Hi there. Three times now I have been caught in hostilities over the marriage question, or questions, more correctly. This time, I want to describe as exactly as possible what I positively know about marriage. I hope it helps everyone with questions and issues about marriage.

I AM A CHRISTIAN

This is important because everything I say is colored by my worldview. Anyone reading is totally free to take exception to my worldview. You have every right to reject, resist and discount my worldview. I also have every right to hold my worldview, declare my worldview and uphold my worldview. If you stop reading at this point, it is entirely your prerogative. But that will mean that you cannot sensibly answer any points I marshal after this introduction. And I will be hampered discussing with you.

Furthermore, being a Christian does not render me ignorant of other wordviews or insensitive to them. But I cannot be both a Christian and a non-Christian. As far as I'm concerned, only Christ is right: others are right omly insofar as they agree with Christ. If you hold the opinion that I'm a bigot because of that, it's ok: you're free to, just as I'm free to hold the view that you are ignorant to hold such a view of me.


WHY MARRIAGE?

No, it's not only for sexx. No, it's not only a buddy system. No, it's not only just another milestone in the course of life. No, it's not only insurance. Marriage has a particular purpose attached to it.

Humans are just about the only creatures that never wholly quit the job of guiding their young. It's perfectly normal to find an able-bodied middle-aged human with young of his own and a repository of other people's confidence taking a deliberate trip to the countryside to visit with an invalid who is on the out and ready to drop into the grave to ask their counsel over some matter of concern to them. In the absence of biological parents, sufficiently older members of the species who have shown certain peculiar interest in the life of the younger serve just as well. It comes very naturally to humans of all colors and cultures to care for their young and guide them and for their young to seek this care and guidance.

The concept of the family is not merely resultant from this natural tendency, it is itself the manifestation of this tendency. Humans form units specifically in order to preserve values. It is no longer such a conscious understanding for the vast majority but it is nevertheless true. Family units are how we preserve moral codes. And it is interesting to note that these codes impact on the whole spectrum of human activity. Because of this, the family unit pretty much decides the fate of the world which we know is subject to human government.

Marriage makes the family unit. The family starts from two people in a contract or covenant with each other. It really cannot work any other way. The male and the female species are very complementary halves of a whole. They are different in pretty much every way, with each of them holding a specific capacity for one type of approach to life. Together, they form the full picture. The lack of one in a family is apt to tilt the balance of a child's character and personality. It would seem that to form the whole person in the child, both physically and psychologically, bothe the male and the female parents are needed, perhaps because each one brings something to the table that the other one cannot by reason of gender.

Marriage then is effectively how we decide the fate of humankind and, consequently, the fate of the world.

Of course, not all marriages biologically produce children, but every marriage affects lives other than those of the couple for the obvious reason that spouses affect how each other thinks and feels about pretty much everything so that we all approach issues with that subtle but vital difference as our marriages develop.

Marriage is a special relationship designed to ensure the growth and improvement or positive development of our world. Obviously, to have sexx or kids or a good buddy or insurance for old age, marriage is not absolutely necessary, but it is a near-impossible job to make proper human beings out of anybody without the strength and support of an opposite-sex spouse.


WHAT THIS MEANS FOR THE UNMARRIED

Simply that you'd be getting yourself in a pickle picking your spouse arbitrarily among other interesting issues.

I think that the above is the biggest issue that singles face - knowing how to pick one's spouse. For women, there's the "he's really nice and caring but not very . . . while he's very spontaneous and adventurous but not . . ." types of confusion; while for the men, there's the "she's a nice, respectful girl but she . . . while she's a wild, clubtype girl but . . ." types of confusion. There are other funny issues like that too. How does one know Mr and Miss Right?

Well, first, the Rights are a family, not only individuals. And you must appreciate that they most certainly exist. There is a type of person exactly right for you and a type entirely wrong for you. I don't know any real reason to say that there's only one person in the whole world who is right for you, but there may be. I have a subconscious hope that there is for me. It's such a romantic notion and it does help with fighting to keep what you have in the person you love. However, I do know that very possible situations like an unexpected death could make it necessary to love someone else and it is not easy to do so when you feel like you're betraying the one person you meant to love forever and nobody likes to compete with a ghost. And I also know that marriage is all about the preservation of values and the use of them to accomplish the goals of one's life . That means that as long as one's spouse is in agreement with one's values and both share the same outlook on life, the purpose of marriage is achieved (of course, the values must be the right ones for this to be so) and the truth is that there's more than one person in the world that one will or can find with that resonance.

So, Mr and Miss Right come from one family. If you find that family, you can pick pretty much anyone you want.

I think that's the key question to answer here. Every other question can be answered from it. Except perhaps whether or not it's ok to be celibate. The answer there is: most definitely.



