Experiencing A Successful Marriage, Family, And Romantic Relationship
The 2009 JOY FM Bridal Fair opens officially at 10am on Thursday 25th June at the International Conference Centre in Accra, and will briskly roll until 10pm on Sunday 28th June. As we know, the climax of the fair is the Bridal Symposium on Saturday 27th June which is massively attended by thousands, and is broadcast worldwide as well. Do your best to tune in and imbibe the nourishing relationship formula whose chemistry is carefully crafted to marital and romantic precision for any present or future bride and groom who aspire to attain the commanding heights of family success.
If you tune in to JOY 99.7 FM at 4:30am to 5:50am Monday 22nd June up to Thursday 25th June, Rev. Dr. Kisseadoo will also be on air expounding on some truths about successful family life. Instead of the normal recorded message, he will also speak live on JOY FM at 8:30pm on Sunday 21st June (Fathers Day) during his regular “Hope For Your Family Broadcast”.
As we prepare for the Bridal Fair, I would want us to discuss in a nutshell some of the principles necessary for us to experience a successful marriage, home, and family life, and be able to enjoy all of our love relationships.
It would take volumes to elaborate on all the rich gems that could be explored. For the sake of brevity and easy digestion, let us select 5 points and highlight them at this juncture:
Marriage is a covenant relationship ordained by God.
Marriage should not be taken lightly, because you cannot simply break or leave it once you enter into the sacred relationship. Anytime your car breaks down, do you think of abandoning it and go for a new one as an immediate solution? How many new cars would you then possess in a year? Then all the streets of the world would be littered with metals from disabled cars with nowhere to step our feet. You do your best to fix the broken car, even when it is a miserable jalopy. I sometimes see some vehicles on the road with so much smoke and sounding metal parts that do not even match the smoke from ferocious burning farms and forests. But the owners cling on to these awful automobiles till the stage when even a resurrected Mr. Ford (of Ford motors in Detroit) could do nothing to fix them.
It is absolutely a defeatist policy for anyone to think of marriage as a try-and-error escapade or reckless adventure. No one should make plans in advance to divorce a partner in a marriage, “in case it does not work”. Marriage by convenience and by stipulated contract is no marriage at all, no matter how you try to call or define it. Marriage was designed by God to be a permanent covenant relationship between one man and one woman. You must go into marriage like a full-scale war with the objective to “do and die”, fueled by faith, courage, burning passion, zeal, diligence, perseverance, and purpose that are rooted in the fear of God and unflinching determination to make the relationship work to a successful and fruitful end with God's help.
There should be absolute commitment in all romantic relationships, marriages, and family life initiatives.
Serious and genuine commitment is a major problem for many people today, especially teenagers and young adults who have slumped into a “take-it-easy mode” because of the luxury of technology and facilitation by modern development, and did not therefore experience the toil and sweat of their parents and the older generation. Genuine commitment is woefully absent in relationships today because of the lack of proper understanding of marriage and family life, lazy attitudes that hate hard work and perseverance, lack of patience to achieve lasting results, absence of the fear of God, escalation of immorality and careless living, wasteful spending, lack of love and care for other humans, and the multiplication of distractions of the modern world that take away our focus from what is essential, all of which do not help us to order our lives and priorities in the right direction.
There are 3 aspects of commitmentCommitment to God;Commitment to the institution of marriage or family; and Commitment to the individual in the marriage or family.
No form of commitment can be adequately or meaningfully established without these three principles in that order. Look critically around you and around the world at leaders, politicians, managers, ministers, husbands, wives, children, relatives, fiancées, institutions, businesses, churches, and all communities, and give me a classic example of anyone who did not fear God (which goes with obedience to God's word), violated the fundamental principles of the institution or community he or she is dealing with without any conscious efforts for commitment, but has genuinely succeeded in becoming truly committed to his or her spouse, children, parents, in-laws, relatives, colleagues, and friends on a personal level.
If a person is not committed to God, and is not committed to the regulations and requirements of marriage and family, then it becomes very difficult to become committed to the husband, wife, child, or family member. The person then cannot easily make quality time for the chosen mate in the relationship, help to meet his or her needs, live happily with the person, and obtain success in the marriage or family life. The same principle applies to all other relationships in homes, churches, institutions, organizations, communities, and nations of the world. If you do not fear God, you will not commit properly to the principles and regulations of your church, school, work, organization, city, or nation, which will ultimately affect your commitment to the person or people that you are dealing with.
It is common to see people becoming frustrated and getting easily wearied in their perseverance to establish their commitments to live with people, work cooperatively with them, relate sweetly to them, and enjoy their company. The major reason is because when the fear of God and commitment to God is lacking, and the person willfully or ignorantly ignores the necessary values or violates the required rules of the particular institution, then the foundation for commitment to the person or people involved becomes a difficult task to accomplish, and his or her gas quickly runs out!
There are principles for marriage, family life, and all romantic relationships that must be adhered to.
There are basic principles that must be known and obeyed by every human being before anyone can hope for results and benefits in any relationship, especially marriage. We usually want to chase after success, good results, and rich benefits in our relationships, using every means possible to grab them without taking time to observe the principles necessary to obtain the fruits we yearn for. When we talk of principles, we imply a set of important values and guidelines by which we live and operate orderly and wisely, for obtaining any good thing in this life, in order for it to have real meaning and produce the expected results that will become a lasting legacy.
