Marriage

Moving Beyond The Stalemate In Marriage

By Trillia Newbell

Let me be honest from the start. At the beginning of my marriage, I was a harsh jerk. My self-righteous impatience made it almost impossible for my husband to plan even a Saturday out for the two of us because I questioned every decision he made.

But God...

He is in the business of graciously convicting and sanctifying his saints, and over time God did a work in my life to show me the beauty of God’s design for headship and submission — a beautiful design highlighted by C.S. Lewis in what has been voted the most important Christian book of the twentieth century: Mere Christianity.

Unpopular Complementarity

Lewis recognized the topics of headship and submission were already unpopular in his day, and they needed to be addressed, and needed to be addressed in a book on the essentials of the faith. And he knew they would be hard to address. After addressing the permanency of marriage, he writes, “Something else, even more unpopular, remains to be dealt with. Christian wives promise to obey their husbands. In Christian marriage the man is said to be the ‘head’”.

Here’s why it mattered to Lewis:

The need for some head follows from the idea that marriage is permanent. Of course, as long as the husband and wife are agreed, no question of a head need arise; and we may hope that this will be the normal state of affairs in a Christian marriage.

But when there is a real disagreement, what is to happen? Talk it over, of course; but I am assuming they have done that and still failed to reach agreement. What do they do next?

They cannot decide by a majority vote, for in a council of two there can be no majority. Surely, only one or other of two things can happen: either they must separate and go their own ways or else one or other of them must have a casting vote.

If marriage is permanent, one or other party must, in the last resort, have the power of deciding the family policy. You cannot have a permanent association without a constitution.

And such a constitution will subtly flavor everything for the better. Lewis not only believes that the husband is the head of the wife, but that this must shape practices in the home. It is a functional complementarity, or what I would call a common-sense complementarity.

Functional Complementarity

Whenever two people need to make a decision, and a disagreement

I Do.

arises, one must lead. One must make the final decision. Important decisions in marriage require moving beyond a stalemate. And if the man doesn’t lead, the woman will.

For Lewis, the implications of (Ephesians 5:22–23) determined that the man was the head of the woman, and therefore the man would make the final decision.

But notice what Lewis is not saying. He is not saying a wife is a voiceless doormat. If that were the case, there would be no discussion, no possibility of stalemate, and the man would merely decide. Lewis doesn’t say that a woman cannot, and should not, have an opinion. Quite the contrary. His point is that the power of final decision in the case of disagreement falls to the husband and his role as the leader.

Sacrificial Complementarity

But decision-making is only the beginning of complementarity.

Lewis was not married when he wrote this, and admits that he could speak only second hand. He was a bachelor until his sixties, when he married his American friend, writer Joy Davidman Gresham. They were married after she received alarming and heartbreaking news that she had bone cancer and was given only a few days to live. Those days turned into four years, and during those long and painful years, Lewis overcame his own physical limitations to serve his wife unselfishly and tirelessly until she died.

Over the course of these four years, Lewis modeled the full scope of complementarity in his sacrifice for his wife. He lived out (Ephesians 5:25): “Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, that he might sanctify her.”

The Courage of Lewis

I imagine the great comfort Joy felt in having her husband sacrificially love and serve her. I’ve never faced a debilitating disease or chronic illness, but I have experienced suffering, and in that suffering, I have experienced the same type of self-sacrifice in my husband.

He is not perfect, nor am I. We both sin against each other, and we return to the grace of God in the gospel. But I have learned to submit to him gladly, and I no longer desire to usurp his authority — not because my husband is infallible, and not really on the testimony of Lewis, but

See STALEMATE on Page 23

I Do.

SOUTHERN OAKS

P L A N T A T I O N

Stop Divorce And Recommit Yourselves

By Angie Lewis

Recommitting yourselves to one another in marriage is for couples that are choosing to work on their marriage, resolve issues, and recommit their lives to each other. It is for couples that have grown apart spiritually and or emotionally and intend on encouraging each other through their devotion to one another. And finally, it is for couples who just want to remind their spouse of how much they mean to them, and to keep the bond going strong.

Recommitting your lives to each other can be an elaborate affair involving all of your friends and family, or it can be a simple and private ceremony between just you and your spouse. Of course, in both instances, God is a special witness overseeing your re-promise to each other. Let your spouse know that marriage is for life and your commitment to the marriage will be life long concern of yours through the good times as well as the not so good.

For believers, recommitment involves asking Jesus Christ into your marriage and basing your thoughts and actions upon the Word of God. Recommitment is knowing what your responsibilities in the marriage are according to God and His standards.

Recommitting is NOT lip reading some words to your spouse that you really don't mean but to speak from your heart knowing full good and well that God is listening to your every word. Come together in prayer and recite whatever vows you have prepared ahead of time.

You might be wondering why would it be necessary to recommit yourself to the person you married? Recommitment shows your love on a regular basis and brings couples closer together, reminding them of how important the marriage really is. The other reason is if couples married too young and they did not hold the same value toward the marriage, as they should have, they now have the chance to make up for that by recommitment to each other.

By choosing to work on marital issues and recommitting to each other the second time around, the marriage will most likely become more valuable in your conviction bank.

The most important aspects to remember about recommitment are it first involves having a committed heart to Jesus Christ, so we can fully understand what commitment means. The second most important aspect is realizing that marriage is not about you. It is about both of you, and that means considering the feelings of another in all situations that would involve the person you married.

I have listed four important aspects below that would help to bring commitment back into the marriage with your willingness. 1. God 2. Selflessness 3. Choosing to love 4. Marriage is for life

This does not mean your marriage will not run into problems, but it means that now you have the proper resources to apply into the marriage when confronted with certain issues that upset the apple cart from time to time. No marriage is perfect; marriage is only what we make it to be.

The main reason, I believe, people get divorced is because they don't have the foggiest idea how to manage issues that arise in the marriage. But if we choose to accept and follow the four steps above it will bring a dead marriage on the brink of divorce back to life! So stop divorce and recommit yourselves to each other. Take responsibility for your marriage!

God is the greatest source for our marriage and He provides us with what we need on a continual basis, therefore we should strive to make God a priority in our marriage. His loving guidance is what helps us to feel content so we won't feel the need to be selfish. The minute we take our eyes off of Him we trod the path that leads to relying on our own understanding and we become selfish.

We should choose to love our spouse even when we don't feel like being very loving because that is how we are to love our spouse. Jesus Christ has taught us how to love through His actions of love for us. Recommitting your life to your spouse means your marriage is important to you and that you want to remain married for life through the good times as well as the bad.

Put on therefore, as the elect of God, holy and beloved, bowels of mercies, kindness, humbleness of mind, meekness, longsuffering; Forbearing one another, and forgiving one another, if any man have a quarrel against any; even as Christ forgave you, so also do ye. (Colos-

sians 3:12-13 KJV)

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