to feel sympathy for those who hurt us.  We have all sinned and fall short of the glory of God.  But abuse, infidelity, laziness, and jealousy are all detrimental to a marriage, in addition to our well-being, and so they must be confronted.

If your spouse has an issue with these detrimental habits in your marriage, do not let it go.  Pray earnestly, but do not be afraid to confront your spouse.  If your spouse does not listen, consider counseling or other resources to help you deal with your spouse in a graceful manner.

Grace is God’s indescribable gift to us (2 Corinthians 9:15).  When our spouses do not meet our expectations, let us extend this same gift to them.  Instead of making them meet your expectations, let God reveal His expectations for you and your life partner.

Photo by Jeremy Yap on Unsplash

Categories
Marriage

Marriage Monday: This is Your Time

It is so tempting to go on social media and see that you are falling behind.

Look at everybody else having kids, buying houses, getting engaged, getting married, putting their kids through pre-school.

When will it be your turn?

For a long time, I had fallen into the trap that if I just get to the next level, then I could finally start living. All I need to do is graduate college.  All I need to do is move out from my parents’ house.  All I need to do is get a boyfriend.  All I need to do is get engaged. All I need to do is get married.  If I have all my ducks in a row, then I’ll be happy.

But after attaining all of these things, I’m still not content. Well, I’m at least not content in these things.

My husband and I have a lot to be thankful for this time of year.  We survived our first year of marriage happier than ever.  We are now debt free after paying off my husband’s 6-year finance loan in one year, and after paying back my sister a couple of dollars we owed her from my mom’s bridal shower.  My husband and I are thriving in our hearts and in our marriage and in our careers.  But according to the world, we haven’t reached the next level.

Can you believe that people are asking us when we are having kids?

Can you believe that people are asking us when we will buy a house?

Can you believe that people are asking us when we’re going to get a real job?

We have learned to be discontent in this ever-changing world.  We have learned that if we follow the way of the world, we will never be happy.  So we’ve chosen to follow the way of Christ, the way that God has called us to live.

You see, God is the giver of life and the redeemer of time.  God is the one who calls us to live a life, and He is the one who plans our live for us.  He did not allot this time for us to prepare for life.  No, in this very moment, we are living.

My husband and I have learned several things to help us be content in God:

  • Be thankful.  We just finished Thanksgiving.  What are you thankful for?  As we mentioned before, we paid off a 6-year car loan in 1 year.  We are happy in our marriage.  We have peace from God about the decisions we have made.  And we don’t need anything else.If you are feeling discontent, write down a list of things that God has blessed you with.  Whether you’re married and you have a house full of kids and a noisy dog, or you’re single living in your parents’ house with a retail job, you have a lot to be thankful for.
  • Take a break from social media.  When I see smiling faces staring back at me on Facebook and Instagram, sometimes I get a little jealous.  Why don’t I get to go on that exotic vacation?  Why don’t I have my book published yet?  Why don’t I get to meet those cool people?  Why don’t we have a house yet?  The best remedy to these “If only’s” is to turn off my computer and live.  I might not have my dream life, but I have the story that God has written for me.  At the end of the day, His story is always better than the one I would have written for myself and for my family.  Sometimes, you need to celebrate with your friends from a distance.  When your friend is pregnant and you’re just not at that stage of life yet, take a break from Facebook and don’t fall prey to all the pregnancy announcements, gender reveal parties, and baby shower pictures.  Learn to love your own life, while also appreciating the work that God is doing in their lives.
  • Plan.  Sometimes it helps to make your dreams real when you sit down and plan.  We are nowhere near ready to buy a house, but when we sit down and think about how we want to decorate our house and what kinds of parties we want to have in our home, it makes our dreams more attainable.  It makes our fantasies realities.  Obviously, you don’t want to plan everything before the time is right.  You don’t know where God is going to lead you to live or how He’s going to lead you to raise your kids.  But you can talk about what is best for you and your family, and that can give you hope that it will happen someday.  If you’re also in a place in life where you want kids or a house or a career, and are potentially able to have those things, create goals with how to get there.  Make a budget toward saving for a down payment on a house.  Send out your resume to companies that do what you want to do.  The best way to plan is to pray.  Pray for God to show you what to do and how to get ready.

