Differences Keep Marriage Interesting

In this Marriage UPGRADE, Dianne Barker opens up about her own marriage and what she and her husband learned about their “differences.”

“I tiptoed through the marriage minefield,” Dianne said, “until an epiphany changed everything.”

I (Dawn) think every marriage has a minefield, something that can explode into anger and bitterness, so I was eager to hear about Dianne’s “epiphany.”

Dianne continues . . .

Marriage is hard—for everybody. It’s that opposites attract thing.

My husband and I are as different as two people can be. He’s a perfectionist and totally focused while I tend to be disorganized and forgetful.

After checking the oil in my car, he said, “Next time you’re out, stop at the gas station and have one of the guys add a quart of oil.” A few days later he asked about the oil.

“I forgot—but I’ll get it when I’m out.” The thought never crossed my mind again.

The next week I stopped by his parents’ house, where he was working on their lawnmower. As I started to leave, he said, “Go to the gas station and get a quart of 10-W-30 oil.”

“Sure!” I said cheerily and went on my way. Two hours later he came home, agitated and snappy.

“What happened to the oil?”

“I had it put in the car.”

Given the preceding events, who would’ve thought the oil was for the lawnmower! Scowling his disapproval, he stomped out the door to take my car for a complete oil change—perfectionists don’t mix brands and weights.

Personality differences caused contention in our marriage from the beginning.

We had different perspectives about almost everything, and decision-making often ended in deadlock. To solve the matter, I’d agree to James’ decision, but struggle with lingering bitterness, feeling my opinion had received little respect.

Adding two children to the mix increased the frustration. We had to agree, even on small matters, concerning our kids. I couldn’t walk away and pout. Like a soldier in battle, I tried to dodge the minefield—issues that could prove explosive—until an epiphany changed our marriage:

Our conflicts mostly resulted from temperament differences, not malicious intent.

It’s as hard for my spouse to accept my differences as it is for me to accept his.

Although James and I had no training in conflict resolution, we had two factors in our favor. We loved the Lord and we wanted to please Him.

The epiphany led us to four choices that transformed our relationship.

1. Acceptance.

We determined to accept each other AS IS. Marriage requires living with another person’s strengths and weaknesses. Because I need God’s transforming touch, I can be patient with my husband’s imperfections. Acceptance reduces tension and builds friendship.

2. Appreciation.

Learning to appreciate our differences, we noticed the strengths of our opposite personalities actually balance and enrich our relationship. One personality isn’t superior.

God designed us with differences and brought us together to accomplish more for His kingdom than we could do alone. Verbalizing appreciation minimizes irritations and builds respect.

3. Application.

Applying Scripture to our daily walk, we practiced biblical relationship principles.

“Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you” (Ephesians 4:32).

“Above all, keep loving one another earnestly, since love covers a multitude of sins” (1 Peter 4:8).

Extending unlimited forgiveness and unconditional love brings healing and restoration.

4. Acknowledgment.

Recognizing our contribution to the conflict or misunderstanding, we learned to humble ourselves and ask for forgiveness. Christ said if we go to worship and remember someone holds an offense against us, we should go and be reconciled (Matthew 5:23-24). He didn’t mention who’s at fault.

Assuming responsibility and seeking forgiveness can nip bitterness before it takes root.

Pleasing our Lord has top priority. That takes care of many smaller issues.

What has top priority in your marriage?

Dianne Barker is a conference speaker, freelance journalist, radio host, and author of eleven books, including the 1986 best-seller Twice Pardoned. Her 2014 book, I Don’t Chase the Garbage Truck Down the Street in My Bathrobe Anymore! Organizing for the Maximum Life, won the Christian Authors Network Golden Scroll third-place award for non-fiction book of the year.

This post is adapted from Help! I’m Stuck and I Can’t Get Out! The Maximum Marriage Maintenance and Repair Kit, available soon at www.diannebarker.com.

T-shirts in adapted graphic designed by daleos.net.

Modeling God's Love When It's So Tough

We have seen a monumental display of God's mercy this week, and in Dawn Wilson's Spiritual Life UPLIFT, I want us to focus on the grace of forgiveness.

At his bond hearing, Dylann Roff stood in his striped inmate jumpsuit with a blank expression as family members of the victims he admittedly gunned down at the historic Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal (AME) Church said over and over again, "I forgive you."