For example, if you have engaged in any sexual activity and caused any child to be born into this world, it is your duty and sacred responsibility to work hard and care for that child (no matter your faith, race, color, or social position). It is morally irresponsible and wicked (to say the least) to marry someone legally, and indulge in sexual activity outside of your spouse. Some even indulge in incest with their own daughters! Solemn! And some men shamefully enjoy sexual activity with their housemaids and close relatives who happen to live in their homes, and their secretaries or employees in offices. Others cannot live a life of moral sanity without constantly flirting with an old girlfriend or boyfriend. If that is your problem, call upon Jesus for deliverance; call the spirit of adultery behind your problem by name and rebuke it in the name of the Lord, and get into meditation on scripture for cleansing and power to maintain holiness and purity in your life.
Many people begin courting, enter into marriage, and live with their spouses without any principles that they mutually agree to live by. This is where premarital counseling becomes necessary for prospective spouses. They rather depend on their feelings or the wishy-washy ideas that float around them, without morality, discipline, and decent values. All their decisions and choices therefore become faulty. I have to keep reminding us that several of the problems in marriages and romantic relationships are due to the fact that many of us do not understand the basic principles and real meaning of marriage, family life, and dating or courtship.
Parenting began in the sinful state of man, and that is why the training of children is such a difficult task.
Humans never experienced how to parent a child in their sinless state. Adam and Eve began to have children after they had acquired a sinful nature, and passed on that unfortunate legacy to all of us. Thanks to Christ who delivers us from that curse! Our children are special gifts from God to us for us to become good stewards by training them to continue the good works we start, and maintain the good legacy passed on to them. My wife and I always tell our children that we are imperfect parents training imperfect children. Parents should therefore know that they become trained themselves in the process of parenting, and should carefully and diligently learn their lessons, and become more experienced parents with time.
Parenting never ceases from birth to death, and parents and their children should build strong bonds of love, care, and sharing as they grow together. Parents should take time to explain the reasons for their exhortation and instruction to their children, so that they can meaningfully impart them to their own children in the future.
All training must aim at training of the mind (mental development), followed by physical development, then spiritual development, and then social development. These 4 basic areas of development are the same areas that any young adult should focus on in his or her preparation to enter into marriage (after being trained in those areas from childhood), in addition to emotional development (dealing with anger, sorrow, fear, frustration etc.) and financial development (ability to acquire, receive, give, use, and manage money wisely and productively).
Couples must fully complement each other in a marriage, in order to become the complete couple
No one should be the hero in any relationship. It is wrong, unkind, and un-loving (if not ungodly) to use my weakness to popularize yourself under any circumstance. We all love to do that in order to become the good guys! It is even worse when you betray your partner and friend or relative by joining others to gossip and engage in slander and negative criticisms about your partner or friend's weaknesses in order to gain political, financial, social, marital, academic, or ministerial points.
If you see any weaknesses in me or I see any in you, it is our moral an godly duty to pray, and look for the best means to help one another out of our bad habits and weaknesses, so that we can unite, share a common ground, develop common interests, and move along cooperatively for mutual love and productivity. All resources should be shared equally in any committed relationship without any form of cheating, in order for each one to develop freely, independently, and sufficiently, and use the developed talents and gifts to complement the other partner. We were all created equal by God (with same bodies, souls, and spirits), but we are all not equal (in terms of talents and gifts).
Your preferences should not be transformed into commandments in any relationship. Recognize and humbly admit what you do not know or skills you do not have in the relationship, and patiently teach each other until you learn more from one another, grow more into each other, love each other deeply, and appreciate each other joyfully as you wait and work mutually to acquire more skills, overcome more weaknesses, and share more resources together.
You should study each other very well in your relationship, and seek to satisfy the interests, needs, and welfare of each other, and show respect for each other's rights, feelings, and opinions, which is the real definition for true love.
Real love is wise and sacrificial, and is very rewarding when the love is sincere and consistent. Genuine respect, true humility, and sacrificial commitment bring fervent love to the table. A selfish, fake, uncommitted person is the one who loves things and rather uses people; but a loving, selfless, wise, genuine, committed, God-fearing person rather uses things, and loves people. Which category do you belong to?
By: Rev. Dr. Samuel A. Kisseadoo (Professor of Biology, USA)
Founder and President, Fruitful Ministries International Inc (Evangelistic & Teaching Christian Ministry).,
Write to: 6 Red Robin Turn, Hampton, Virginia 23669, USA. Or, call: 757-7289330
In Ghana call Fruitful Ministries at: 233-20-8126533 or 233-276-322982 in Accra or 233-244-786658 in Kumasi.
E-mail: [email protected]. For additional teaching, visit our Website: www.fruitfulministriesint.com
More information can be found in the 12 books authored by Dr. Kisseadoo. You may Contact Dr. Kisseadoo directly, Fruitful Ministries, or Challenge Bookstores in Ghana for copies.
Tune in and listen to: “Hope For Your Family” broadcast by Dr. Kisseadoo on JOY 99.7 FM every Sunday at 8:30pm (Ghana time).