Compatibility in Christian Marriage ....

[A_Thinker]

In another thread, a poster asked about differences between potential marriage partners ... and how to reconcile those differences in a way which is compatible with the counsel we receive from scripture.

This was my response ...

People who marry are different in some ways. My wife is quite strong and extroverted, ... while I am more like your fiance (i.e. quieter and more introverted). If I were weaker, my wife would, likely, run over me (not that she wants to, ... buts that's just her nature). I had to prove myself to her (i.e. that I could match her, and provide reliable strength and leadership for the two of us).

A scourge we see today is that many women consent to marry unreliable men. Then both are unhappy, because the men feel put upon, ... and the women feel abandoned. Obviously, this is not a good situation for a relationship which you want to endure. Men don't do particularly well ... when they are expected to perform at a level to which they have yet to rise ... and women don't do well ... when they find that they cannot rest in the strength of their spouse.

The question is, can the two of you work together for the good (i.e. to positive effect) ... or not.

If not, ... it may be best to find another match.

Courtship and engagement are times/opportunities to "test the waters" of compatibility. The two of you should take on some joint projects ... and see how well you work together. Usually, the preparations for marriage is a good testing ground. Everyone must do their part, while maintaining unity and harmony with the other. Unfortunately, in modern first world culture, the task and challenges of wedding may be shouldered by others than the couple to be (i.e parents). In such a case, each partner in the potential match should be vetted in other joint endeavors, so as to determine true suitability.

 

[Aussie Pete]

People who marry are different in some ways. My wife is quite strong and extroverted, ... while I am more like your fiance (i.e. quieter and more introverted). If I were weaker, my wife would, likely, run over me (not that she wants to, ... buts that's just her nature). I had to prove myself to her (i.e. that I could match her, and provide reliable strength and leadership for the two of us).

A scourge we see today is that many women consent to marry unreliable men. Then both are unhappy, because the men feel put upon, ... and the women feel abandoned. Obviously, this is not a good situation for a relationship which you want to endure. Men don't do particularly well ... when they are expected to perform at a level to which they have yet to rise ... and women don't do well ... when they find that they cannot rest in the strength of their spouse.

The question is, can the two of you work together for the good (i.e. to positive effect) ... or not.

If not, ... it may be best to find another match.

Courtship and engagement are times/opportunities to "test the waters" of compatibility. The two of you should take on some joint projects ... and see how well you work together. Usually, the preparations for marriage is a good testing ground. Everyone must do their part, while maintaining unity and harmony with the other. Unfortunately, in modern first world culture, the task and challenges of wedding may be shouldered by others than the couple to be (i.e parents). In such a case, each partner in the potential match should be vetted in other joint endeavors, so as to determine true suitability.

Well said. Mark Gungor has a great take on this, entertaining as well. Some women seem to think that a husband is a project to work on until he meets their standard. Then they think, "He's not the man I married".

 

[bèlla]

I think its impossible to gauge compatibility without the Lord’s direction and an understanding of your strengths and weaknesses. Most people are choosing companions based on their ideal selves and becoming disheartened when their wants and needs go unmet.

Marriage is an undertaking of two unfinished persons en route to God’s sanctifying presence. Expectations of flawlessness from the other and over estimation of your own will always lead to disappointment for each.

 

[Halbhh]

I think its impossible to gauge compatibility without the Lord’s direction and an understanding of your strengths and weaknesses. Most people are choosing companions based on their ideal selves and becoming disheartened when their wants and needs go unmet.

Marriage is an undertaking of two unfinished persons en route to God’s sanctifying presence. Expectations of flawlessness from the other and over estimation of your own will always lead to disappointment for each.

That's so true.

Part of how Christ profoundly can support marriage of the two is if they look to Him, Who is that perfection we want. We can stay wonderfully (and happily) humble, because He is Lord.

