BIGGEST DECISION OF ADULTHOOD
The relationship with your significant other, spouse, girlfriend, boyfriend, or fiance if your engaged, By Jeff Knight
This relationship is the most impacting relationship in your adult life. Mom and dad take you to the age of adulthood, but after that life usually involves your significant other! There is probably not a more important decision for you to make in your life than who you are going to marry! Did I say marry? You bet I did, because if you are of age to be married, not married but acting married; or if you are not of age to be married, but acting marred; you quite possibly are already like an ice cube in the boiling water, change forever!
For the rest of your life this person is going to impact every decision, emotion, day, month, year, season and etc. This person will decide with you the color of your car, toothbrush, hair, house and dog. They will be a part of your triumphs, when you are on the high point of life. They will be a part of your crashes, wrecks and days you feel like a joker.
Your spouse best take you up, to your potential. They better love you where you are at, support where you are headed, disagree when you are mediocre and cheerlead when you are excelling. If you were born an ice cube with a destiny you better not marry a pot of hot boiling water!
A few suggestions on how to stay out of the hot h2o from the start...
- Include trusted friends, family, your pastor in your decision before you even start a relationship with someone. They may see what you can't or are unwilling to see.
- Really take the time to get to know someone before giving your heart away. Don't awaken love before the right time. Do so and you'll pay with heartbreak.
- Wait on God. It might seem like a century, but God's best comes in His time.
- Pray. My wife prayed for her husband the entire time she was growing up. Nothing wrong with advanced prayer.
- Know who you are. I hate it when I hear about a story where someone marries and ten years later they separate because they say, "I'm having an identity crisis." Identity? Seriously, after ten years, your identity is not your own anymore, it belongs to other people. Know who you are before you start so you don't wonder who you are when who you are belongs to more precious ones, your kids.
- Take your time. You've got the rest of your life to be married. Make sure you do what you gotta do before for you say "I do." I hate it when a married person turns to their spouse and says, "I'm sorry, I just gotta do this..." No, you're married now, you lost the privilege to do what you wanted to do when you wanted to do it. Now what you do is a part of who you are, and you're married.
- Get back to the basics. Laugh, love, fun, tenderness, value, sympathy, empathy, wholeness, sex, food, fellowship, laughing, you know the things that made this marriage in the first place.
- Mediocrity creeps into every relationship. Sit down with your spouse and look around, what do you see that is mediocre about your marriage/surroundings? Get it out of your marriage, now!
- Prayer. Sometimes, at night, I will walk our property praying for my family. My prayer life is less than perfect, but that's what makes those moments when I intentionally pray for Melinda so powerful. Like the times when I reach across our bed after she is asleep and I pray a blessing over her.
- Serve. In our culture the focus is on getting our personal needs met, and serving has become a foreign word. Instead of demanding simply serve your spouse. If they act surprised by your service it's a clue you can serve more. If they act thankful it s a sign they really appreciate you. If they don't care, you may need to get some help.
- Get help. Marriages go through difficult times! Don't sit home and hope that it will get better. Get help if your marriage is struggling or damaged. You might as well admit that things aren't perfect and pursue God's best now instead of waiting until help is the only option, yes? Thought so.
- Excellence. Stop surrounding yourself with anything other than excellence. We don't use the "d" word in my house, it's not an option. Stop lowering your standards to what you see on television, or in a friends relationship or someones life. They are not you, you are not them. Put excellence on everyday.