Do not give into the lie that you are not living now.  If you are breathing, you are living. This time is not preparation; this is it.  No matter if you’re working an entry-level job or you’re the CEO of your dream company, you are living.  No matter if you’re single or if you’re married with five kids, you are living.  No matter if your place of residence is your parents’ basement or a mansion, you are living.  Stop waiting for the next level and be thankful for this level.

Photo by Thorn Yang on Unsplash

Categories
Marriage

Finding Financial Freedom as a Couple

This post is a unique one because my husband helped me write it.  Go, team!

My husband and I are excited to say that we are 100% debt-free.  In our first year of marriage, we paid off my student loans (about $20K by the time we got married), his car loan ($21K with 0% interest), and a few dollars we owed my sister!  We are now in the process of saving money toward our emergency fund, and after that, we will start putting money toward a down payment for a house.

As many Christian couples that have gone before us, we have learned a lot from the teachings of Dave Ramsey, as well as from Christians around us who are good at budgeting.  We are thankful for their wisdom, and ultimately, for the wisdom that God has provided for us during our newlywed stage.

Here are some quick tips that have helped us to find financial freedom as a couple:

  • Evaluate your priorities. As a couple, we’ve had to make some hard decisions together about our spending.  Do we use our wedding money to pay off student loans, or to buy a house?  Do we save for a house, or do we go on vacation?  Wherever we choose to spend our money demonstrates our priorities.  Even while looking for jobs, we’ve had to ask ourselves: would we rather be making six figures, or would we rather be together as a family?  Unfortunately, the world does not promise us both.  We often have to pick between long hours of overtime and spending quality time with our loved ones.  We’ve clearly chosen the latter; we’ve both decided that we never want work to come before our marriage, even if that means making less money.
  • Tithe.  Along with priorities, in our marriage, our priority is to give glory to God and to serve Him above anyone else.  We have chosen to love God first, then each other, and then our family, and then everyone else.  That pattern of love is the way we make every decision, including with our finances.  We honor God by giving Him the first-fruits of our income, not the last bits of crumbs, if there’s even any left!  We have seen God bless our marriage and bless our finances through our decision to honor Him with the money that He has given us.
  • Make a budget.  Sit down together and make a budget that works for both of you.  One thing we’ve learned from Dave Ramsey is to assign every dollar that you make to an item on your budget.  The money shouldn’t just sit in your bank account.  It should have a purpose, and you and your spouse should have control over it.
  • Stick to the plan: This is the point that my husband wanted to add.  If you don’t stick to the plan, then you’ll just get right back into debt.  Plain and simple.  These are the wise words from my husband!
  • Have open communication: Today, I got a check for $10.  Ten.  Dollars.  That’s it.  But I still sent a message to my husband to let him know about it and to let him know what I was going to do with it.  Part of sticking to the plan is to talk about what money is spent, what money is taken in, and what money is being saved.  We can talk about what is working in our budget and what needs to be adjusted.  We don’t hide any money from each other, and we don’t make any major purchases without talking about them.
  • Make it fun: My husband and I have truly enjoyed saving our pennies together.  We have found fun and creative ways to save money each day.  In the beginning of our marriage, we would go out to eat in order to have fun.  Just yesterday, our date night involved learning how to play the guitar together by watching videos on YouTube (for free!).  When we went out to eat on Friday, we tried to see what little things we could change to our meal to lower the cost; we ended up sharing a drink and the fries.  It can be fun coming home after a day together and still having money in our pockets.

I am thankful to God that my husband and I are a team.  Since we do everything together, we are able to celebrate our personal victories together.  That includes becoming debt-free and saving money toward bigger things.