A daughter of Ethel Lance said,

"You hurt me. You hurt a lot of people, but God forgives you, and I forgive you."

To the astonishment of a watching world, relatives offered words of grace. Mercy. Forgiveness.

It was a painful but powerful testimony to the work of Christ in the hearts of those who love Him.

In Commentary magazine, Abe Greenwald, senior editor of Commentary, wrote, "The late [antitheist] Christopher Hitchens formulated (and forever repeated) a superficially clever challenge to people of faith: 'Find one good or noble thing,' he said, 'which cannot be accomplished without religion.' The astonishing rejoinder to Hitchens comes now from the family members of those who were gunned down Wednesday night in Charleston, South Carolina."

"At today’s hearing for the suspect, the spouses, siblings, parents, and children of the murdered innocents addressed the man being held for this unspeakable crime—and showered him with mercy and forgiveness. Theirs is a model for all humanity and a testament to the unique and transcendent power of faith." 

How can those, so wounded, so wonderfully forgive?

Forgiveness does not mean the relatives approve of Dylann's evil act. Forgiveness releases Dylann to God's hands. Forgiveness prays for peace, but it does not mean we don't need just laws to deal with those who are filled with hate and would harm or kill.

The victims' families are following in the footsteps of the Great Forgiver.

1. Jesus Modeled Forgiveness.

Mark 2:5 - "And when Jesus saw their faith, he said to the paralytic, 'Son, your sins are forgiven.'"

Luke 7:48 - "And he said to her (a sinful woman), 'Your sins are forgiven.'"

John 8:11 -"...'Neither do I condemn you (an adultress); go, and from now on sin no more.'"

On the cross, Jesus forgave a repentant thief, hanging on a cross beside Him (Luke 23:42-43), and He even forgave those who put Him to death! (Luke 23:34)

2. Jesus Taught Forgiveness.

Matthew 6:14 -"For if you forgive others their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you."

Matthew 18:21-22 -"Then Peter came up and said to him, 'Lord, how often will my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? As many as seven times?' Jesus said to him,'“I do not say to you seven times, but seventy-seven times.'" [Story of the Unforgiving Servant, Matthew 18:23-35]

We see the power of forgiveness in the much-loved parable of the prodigal son (Luke 15:11-32), modeling the Father's love and forgiveness.

Jesus exemplified and taught the kind of monumental mercy and forgiveness we've seen at Emanuel AME Church.

Dr. Alveda King, niece of Martin Luther King Jr., says, "Hate cannot drive out hate. Only love can do that."

As the deadly shots came, the victims were in Bible study. They loved the Word of God. And likely, they too would say to us, "Love and forgive. It is when you are most Christ-like."

Do you struggle to forgive? Can you walk in Jesus' footsteps and forgive by faith?

Dawn Wilson, founder and President of Heart Choices Ministries, is the creator of three blogs: Heart Choices Today, LOL with God (with Pam Farrel), and Upgrade with Dawn. She is the Director of the San Diego chapter of Network of Evangelical Women in MInistry (NEWIM San Diego). Dawn is the co-author of LOL with God and contributed "The Blessing Basket" in It's a God Thing. She and her husband Bob have two grown, married sons, three granddaughters and a rascally maltipoo, Roscoe.

I Choose Grace

Those who know Mary James will testify to the sweetness of her spirit and the power in her songs. I asked Mary to share an UPGRADE Uplift to encourage our hearts.

“If you believe change is not possible when looking at a situation,” Mary says, “you are deciding what God’s grace is capable of achieving.”

So many times, I (Dawn) have allowed the enemy to weigh me down with regrets. When I do that, I can’t move forward. But God does not leave us without hope.

Mary continues…..

The message of God’s grace through Christ is the most beautiful gift any of us can ever possess—especially for those who have made significant mistakes along the way.

Though we may have regrets, the weight of God’s forgiveness covers our choices with a love so big that the past loses it power over us. 

I recently heard a message that sadly left listeners without this hope. Its focus was on parenting. In a nutshell, the message said, “If you do not do as Scripture instructs, you will have regrets.” 

Ok, makes sense. We know that Scripture has been given to us for a reason and will spare us much heartache. But all of us have fallen short of its expectations.

So then what?  Oh, yes . . . a heart full of regret.

As a person who the enemy loves to torment with the past, I began to squirm in my seat.  Occasionally, I squeezed my husband’s leg in almost uncontainable frustration. 

