Stop Your Divorce By Choosing What Is Best

Maybe you are so fed up with your marriage right now that you are even wondering why you should try to choose what is best for your partner when you really think he or she doesn't deserve it. As a Christian, of course, the answer is because you know that "deserving it" has nothing to do with love. Love is a choice, and this article is about making those kind of choices for each other. If you choose to consciously work on being kind to one another instead of just being nice, I believe you can really save your marriage and even stop a divorce.

When both partners in a marriage intentionally use their freedom to give to, serve, and love the other, their relationship is rejuvenated. In 1 Corinthians 13:5, Paul writes that love is "not self-seeking." An intentional marriage is a 100/100 proposition. Acts of service know no gender lines.

Try asking yourself who you are in public and who you are at home. Are they the same person? Could a stranger follow you and your spouse around for a week and know, without you telling them, what your values were and the kind of relationship you had?

What qualities do you want to be known for at the end of your life? If you do not see that your present lifestyle choices are making a positive statement about your values, only you can make up your mind to start making choices that will change this.

For example, you could try using a "love basket". A love basket is a basket that holds a tablecloth, candles, matches, napkins, silverware, and plates. It can be packed by either sex. It is never to be used with friends or with children. It is to be used to enjoy time with your partner alone. You see, you need to choose to make time alone with your spouse, otherwise "life" just gets in the way and you can wind up drifting apart.

Here are some other choices you could make:

• A date time once a week. Alternate the planning.
• A daily time, even just 20 minutes, where you take the time to connect with your spouse.
• A weekly time for sexual intimacy and pleasuring. (More is ok too!)
• A weekly issue discussing time.
• A daily prayer time together..

Looking for more happiness? Try something unique.

• Write a love letter or poem to your mate.
• Create your own David Letterman list: The Top Ten Reasons Why I Love Your Are...
• Create a gratitude journal. Once a day for a year catch your spouse doing something that you value, admire, love, or respect. Write it down and at the end of the year, give it to your partner as a gift.
• Give your partner a gift of your time and energy. Offer them a day that you will work on a project that is important to them or free him up to do something they really want to do.

Feeling of love flow from consistent acts of love. It isn't the bad stuff, but rather the lack of good stuff that causes complacency in a relationship. Periodically every marriage suffers from a case of the relationship "blahs". Nothing is terribly wrong, but nothing is particularly right either. You find yourselves simply too busy, too tired, or too stressed to relate effectively. Choosing what is best, however, means that you begin to make the decision to help your mate become all they can possibly be. By doing this, you find yourself happier too. Good luck, and God bless.

Avoiding Divorce by Encouragement

Avoiding Divorce by Encouragement

Do you feel encouraged by your mate in your relationship? Unfortunately, many couples laugh at this kind of question. In fact, if you are having trouble with your marriage and have even considered divorce, chances are feeling criticized or discouraged is often a major reason we want out of the relationship.

A critical spirit makes a marriage brittle. Love becomes increasingly fragile and weak. If you can find encouragement at home, however, you will want to keep going home after dealing with the normal stresses of the day.

As you likely know, all marriages have ups and downs. If you can stop the destructive cycle of criticism of your mate, those very ups and downs in your relationship will not be as devastating as they used to be. If you start making changes to try and be a more encouraging person , you can expect that rough moments will be seen as an opportunity for growth.

Curious but skeptical? Consider how you respond to criticism. Do you turn inward by feeling defensive, deflated and demoralized? Do you turn against by firing back your own criticisms or threaten to leave? Or do you turn away and withdraw and nurse your wounds, afraid of another conflict--leaving you to feel victimized by your partner's words. All of these responses kill love.

You have another choice. Turn towards your partner by:

• Say "ouch". Let your partner know that you were hurt by what they said.
• Ask for a Do-over. Let your partner know that you don't want to accept what they just said to you as a way to build your relationship. Ask them to try to say it a different way.
• Take a Time-out. If you are really uncomfortable with the way a conversation sounds and you can't deal with it correctly, tell your partner you need time to cool off before starting the conversation again. Set a definite time to try again--like an hour. If you need more time, ask for it.
• Admit your part. If you are sliding into a critical spirit yourself, admit it right away and try again.