Make the decision today to trust God with your finances and to work toward your financial goals as a team with your spouse.

Photo by Jonathan Brinkhorst on Unsplash

Categories
Marriage

Why the First Year is the Hardest

For eleven months, my husband would ask me if we could eat our anniversary cake.  “No!”  I protested.  My play-it-by-the-rules attitude insisted that we must eat our anniversary cake on our anniversary.  That’s what made it special, right?

On the drive home from our anniversary trip last week, we were so excited to finally be able to eat our anniversary cake.  My husband joked that they gave us the wrong cake, or that the box was empty, but we both hoped that none of those were true.  For most of our months of marriage, we’ve heard several horror stories of in-laws eating the wedding cake while the bride and groom were on their honeymoon.  We were thankful that was not our story!

I began to realize that this was the last tangible piece of our wedding that we could grasp together.  My dress is collecting dust in the closet.  My husband returned his tux.  The rest of the food had already decomposed in the trash (sorry for that graphic!).  Even the honeymoon was a distant memory.  This cake was the last tangible piece of the wedding that we can experience.

The last time we had this cake, we were madly in love.  We ate the strawberry and buttercream without a single clue of what it would be like to spend the rest of our lives together.  We had no idea what we were in for in the years to come.

This time, the cake tasted even sweeter, because we were able to eat it on the other side of the spectrum.  We were able to eat the cake knowing that we were much closer, much stronger, and much more in love than we were the last time we ate it.

The lovely people who offer us unsolicited advice warned us that the first year of marriage is always the hardest.  Some have even gone as far to say that the first year of marriage will either make or break your relationship.  Hearing advice like this left me a little fearful of what the first twelve months of our journey together would hold.  I wondered if every fight, every disagreement, every time I didn’t get my way, would make or break us.

Since my husband and I fought on the same side, we knew each conflict would only bring us closer together.

We’ve learned together that the first year of marriage is the hardest because it is the first year where we have to surrender.  The rest of our marriage will continue to be surrender, but after surrendering our holiday traditions that were so familiar to us, after surrendering our own personal ways of budgeting, and after surrendering how we spend our quality time, we now have a rhythm for the rest of our lives together.

We know that surrender is still going to feel uncomfortable.  We know that surrender is not always going to be cut and dry.  We know that surrender is going to involve compromise from both of us.  But since we’ve already surrendered to one another for a year, we know that we can continue to surrender daily for as long as we both shall live.

Biblically, this type of surrender is called submission.  Ephesians 5:21 calls us to submit ourselves to one another.  The marriage relationship is no different.  We need to submit ourselves (our hopes, dreams, traditions, and beliefs) to one another in order to become one.  Surrender helps us to connect.

Our society does not like surrender.  Society teaches that we need to fight for our rights, to fight for our way, to never give up until we win.  Surrender, however, is messy.  Surrender tells us to fit a square peg in a round hole.  But surrender causes us to give up our comfort for the sake of true satisfaction and true contentment.

I wanted to write a blog post about my wedding cake because I was amazed that it tasted so good.  People had told us that the wedding cake usually tastes horrible by the first year.  (But hey, here’s a shameless plug for those planning their wedding: strawberry apparently freezes really well!)  I was so excited to be able to prove them wrong.  I was so excited to share that our cake tasted just as delicious as it did one year ago.  I was so excited to share what this cake symbolized: that we defied the odds of our society, that we defied the negative “advice” that we received, and that we not only survived our first year of marriage, but we thrived.

Are you thriving in your marriage?  Maybe it’s time to surrender your expectations of the perfect marriage, your holiday traditions, your budget, and your time.  But since I’ve been getting a lot of unsolicited advice since marriage, I’m going to offer you some: surrendering to your spouse is so much easier when you’re already fully surrendered to God.  Jesus surrendered His life so that we could have a relationship with God.  He calls us to give up our lives in return.  Our surrender to our spouse is just a small reflection of our surrender to Christ.  Ultimately, we must give God control of our lives and let Him remove the roughness of our edges so that we could connect deeply with our spouses.