The message continued and my spirit grew heavier and heavier, especially for the men in the auditorium who were being held to the highest level of accountability.  Yet I remained hopeful and kept waiting for it . . . and waiting . . . and waiting.  

But it never came. 

There was plenty of truth, but no grace. Not a shred.

As my husband and I sat there—two people who have made a thousand mistakes as parents—we were left to see ourselves as only one thing: failures.     

Years ago, I heard Bunnie Wilson share about the remorse she had in raising her children. Her regret was that she had not taught them to have a servant's heart. But—and there was a but—she pointed us all to a new day, a new beginning, a Christ-centered resolve. 

Bunnie said that now, every time she is with her children, she models servanthood for them. What she did not teach them when they were young, she taught them as adults.

And they were changed by her efforts. 

Every parent in the room who had missed the boat in some aspect of parenting left with that hope.  I have never forgotten her reminder of God’s ability to redeem our less than perfect choices.    

If you believe change is not possible when looking at a situation, you are deciding what God’s grace is capable of achieving.

God has given us history so that we that we can learn from it, but Paul also understood the danger of living in the past.

As he wrote in Philippians 3:12-14,

“Not that I have already attained, or am already perfected; but I press on, that I may lay hold of that for which Christ Jesus has also laid hold of me. Brethren, I do not count myself to have apprehended; but one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forward to those things which are ahead, I press toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.”

We can live in the bondage of regret, or we can let the power of God’s grace move us into a new day. Either way it requires effort.

Regret is like carrying around that proverbial baggage, where grace requires humility: placing any limitations, grudges or shame into the hands of God.

Whether we are at the podium or in the pews, rigidity in our thinking when it comes to God’s ability to change us or restore a relationship/situation, diffuses the work of the cross. 

Oddly, our regrets can be the very things that help us understand our need for Jesus.

We must accept consequences, but God has shown us time and time again that He can take a mess and turn it into a masterpiece.  

Which do you choose? The mess or the masterpiece? Regret or grace? 

 Mary James is a Christian Artist and Speaker who has embraced the charge found in 1 Peter 2:9, that we are, “Saved to Proclaim the excellence of Him who called us out of darkness into His marvelous light.” Through her music, testimony of grace, and transparent, biblically-centered messages, Mary is devoted seeing hearts and lives healed, strengthened and transformed by Christ. Since entering ministry in 2000, she has released five full-length CDs, shared the platform with leading Bible teachers such as Dr. David Jeremiah and Kay Arthur, and is a three-time Inspirational Country Music Female Vocalist of the Year Award winner. Visit Mary's Website.

Graphic in post adapted, Image courtesy of marin at FreeDigitalPhotos.net.

Forgiveness Is a Personal Choice

Renee Fisher's book about forgiveness encourages us to look at forgiveness from many angles, but this focus is my personal favorite.

"The only person you have control over is yourself." Fisher writes. "The only attitude you can control is your own."

Sometimes that's tough. We hurt and wish we could make others understand. But the issue is, God wants to change our hearts.

Fisher continues . . .

We can’t control what other people do, how they act, or what they feel. We can only make choices for ourselves.

For instance, Paul knew his story was less than perfect.

Before his conversion, he persecuted Christians! But he didn’t let the sins of the past stop him from becoming a mighty Christ-follower. He received the title of apostle because he wasn’t afraid to truly let God transform him. He gave his weaknesses to God and became a new man. The former enemy of Christians became one of the most influential leaders of the early church.

For I am the least of all the apostles. In fact, I’m not even worthy to be called an apostle after the way I persecuted God’s church. But whatever I am now, it is all because God poured out his special favor on me - and not without results (1 Corinthians 15:9-10, NLT).

When we beat ourselves over the head about our shortcomings, mistakes, and even what we assume to be failures, remember all those imperfect people who made it into the “Hall of Faith.” Remember those who have gone before us.

• Peter denied Jesus three times.
• Abraham slept with his servant.
• Paul persecuted Christians.
• Jonah ran away from God’s call.

You’ve made mistakes.

So have I.

But we can move forward.

Christ can transform you and me - just like He transformed Paul.

Proverbs 26:11 says, “As a dog returns to its vomit, so fools repeat their folly.” Don’t be a fool, caught forever in the trap of the same old mistakes.

You might be weak. You might be humble. But with the power of God within you, you can choose a new life.