I understand that this is a very difficult thing to change quickly in a relationship. However, if you are facing a divorce and want to stop it; or you are trying to find healing in your marriage, it is worth the time and effort to try and fix this thing.

In conclusion, take the following comments as something to think and act on with your partner. Love always gives an opportunity for a new start. In a long-term marriage it is far too easy to overvalue what someone is not and to undervalue who he or she is. Adjust your attitude from focusing on what is wrong to focusing on what is right. Practice noticing behaviors and interactions that you like and admire. Saying "I love you" gets you a grade of B+ ; but saying "I love this specific thing about you" gets you an A+. Commit this day (and every day after that) to encourage your partner. Begin to do this more often than you criticize your partner, and divorce should no longer be such an appealing option for either side.

Avoiding Divorce by Encouragement

In Need of A New Beginning

In Need of A New Beginning

This is an article for married couples who have survived marriage for a number of years. You may have experienced many ups and downs. You love your partner. You are not planning a divorce.

But you are tired. You are disappointed for reasons you don't quite understand. You want to start over--not with another partner, but start over to find again why you married them in the first place. Don't worry, there is hope. We can change our unproductive patterns of interactive and repeating the same mistakes. We can reverse patterns leading to disillusionment.

If you can work together and take a risk to create one good year of marriage, you can create a positive pattern and then repeat it. Rather than divorcing each other, you can learn to divorce the way you have done marriage. Are you excited for the possibilities? Here is the first step, give up unrealistic expectations.

Even after being married for a while, many people romanticize love and marriage into some magical vehicle for personal happiness, emotional satisfaction, and spiritual transformation. When we hang on to fantasies of what we think marriage should be like, our realities seem like harsh burdens to bear and we become dissatisfied with our relationship.

People who refuse to release their expectation of the romantic ideal become critical, judgmental, accusing, and demanding. Yet when we are in touch with reality, we know that we are not perfect ourselves, and have an easier time accepting imperfections in our partners.

So, for today, dare to take an honest look at your expectations in your own marriage or relationship. how much of the problem is in your expectations, and how much is really an issue that needs to get resolved? Ask your partner the same question. Talk about your expectations and how well they are being met. See what kind of reality you can meet at together.

A lot of ideas for this article come from a book I picked up by Dr. David and Janet Congo called One Good Year of Marriage. I hope to refer to it for a series of articles about marriage advice in the near future.

In Need of A New Beginning

Christian Relationship Checklist

Christian Relationship Checklist

If you are a Christian interested in finding the right partner, maybe you have been searching for how to make your dating life compliant to the standards of the Bible, not the way the rest of the world says is ok.

So many relationships end in sorrow and marriages end in divorce. If things were done the way that God suggests, how much more happiness would there be in relationships in this world?

If you are tired of the old way or want to avoid it altogether, here is a basic checklist based on Scripture that you can use as a general guide for your pursuit of a Godly relationship or marriage.

• Don't get physical! (In any sexual way - that's saved until marriage.)

• Don't develop Emotional attachments without marriage commitments (you intend to Keep)

• Don't make promises you don't intend on keeping!

• Don't get involved with Unbelievers or believers not walking with God.

• Do wait to start a One person relationship with a person you KNOW you could marry.

• Do watch from a distance! Look for proven godly character. Too many can put on a good "show".

• Do seek your parent's input.

• Do honor God every step of the way in any relationship!

Remember: It's all right to be friendly in a godly way with other young people. You just need to be careful not to cross biblical lines that God Clearly draws for us.

Good luck. If you truly commit to doing things God's way, He will surely bless your efforts.

"Every Date is a Potential Mate"

"Every Date is a Potential Mate"

These words were printed in an old brochure some friends and I discovered while on a band tour in university in the foyer of a church. While we all had a good laugh at it then, I have come to the realization that maybe there was a great deal of truth in this approach to Christian dating and relationships.

As I found on a really interesting website about Dating and Courtship, "the problem with our modern dating system today is that it encourages young people to be with many many people, rather than just patiently waiting for the right godly Christian young person whom you could develop a godly "FRIENDSHIP", with hopes and Intentions of a long term commitment leading to marriage."