 

[A_Thinker]

I think its impossible to gauge compatibility without the Lord’s direction and an understanding of your strengths and weaknesses.

I agree. Both my wife and myself observed the Lord's explicit guidance as He brought us together ...

 

[Endeavourer]

The two of you should take on some joint projects ... and see how well you work together.

In such a case, each partner in the potential match should be vetted in other joint endeavors, so as to determine true suitability.

This is excellent advice, although I would suggest these projects long before the wedding plans. Fixing cars together, making batches bread, painting the rooms in a house, etc etc. Some of the dates should be long work days together. Some tasks that the man tends to enjoy more and some that the woman tends to enjoy more. See how the other's patience holds up in tasks that are outside of your typical realm. Do you still have a fun time together?

Several other areas of incompatibility are also full stop no-go's for me:

a) if one partner's intellect is significantly more developed than the other's. Although not always accurate, one indicator might be levels of education. If education levels are different, has the one with lesser education shown a life style of curiosity and learning? Sometimes the less educated person is the more curious and intellectual while the more educated person got a party degree, so this isn't a formulaic science. Do you enjoy the same level of depth (or shallowness) in your conversations? If there is an imbalance, generally the conversations will be very boring to both of you in your future and you will not enjoy spending time with each other in the future.

b) do you enjoy similar levels of activity? This is important so you enjoy spending your recreational and free time together. Dating in marriage (spending time with undivided attention) is critically important to keep yourselves over the threshold of being in love with each other. However, it has another significance: generally more active people have a more active sex drive. If one of you is inactive and the other is active there will likely be a longstanding mismatch in sexual desire/drive.

c) If there is something you believe (or do) that you would continue to believe in or do at the expense of another person, make sure the other person believes in (or does) the same things. One example is faith. If you will continue to believe in Jesus, or continue to go to church, even if it hurts your spouse, make sure they have the same faith and also the same desire to go to church. Differing doctrines can cause problems (which church to go to, spiritual discussions between you) and likely will cause problems if you have children since both of your instincts are to raise your children in the truth as you see it.

Here's a great article that discusses these concepts in more detail, along with several others:
https://www.marriagebuilders.com/choosing-the-right-one-to-marry-2.htm

 

[TraceMalin]

Men are in crisis in society and relationships today. May I recommend Wildmen, Warriors, and Kings: Masculine Spirituality and the Bible by Patrick Arnold? The chairperson of the religious studies department loaned that book to me in college. It's an excellent read.

A review by Bert H. Hoff states: Jesuit Patrick Arnold brings his sharp mind and sharp pen to bear on articulating a masculine spirituality that draws on Jewish and Christian spiritual tradition to find powerful, challenging, healing images for men as they face the dangers, stresses, and vapidity of modern life. His thesis is that although modern liberal tradition has lost awareness of male spiritual needs, and even grown hostile to them, great resources for men still lie buried in the biblical and historical tradition.

As a child Arnold encountered men who spent a lot of time in the Black Hills, who almost always had a very appealing air of wisdom and spiritual strength about them, a sense of belonging to the earth and relatedness to its creatures. "I'm not a religious man, I don't go to church, but up here in the Hills I feel close to God and I talk to him in my own words." There does not seem to be room in the modern church for these men, in part because of the mysandry in seminaries in the last decade or two. After an excellent chapter on masculine spirituality, he urges men to add "mysandry" (man-hatred)(characterized as an ideological spin-off of extreme feminism) to his private glossary of important terms and gives examples of mysandry in seminaries. One of the most compelling is the female theological professor who forbade men from speaking in her class.

The book then presents masculine archetypes from the Bible. Robert Bly, who wrote an excellent introduction, found the chapter on Jonah the Trickster particularly brilliant. Other chapters discuss Abraham the Patriarch and Pilgrim, Moses the Warrior and Magician, Solomon the King, Elijah the Wildman, Elisha the Healer, Jeremiah the Prophet, and the Lover. It concludes with a discussion of the masculinity of God. Perhaps it is this part that Robert Bly was thinking of when he describes this as "a brave, passionate, and sometimes one-sided book."