WHAT IT MEANS FOR THE MARRIED

Marriage is tough. I'm not married, but I can tell from two things: observation of marriages close to me and my experience of exclusive relationships; and perhaps a third - the Bible.

It's quite a large order to produce another human being. Those who have had to work on themselves with any kind of goal in view know that it's no mean feat to manage a human being. Human beings can be almost unpredictable and unmanageable. It takes so much energy to be able to deal with them. And if they're your kids, it's a rest-of-your-life affair. Now imagine feeling that responsible or getting that involved with someone you didn't birth and who is your age. A girl once told me, 'your problem is that you never do what you're told.' Well, how much of that sentiment is found in marriages? That feeling or need to make someone behave, how much of it is found between husbands and wives?

Marriage is tough because expectations are imvolved. People don't want to be left hanging. Now, this is perfectly reasonable. Try to imagine the husband as the head or the central nervous system and the wife as the body. What would happen when the muscles and bones and other tissues reach out throught the peripheral nervous system for coordination and supply from the CNS and there's no answer or the CNS reaches out to coordinate the extremities and organs and the bulk to get something done and accomplished and there's nothing there? It's a real pain because in both cases there is so much waste and frustration. Both the CNS and the rest of the body must be in tandem or death sets in.

Consider that in our body, it's perfectly normal to be unaware of the firing electrochemical pulses sending messages between our brain and everything else and yet everything works in such perfect unity that there is a little feeling of absurdity when the head is spoken of like it's a separate entity from our body. In fact it is not. The head is as much a part of our body as our stomach is even though we'd digest no food unless our head says so, and our head would get no nutrition unless our stomach digested it. That's how it is in marriage. The husband must be where he ought to be when the wife looks for him just like the wife must be where she ought to be when he looks for her.

For this reason, if you're married, learning to fit into the perfect dance with one's spouse is what it's all about. It won't happen automatically but if you both are heading in the same direction, you'll find that rhythm. But if you aren't, look at the next section.

Again, marriage makes two people one person. This means that it is entirely strange and abnormal to hear about in-law's deciding how a couple treat each other. That is not normal, that is not right. A married couple is one unit. What is done or said to the one is done and said to the other. So, the husband's mother must be understood by all to be the wife's mother as well and if she does not act accordingly, the husband ought to straighten her out. That's the principle here.

Again, since they're a unit, it isn't the wife who's barren or the man who's infertile, it's the couple that's infertile. It isn't just the man who lost a job, it's the couple who did. It's not just the woman who's pregnant, it's the couple who is. True, it's one half that's fully involved in any of those instances and situations just like them, but it is as completely the other half's fight. Whatever the situation, the unit should naturally pull together.

As much as possible, as long as both are available and capable, neither should usurp the other's place in the marriage. There should be space for each to maneuver within their roles. And it should be clear what each wants to ans is able to bring to the table.




DIVORCE

And the big question, " why get married if you you intend to get a divorce?" Ah, but the other big question arises, "why does the concept exist at all?"

Both are good questions and worthy of answer. I will begin with the second. I am convinced that the concept of divorce never arose out of the need to escape a marriage one is not enjoying but as a deterrent. I think that honest divorcees who are self-aware can attest to the fact that splitting hurts one helluva lot. It's not by any means to up and walk out of a home you call yours or even throw out the person you built it with, sometimes even when that person has turnes into a despicable monster. If it isn't because of some flashes of a possible change in the erring spouse, it wil be the memories of once upon a time that makes it so hard to let go. And once you've allowed yourself to lose faith in a marriage once, it becomes quite easy to lose it again. This is because a very deep and vital trust has been eroded.

It takes a great deal of trust to give oneself to another regardless whether one is a man or woman. To close out all other options and pick this one guy or girl for the journey of a lifetime, literally speaking, is a massive step to take and it's not easy to make even if you're a man. So once it's taken, there's a subconscious need to justify it. Some years down the line, a few or many troubles later, you'd still find participants looking for ways to save their marriage rather than destroy it. The reason is that people grow on each other. That's just it is.

Thus, a divorce is always like a surgery where one has their heart ripped out. Closure is not achieved in this case just because divorce papers have been signed and one has "moved on". Marriage is a very powerful bond. In fact, in its true state, between Christians, it is utterly indestructible. When that bond is broken, lives are badly and indelibly scarred, but there are times when a break is not only justifiable, it is, in fact, very necessary and well adviced.