I think anyone who is part of the dating game knows the truth of this statement. No matter if I like it or not, you will not be able to go to the Bible and find any evidence that supports the modern dating system of "shopping around type of relationships" (involving, emotional bonds, physical bonds and mental intimacy) till you find the perfect person. God's word certainly tells us to look for one godly mate. Maybe Christians should spend more time patiently looking and developing friendships that do not involve emotional commitments UNTIL a young man and a young woman are prepared and able to COMMIT to Marriage.

Another problem with dating the world's way is that it practically encourages people to break up. The couple dates and gets emotionally and maybe physically involved, but if something happens that either party doesn't like, they break up. In this kind of dating game, partners can easily develop the mindset that even in marriage if they don't like the way something is going, they can easily break a commitment to the other person and divorce. This is certainly not the way God desires us to live.

In fact, Numbers 30:2, Mathew 5:37, and Colossians 3:9 state that you should not promise something to another (such as love, affection, relationship) where you do not really intend to keep that promise. To do so is to sin before God. Instead, it is wise for people to watch at a distance when looking for a spouse. You can watch and see if the person you are interested in is walking a Godly life. You can take time to develop a friendship that is not based on emotional or physical attachment. You can get advice from other people whom you respect--maybe even your parents, to see if they think this person is a good match for you.

In conclusion, I really am suggesting that maybe Christian dating is a wrong concept altogether. It would seem that God suggests more of a carefully planned out courtship. Here are the guiding principles that appear to be suggested by God's word:

• Dating, or courtship, should only take place when both sides are ready to seek out a potential marriage partner.
• If you are a Christian, you should only consider dating a Christian
• You should take it slowly, not getting emotionally or physically involved. Take advice from other Christians who really have your best interests at heart.

Of course I would like to hear your comments about this topic. Do you think that following an "every date is a potential mate" philosophy is good advice? How could you implement it in your dating life now?

How Does God View Dating?

How Does God View Dating?

I have been married for a long time, but not so long ago that I do not remember the whole pressure of finding a boyfriend and wondering if I would find the right man. Kids younger and younger all the time are exposed to the idea of having a boyfriend or girlfriend, and hardly anyone denies the sexualizaton of our children from the media and other cultural influences. As a Christian, however, we are called to be different from our culture when that culture is different from the standards of God. So, I believe it is especially important to understand what the Bible really does say about "dating" and male/female relationships.

While dating can mean anything from going out to a movie to premarital sex, I cannot give a complete answer to this topic with a short blog post. However, the whole idea of dating itself is not something that was really done in the Bible times. How can we know, then, what God's heart is on the matter? That is the general topic that I will cover first.

This may cause a lot of controversy, but let me say that there is not a single Bible reference that I can find that endorses the kind of recreational dating that takes place today. By recreational dating I mean dating that takes place where both people have no interest in a long term commitment, where fleshly and emotional pleasure are all that are important, and there is no thought of marriage.

Christians may already be protesting, "But how can I find out if I like someone if I can't try them out first?!" Believe it or not, playing the field is not the only way to get to know someone, and I will get to some of those ways in future articles.

Let me start this controversial topic out with one main point, however. The Bible makes it very clear that if you are a Christian, you should not enter a relationship unless it is with another Christian. That principle is made pretty clear in Deuteronomy 7:3, 2 Corinthians 6:14, and 1 Corinthians 7:39. While I know there have been successful relationships where a Christian marries a non-Christian and is able to convert the unbelieving partner, most cases have a lot of heartache and sorrow to get to that point. If God calls marrying an unbeliever a sin, dating one is also sinful. Of course you can't always be sure that someone you are dating is truly a believer or not, but that will prove itself over time if you are looking for the truth.

I realize that some of what I've said already may seem extreme to many Christians already in the middle of the dating scene. I am writing these articles to offer my research on the topic and engage those seeking answers into dialog so we can find truth together. Please comment on what you read and offer your wisdom as well. Look for part 2 in this topic soon.

How Does God View Dating?