This is an actual picture of a tier of our wedding cake.  It tasted better than it looked!

Categories
Marriage

Make Time to Connect

My love language is quality time.  That doesn’t just mean that I like to sit with my husband and watch TV.  No, it means sitting face to face and having a deep conversation that involves getting to know each other (and preferably, this meeting should have tea involved).  Since this is not my husband’s love language, it took us several months to understand what that looked like in our marriage.  This weekend, my husband truly spoke my love language.

This weekend, we celebrated our first anniversary.  My husband found us a sweet bed and breakfast in Connecticut.  Considering we are from suburban Long Island, where we have a plethora shops, restaurants, and movie theatres, we were in for a rude awakening when we noticed that there was nothing in sight around us but beautiful mansions, trees, and the house where we would be staying.  I had asked my husband to plan a place that was just the two of us.  I didn’t want any distractions; I just wanted to relax with my husband.  We were three hours away from home and we didn’t have cell phone service.  It was exactly what we needed.

In the thirty hours we were away (between driving to Connecticut, staying at the B&B, and driving home), we talked about everything.  We resolved some issues that we were having and made compromises that worked in both of our favors.  Since we were away from all the distractions and anyone who could make an objection to our plans, we figured that in the middle of nowhere was the perfect place to resolve our issues and set goals for the year ahead.

We spent at least an hour trying to state our case, looking into each other’s eyes and attempting to compromise.  We now have our holidays planned from Thanksgiving this year (2017), to Easter 2019.  We also have more of an idea of our financial goals for the upcoming year.  We used the time that we were given on this trip to truly get back on track and fall in love again.

Life gets in the way sometimes.  We’re distracted by work, by money, by our plans with friends/family, and by our own hopes and dreams.  We have both been in a season of waiting for several months, and it has taken a toll on us emotionally and physically.  The best solution for both of us was to drive three hours away, sit in a fancy house with no one else around, and re-connect.

We have found that this time away has truly helped our marriage for the better.  We were in love before, but now that we have reconnected and we are on the same page, it feels like we have a deeper intimacy because we’ve been reminded that we’re fighting on the same side.  We’re praying the same prayers and aiming for the same goals.  We know that we can use our time to remind ourselves of the commitments we made over the past few months.

If you need to reconnect with your spouse, here are some habits that we’ve implemented to make our marriage a priority:

  • Make a date night.  Depending on your schedule, your date night could be once a week or even once a month, as long as it’s consistent and it’s firm.  For example, we have our date night on Friday.  That means we cannot make plans with friends/family on Fridays.  Our only exception is when we make double date plans with other married/engaged couples, especially our couples Bible study that meets every other Friday.
  • Be intentional.  Have an agenda.  You don’t have to spend a lot of money.  In fact, you don’t have to spend any money.  My husband and I plan on using our next date night to learn how to play the guitar together (we both have guitars and haven’t even touched them since we got engaged).  When we go out to eat, since we’re on a budget, we make a game out of using a gift card and keeping the bill within the amount on the gift card.  It doesn’t have to be an extravagant night out; it just has to be an environment where you can talk and remind each other of your love for each other.
  • Set goals.  During our first year of marriage, we learned a lot and we realized a lot of our flaws as well.  Talking about our issues this weekend gave us goals to work toward for our next year of marriage.  Setting goals makes what you think is impossible attainable in your marriage.  As a result of this weekend, we agreed to get out of debt (pay off my husband’s car), save for a house, and make better use of our time.  Working on these goals together strengthens our marriage and makes the mundane tasks of life a little more fun.

Making our marriage a priority honors God.  When we pray together and seek God in our marriage, He meets us during those conversations.

 

Photo by Rémi Walle on Unsplash