In a situation where a spouse is unrepentantly pursuing a course irreconcilable and inimical to the purpose of the union even after heart-to-heart's with their other half and consultations with mentors, it may be necessary to walk away. This is not only cutting losses, it is preserving life. If the people involved claim Christ, it takes only behavior suited to an unbeliever to break up and only after the erring partner has been admonished at least twice. And in that case, it may be wiser to stay unmarried at least until it is clear that the erring spouse is unwilling to repent (which detail confirms that they are better considered unbelievers). However, if somehow both halves are undeniably Christians but are finding it difficult for whatever reason to get along, their separation is not final. Scriptures hold that in that case, remarriage can only be to the ex. This is not an impossibility for Christians or too much of a difficulty. The desire for sexx and intimate companionship possible only with a spouse might actually diminish with the break of that union for the Christians involved.

Divorce tells the two to value each other because there are no guarantees outside of the matrimonial home. It is only the immature and ignorant that wield divorce like it's a child's plaything. Those who know the power of a gun do not swing about a gun with its safety off. Nobody with some intelligence would want to wield divorce like a weapon or the wonder drug for all marital ills. Divorce is nothing like that. It's a warning and a dire warning to the married and unmarried alike.



LOVE

How many songs, movies, and poems have been made about this concept? How much drama has been generated about it? And yet very few have the faintest idea what it is. Doe-eyed teenagers give their parents nightmares at home because of it and marriages are made and damaged because of it. Just what in the worls is Love?

Some things I can tell you for sure, none of the '-woods' and music genres can tell you for sure what it is. They might tell you what it's imagined to feel like and how it is fantasized to affect Life, but they can't tell you what it really is. Actually, that's ok because no one who doesn't know God can know exactly what Love is. And those who do know will find words very difficult for expressing the nature of God. Suffice it to say that Love is Life. That's another conundrum, I know, but one who has Love rejoices in Life, just like some movies and poetry portray and such a person finds it quite natural to fill each moment with unspeakable beauty for their spouse. And in the little, ordinary boring details too.

Sacrifice comes naturally to a lover. But sacrifice is not mutually exclusive with self-expression. It is, in fact, a form of self-expression. In a marriage, it's easy for everything to assume boring routine and each half to start feeling obliged to do this or that and then to start looking for some sort of appreciation from the other half. This is where Love is indispensable. Rather than only looking at things as needing to be done, Love starts to look at them as challenges to self-expression and personal creativity: some way to share with one's spouse the deep yearnings of one's heart. That's what Love does - share.

So, love is not a fancy word to sigh over, it's a practical way of living, it's a way to fly. And nobody can know it as well and completely as a married couple can. That dating thing that talks so much of love is not really how we know love, it's just our own courtship system, to show what we're willing to bring to the table. It's at the exchange of vows that the real Love journey begins. And it can carry on until our bodily life is over. What it takes is to learn to take pleasure in living.




I'm sorry this post was so long. I just figured that it's necessary to put out once and for all what my understanding about marriage and all its associated issues are. Thanks for taking the time to read. I really hope it was worth it for you.

Well worth it.

Love is indeed Life.

@ OP,so ihea nine di gi n'obi?
Well done. All I can say is marriage is practical,not theory and until you get into it,you can't really understand it.

Nice write up though! When is the book coming out?

Thanks you guys.

@safelove

Ee, Ada Igbo, o bu ka o di m n'obi o.

You're right. There are things about marriage one cannot know or understand until one is married. It's the same with pretty much everything in life.

But even so, there are things that can be known and in fact must be known prior to entering into actual experience. In fact, it is not possible to enter any experience whose reality you're oblivious of and which you have no concept of taking hold of.

The latter is what I hoped to capture. However, I did not seal my post up as canon. It's open to correction which I would gladly receive wherever it's given.

A long piece, i'll read later by the way are you talking from experience or heresay...? If not from experience then i might have to take you serious after you 've experienced it. Talk is cheap you know?

Very well said. The fact that yu put so much thot into ds n appear to b speaking from ur convictions is most impressive. May ur life match ur words. Isee!

i wish you could summarize, the write up's very long.

This stirs up too many questions inasmuch as it provided some answers. Here's one, what behavior in an erring spouse truly characterizes unbelief or @ what point do you slap on the "unbeliever" tag, cos some Christians struggle with sin...Romans 7 I think? What point does faith for change end? etc. Also, if Jesus said Moses sanctioned divorce unwillingly consequent however upon the 'hard hearts' or hearts of stone of the Israelites and in Ezekiel it's prophesied that when d messiah comes we would get new hearts (hearts of flesh), do you still think divorce is ok even following infidelity? Especially since every time we sin more so with sexual sins we basically committing adultery against God and he forgives? If he forgives us every time, can we hold back complete forgiveness and push for divorce as sanctioned by Jesus in Scriptures? I have an opinion, but im not trying to argue. Genuinely want to know what you think