Daly Focus Blog
Marriage is a unique gift from God. He takes two people – who are often complete opposites – and puts them together with the task of moving forward in unity.
But what happens when times get tough and circumstances change?
Well, couples who have a purpose, a direction, and a plan work through their struggles together and overcome their difficulties as a team.
Couples who don’t have a purpose, a direction, and a plan drift.
And what’s the solution for couples who begin to drift?
When you’re driving and approach an intersection, a traffic light communicates how to proceed:
A green light means move forward.
A yellow light means slow down and prepare to stop or move forward with caution.
A red light means stop immediately.
Author and marriage and family pastor, Scott Kedersha, advises dating couples to approach marriage the same way. Through the wisdom of friends, family, or a pastor or counselor, you can discern whether it’s safe to move forward, whether you ought to slow down and reconsider aspects of your relationship, or whether you ought to stop altogether instead of proceeding into an unhealthy marriage.
Have you ever gotten your car stuck, in mud, or like those of us in Colorado, snow? You rock your car back and forth to get traction, but your tires spin, and you get nowhere.
Husbands and wives can get stuck like that. In anger, so you’re always battling each other. Or busyness, so you never have the time or energy to connect. Or maybe like my guests on Focus on the Family with Jim Daly, Justin and Trisha Davis, you’re stuck in the saddest rut of all: apathy – you’ve given up and stopped fighting for your marriage.
Dr. Gary Chapman wrote the book on love. Literally. He’s the author of the best-selling classic The Five Love Languages. But even Dr. Chapman had to learn how to love his wife well. Early on in their marriage, he and his wife Karolyn struggled to navigate their differences. They had such a tough time that at one point they both wondered if they had married the wrong person.
My wife Jean and I experienced something similar.
The stress of daily life takes a toll on even the happiest couples – which is why marriage and family counselor Dr. Randy Schroeder says seeking marital happiness is unrealistic. A better approach is to pursue consistent marital satisfaction. How? Good habits.
Dr. Schroeder offers four “daily essentials” for creating good habits in your marriage:
“Goodbye, I love you.” Whoever leaves the house first should initiate this.
“Goodnight, I love you.” Whoever goes to bed first should initiate this.
It’s often easier to tell your spouse, “I love you,” than to show them through your actions.
I can tell you that’s true not only from personal experience but from the sheer number of questions we get here at Focus on the Family from married couples about navigating busy schedules, financial issues, and communication and conflict. Each question represents a small everyday moment that somehow turned into a disruption to the couple’s marital unity.
Authors Matt and Lisa Jacobson are with me on Focus on the Family with Jim Daly to encourage husbands and wives to serve and love each other well.
You and your spouse don’t always see eye to eye. One of you talks too much – or not enough. One of you feels hot while the other is shivering cold. And one of you is probably a saver while the other is a spender.
Those differences – especially the last one – can drive you apart. Petty disagreements about money can easily turn into full-grown battles that bleed a relationship dry.
Well-known author, radio host, and financial expert Dave Ramsey is my guest on Focus on the Family with Jim Daly.
I don’t know if there’s a secret to building a happy marriage, but there’s one idea that comes pretty close. The happiest couples know their spouse well and feel like their spouse knows them.
There’s a word for that. It’s called intimacy, and the only way to develop relational connection like that is good communication. That means more than talking about the weather. You have to open your hearts to one another and connect at a deeper level.
Dr. John Gottman and his researchers can predict with almost 95-percent accuracy whether a couple’s marriage will succeed or fail. Their predictions are based on how couples fight – not how frequently or even the content of their disagreements – but how couples actually engage in conflict. They discovered four elements to conflict – which Dr. Gottman calls “The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse” – that are destructive to a relationship:
Criticism
Defensiveness
Contempt
Stonewalling
If the Four Horseman mean certain destruction, how can couples avoid them?
Howard and Danielle Taylor’s relationship is evidence that a biblical understanding of the purpose for marriage is the best foundation for weathering the rough seasons of life.
Danielle didn’t grow up in the church and Howard was raised without a dad. Both adopted unhealthy cycles of relationship they’d learned from their parents. The result was not harmony and intimacy, but arguments, stress and conflict.
Over time, they learned new patterns of relating and communicating with each other, all rooted in a biblical understanding of marriage.
Jim Daly is a husband, father and President of Focus on the Family and host of its National Radio Hall of Fame broadcast. His blog, Daly Focus, is full of timely commentary and wisdom designed to help you navigate and understand today’s culture. His latest book is Marriage Done Right.
