When Pastor Douglas told me to write this article, I thought to myself that I am not the most qualified person to write on such a topic as I believe there are people that have been married longer than we have and have more wisdom and experience to share than us. However, I believe that after being married for 11 years, we should have something to share most especially with newly married or couples thinking about getting married in the future. Coming from an African background, I did not see my Dad show love or affection towards my mum the way we are being taught in church.

There was hardly any expression of love and that was the legacy that was passed down to me and my siblings. Several issues affect marriage’s todays which include the following;

• Lack of Communication
• Unrealistic Expectations
• Willingness to Change
• Anger and Bitterness
• Complacency
• Sex
• Finances

LACK OF COMMUNICATION

In the early years of my marriage, whenever I felt my wife had offended me, I would keep malice with her and could go a week without speaking to her. There were times when I expected her to do something and she had not.  I would get angry as I expected her to know even though she may not have been aware of my expectation.  This meant I would be angry without having communicated what
I wanted her to have done or the reason why I am angry with her. It seemed as if I would have expected her to telepathically know what my needs and requests were.  It is important that husbands and wives get to that place where they can express or discuss issues affecting them without fear that he or she may not be able to handle it. Men have issues and not all men can discuss issues affecting them to their wives.

UNREALISTIC EXPECTATIONS

Looking back now, some of my expectations were unrealistic, there were certain things that I grew up seeing my mum do and when I got married I expected my wife to do the same. My mum was the typical African woman who had a career but would also get home to ensure the cooking is done and all her 5 children had finished their homework before going to bed. All my father did when he got home from work was to eat his food that was already prepared, watch the news on television and go to bed. It took time for me to realise that my wife and mum are totally different. Living in the UK we had to learn to do things together and help each other with the house chores and cooking. There are times when I have to cook for the family or cook for myself when I get home from work before my wife. We also have someone to help with the cleaning as it helps to relieve the pressure from her as she has to juggle a full-time job and see to the children’s needs when she returns from work.

WILLINGNESS TO CHANGE

One thing that has helped me over the years is my willingness to change, the reason some of us do not have good relationships with our parents is because of their unwillingness to change and this is one of the reason why Africa is still backward today. It is seen as a taboo to speak the truth to our parents albeit in love even when they are wrong. My dad is in his 60’s and I am still unable to sit with him to have
a frank father to son discussion where we can air our views without it being construed as rude. This unfortunately is carried over into marriage, when we refuse to change our way of thinking. 1 Peter 3:7 says - Husbands, in the same way be considerate as you live with your wives, and treat them with respect as the weaker partner and as heirs with you of the gracious gift of life, so that nothing will hinder your prayers. It means we must be willing to change the way we think and behave towards our spouses.  It is about dying to self and sometimes giving up the right to be right. It is about working on being the best husband that we can be to our wives’ and children and as the scripture above states it is important we do not single handedly hinder our prayers.  I drew so much inspiration from a wedding I attended recently, when Pastor Douglas was reading the marriage vows, it made me re-evaluate my marriage and the oath we took as it is for life and should be taken seriously.

ANGER AND BITTERNESS

This is another key issue that affects marriage; it is unrealistic to think that we would not be angry with each other. We must however be willing to ask for forgiveness. As men it can be especially difficult to forgive. Ephesians 4:2627 says; In your anger do not sin, do not let the sun go down while you are still angry, and do not give the devil a foothold. It is important that we make up after any disagreement so we do not give the enemy a weapon to use against us. The bible also says that we should be quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to get angry.

COMPLACENCY

Some people get complacent after marriage and may stop taking care of themselves. Both men and women need to constantly take care of themselves. For men it means going to the barbers as often as possible and putting in place things to give them the wow factor. Men should also look and smell good. For women it is about maintaining or even improving the wow factor that attracted their spouse to them. Ensuring you have a nice hairstyle, indulging in beauty therapy and applying makeup to enhance your beauty. I look at my wife and say wow when she is looking stunning! I always like my wife to look good and encourage her to invest in nice clothes. I like her wearing shorts when she is in the house.

The Bible says we should live with our wives according to knowledge and the same thing applies to men. I once read an article about a lady and they asked her how she manages to keep her husband and she said he likes her wearing a pair or Stilettos and police uniform for her husband, she lives with her husband according to knowledge. She knows what he likes and does it.

Some wives are not willing to make an effort with their appearance but we cannot afford to get to that stage where we cannot be bothered with how we look especially after having children. We also need to be able to separate the relationship that we have with our children from our husbands or wife. I often tell my wife that we need to find time for ourselves without the children being involved. No matter how much we love them, they will leave home one day and if we do not have a solid relationship between us, what would become of us? If we learn to enjoy each other’s company when the children are not around we would not be bored or feel we do not have anything in common.

SEX

Lack of intimacy affects marriages especially in today’s society, one of the greatest issues affecting relationships is sexual immorality; in some cases it can be triggered by a lack of sex in the marriage. I have been reading the book of proverbs especially Proverbs 5 which focuses on sexual immorality and adultery. Being a Christian man or woman does not exempt us from it. In fact, the bible says that if you look at a woman or man lustfully you have committed adultery. God help us! MEN There was a time in my marriage, long ago when we had issues with being intimate, at times it would be once a month. It was not my wife’s fault but it affected me in negative ways. The temptation to have an affair preyed on my mind. But what kept coming back to me was “how will I be able to praise & worship God if I do such a thing and how would I be able to pray to God and my prayers not be hindered. My wife had used a form of birth control which made her have mood swings and killed her sex drive. It was not until we figured out what the problem was before things changed.

I know that if we give Satan a foothold he will take complete advantage and if I was living outside the will of God Satan would have used that to block my blessings. Thank God that I did not succumb to the various temptations. Things are far better now on that side as there is no lack of it anymore. Every marriage needs lots of love and intimacy to keep it going. The journey through marriage could be compared to our Christian walk; it needs constant fuelling, growth and consistency.

FINANCES

This is another area that married couples struggle with and can be the cause of serious arguments and discord. This was often a source of frustration in our marriage as our goals and objectives when it comes to how money should be spent or saved were not aligned. It was only after 11 years of marriage that we decided to pull our finances together and draw up an annual budget which we review every so often and try and follow as strictly as possible. This means that we are both accountable to one another on how money is dealt with and we seem to be more diligent in saving and agreeing on priorities on what needs to be done without the arguments and feelings of resentment towards the other rearing its ugly head.

In conclusion, there is no such thing as a perfect marriage, if there was then we would not need God in our lives. The bible says that God requires us to depend on him on a daily basis for everything.

We need to strive for excellence and be the best husband or wife that we can be. We should be seen to be constantly improvingourselves and our marriage. If I was to marry again, I would marry my wife, though she has her weakness, she has great strength. She is kind and loving.

I must say that we are not yet there but by His grace and the willingness on our respective parts to change and act on instructions that God ordained for the institution of marriage, we can leave a legacy for our children and those coming behind. We have good mentors in V2V that are constantly pushing us to excel not just in our marriage but also in our walk with God.

Olumide Adekunle