 

[Halbhh]

Men are in crisis in society and relationships today. May I recommend Wildmen, Warriors, and Kings: Masculine Spirituality and the Bible by Patrick Arnold? The chairperson of the religious studies department loaned that book to me in college. It's an excellent read.

A review by Bert H. Hoff states: Jesuit Patrick Arnold brings his sharp mind and sharp pen to bear on articulating a masculine spirituality that draws on Jewish and Christian spiritual tradition to find powerful, challenging, healing images for men as they face the dangers, stresses, and vapidity of modern life. His thesis is that although modern liberal tradition has lost awareness of male spiritual needs, and even grown hostile to them, great resources for men still lie buried in the biblical and historical tradition.

As a child Arnold encountered men who spent a lot of time in the Black Hills, who almost always had a very appealing air of wisdom and spiritual strength about them, a sense of belonging to the earth and relatedness to its creatures. "I'm not a religious man, I don't go to church, but up here in the Hills I feel close to God and I talk to him in my own words." There does not seem to be room in the modern church for these men, in part because of the mysandry in seminaries in the last decade or two. After an excellent chapter on masculine spirituality, he urges men to add "mysandry" (man-hatred)(characterized as an ideological spin-off of extreme feminism) to his private glossary of important terms and gives examples of mysandry in seminaries. One of the most compelling is the female theological professor who forbade men from speaking in her class.

The book then presents masculine archetypes from the Bible. Robert Bly, who wrote an excellent introduction, found the chapter on Jonah the Trickster particularly brilliant. Other chapters discuss Abraham the Patriarch and Pilgrim, Moses the Warrior and Magician, Solomon the King, Elijah the Wildman, Elisha the Healer, Jeremiah the Prophet, and the Lover. It concludes with a discussion of the masculinity of God. Perhaps it is this part that Robert Bly was thinking of when he describes this as "a brave, passionate, and sometimes one-sided book."

Way back in the 90s for a time, as a non believer, I got briefly into Bly, via hearing some of his poetry, and reading Iron John. The idea being roughly that there is a kind of mystical (this isn't a Christian idea by the way, but is of the real fleshly/body side of us) masculine...essence, like a kind of water down in a well, and men need (Bly's idea) to go to that well and draw up some water. This poetical metaphor works in that all (all humans, both genders) do indeed actually really need to drink of a mysterious missing...water...of some kind -- the Living Water that Christ gives, and we all long for that when we don't yet have it.

So, Bly's poetry (similar to Carl Jung's explorations in a way) works well, because it taps into our longing (when lost or not yet fully taking in yet all Christ said to us) of an actual, real missing thing (but it's not just for men though). Once a Christian really does listen and...absorb/hear, all the way...Christ's words, we go to the well where we can drink more of that living water.

"Jacob’s well was there; so Jesus, wearied as he was from his journey, was sitting beside the well. It was about the sixth hour.

A woman from Samaria came to draw water. Jesus said to her, “Give me a drink.” (For his disciples had gone away into the city to buy food.) The Samaritan woman said to him, “How is it that you, a Jew, ask for a drink from me, a woman of Samaria?” (For Jews have no dealings with Samaritans.)

Jesus answered her, “If you knew the gift of God, and who it is that is saying to you, ‘Give me a drink,’ you would have asked him, and he would have given you living water.” The woman said to him, “Sir, you have nothing to draw water with, and the well is deep. Where do you get that living water? Are you greater than our father Jacob? He gave us the well and drank from it himself, as did his sons and his livestock.”

Jesus said to her, “Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks of the water that I will give him will never be thirsty again. The water that I will give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”

The woman said to him, “Sir, give me this water, so that I will not be thirsty or have to come here to draw water.”

John 4 ESV