Just look what happened to those Bible characters.

• Peter became the rock on which Christ build his church.
• Abraham became the father of many nations.
• Paul became a great missionary and wrote many of the New Testament epistles.
• Jonah went to Nineveh and helped save the city from destruction.

What’s the similarity between these men? They all had a choice, and they chose obedience.

Remember, the only person you have control over is yourself.

Sometimes God uses sin to force us to start over. Sometimes our sufferings have nothing to do with you and everything to do with others’ actions.

Ask God to help you forgive those around you who may have hurt you without realizing it. Ask God for the same measure of grace to use on yourself for being less than perfect.

God cares about you.

Stop comparing yourself to others.

God loves you because He created you and there is no one else like you.

Don’t waste his grace today.

Do you think it’s possible to forgive someone who doesn’t ask for your forgiveness back? Why or why not?

(Adapted from Forgiving Others, Forgiving Me, © 2013 Harvest House Publishers.)

Renee Fisher, the Devotional Diva®, is the spirited speaker and author of four books including Forgiving Others, Forgiving Me. A graduate of Biola University, Renee’s mission in life is to “spur others forward” (Hebrews 10:24) using the lessons learned from her own trials to encourage others in their walk with God. Learn more about Renee at DevotionalDiva.com and ForgivingMe.com.     

The Ultimate Life Upgrade

The Bible talks about one woman who certainly UPGRADED her life!

Dianne Matthews, who wrote the devotional The One Year Women of the Bible—reflections on women of the Bible and women today—writes about this transformed woman.

“While researching women in the Bible,” Matthews wrote, “I fell in love with the story of an unnamed woman in Samaria.”

She continues…

As I read the fourth chapter of John, I pictured this woman with the bad reputation plodding along the path to the village well. She occasionally paused to shift the weight of her clay jar. At least the other women can draw water in the cool of the day, she thought bitterly. She hated waiting until noon when it was hot, but she knew how they’d treat her if she showed up when they did.

What the woman didn’t know was that she would leave the well a short time later as a changed woman. A conversation with Jesus would upgrade her life.

Jesus’ request for a drink shocked her. Jews and Samaritans didn’t associate with each another. A Jewish man who drank from her water container would be considered unclean. Then Jesus made a mysterious comment: “Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks the water I give him will never thirst” (verses 13-14).
 
Her curiosity aroused, the woman asked the man to give her this miracle water. Jesus responded by telling her to go get her husband. The woman probably stiffened.

“I don’t have a husband,” she answered. To her amazement, Jesus’ response showed that he already knew the sordid details of her life—that she’d had five husbands and currently lived with a man to whom she wasn’t married.

She didn’t like the direction the conversation had taken. The fact that this stranger knew all about her personal life horrified her. So she steered the talk away from herself. Surely this man was a prophet. Perhaps he knew the answer to the debate between the Jews and the Samaritans over whether Jerusalem or Mount Gerizim was the appropriate place to worship God.

Jesus explained that since God is Spirit, a worshiper’s attitude matters more than location. Then Jesus astounded her. For the first time in his ministry, he overtly revealed his identity as the Messiah. The woman’s mouth must have dropped open—she’d received more than an answer to a theological argument.

She'd just met the One who is the Answer to everything in life.

At that point, the Samaritan woman ran off to share the news. I find it interesting that the Bible makes a point of telling us she left her water jar behind at the well. I think it’s to let us know that she left much more than that.

When Jesus revealed himself as the Messiah, she understood that he offered forgiveness instead of condemnation for her sinful past. Besides her water jar, she left behind a heavy burden of guilt, shame, and humiliation, along with her old identity as an immoral woman, an outcast from society.

She began the new life of a woman accepted by God as a beloved daughter. The woman with the bad reputation had just received the ultimate life upgrade.

        How has God’s forgiveness changed your life?

[Photo credit of Jesus and the Samaritan woman - "Living Water" by Simon Dewey]

Dianne Neal Matthews is a freelance writer and the author of our daily devotional books including The One Year Women of the Bible and Designed for Devotion: A 365-Day Journey from Genesis to Revelation. She also writes regularly for websites and blogs (such as CBN.com and FindingGodDaily.com), and contributes to compilations (including Guideposts’ 2013 Mornings with Jesus). Learn more about Dianne at her website or connect on Facebook, Twitter or LinkedIn.