Welcome to our first Family Matters newsletter. My good friend Vic Phares suggested that we put together a monthly newsletter and has helped immensely in getting it together. Many thanks, Vic. Please let us know if you would like to be a regular subscriber. The subscription is free. The content will always relate to the family in one way or another. I'm a Christian and my comments will always be framed in the context of the Bible.
IT TAKES A STRONG FRIENDSHIP TO MAKE A STRONG MARRIAGE
by Norman Bales
My wife and I have been married for 36 years, but we've only been friends for about 20 years. We entered marriage with different assumptions, priorities and plans. After sixteen years of battling opposing agendas, we realized we had to get on the same page if we wanted our marriage to continue. We managed to do that by becoming friends.
How do you develop a friendship in a marriage? Pretty much the same way you develop any friendship. Recently, I attended the funeral of a boyhood friend. As I reflected on our relationship, which spanned several years of childhood and adolescence, I saw common ground between our friendship and the friendship in our marriage. Let me explain what I mean.
1. Friends do things together. My boyhood friend and I hunted, fished, swam in the farm ponds (called "tanks" in West Texas) and played country music together. More than that, we talked. We talked about every subject we could think of. Sometimes I thought he was off the wall and I'm sure he thought the same thing about me.
When my wife and I decided to become friends, we started doing things together - meeting for lunch, taking walks in the evening, just sitting and talking about everything from Bible to baseball. We don't take separate vacations. We work together, give one another back rubs and share our deepest feelings with each other. That's friendship. The Bible speaks of the ". . . friend who sticks closer than a brother" (Proverbs 18:24). It takes that kind of friendship to make a marriage work.
2. Friends don't quit on each other. My boyhood friend and I didn't always see things the same way. We quibbled over frivolous matters and sometimes we had big disagreements about the larger issues of life. Occasionally, we got genuinely disgusted with one another, but it never lasted long. We practiced Paul's advice - "Do not let the sun go down while you are still angry" (Ephesians 4:26).
In 36 years of marriage Ann and I have faced much larger issues, but we don't give up on each other. When we first decided to work at becoming friends, I promised her, "We may lose a battle here and there, but we won't lose the war." Friendship means commitment despite disagreement.
I'm still married today because my wife is my very best friend. Who is your best friend? If it's anyone other than your spouse, you need to work at deepening friendship with your marriage partner.
FROM THE E-MAILBAG
QUESTION: I wish to learn more about the sin of adultery. I would like to know about it in the form of statistics and such. Is it really that widespread? Are there really that many cases? What are the punishments since it is a sin?"
ANSWER:
In 1953, Dr. Albert Kinsey reported that half of the men and
one-fourth of the women he surveyed acknowledged extramarital
affairs. For many years, these studies were assumed to be accurate,
but we now know they were not. For one thing a remarkably large
portion of the men he interviewed were in prisons and hospitals
for mental diseases. They were not really representative of the
American male.
In the seventies, Sharon Hite reported that 66 per cent of the men have extra marital affairs, but McCall's magazine disagreed claiming only that only 16 per cent of the men commit adultery.
Redbook surveyed 100,000 women in 1974 and discovered that one third had engaged in extra marital intercourse. They also discovered that women who had engaged in premarital sex were far more likely to be unfaithful to their marriage vows.
Non religious wives (according to the Redbook survey) are twice as likely to have affairs as religious wives.
The Louis Harris poll conducted in 1978-79 indicates that men at that time were placing an increased emphasis on self fulfillment and pleasure. They used the phrase "healthy adultery" to describe their way of dealing with not being able to fulfill all the dreams, desires and fantasies.
In 1981 the University of California at San Diego reported that about 50 percent of the married people of both sexes who have reached the age of 40 had experienced extra marital sex.
On October 17, 1994, US News and World Report reported that in their survey, 15 % of the wives and 24.5 % of the husbands had experienced at least one affair. 37 % of the men in their fifties has experienced an affair, but only 12.4 % of women that age had.
Obviously the numbers seem to be all over the place in the last thirty years. I think two factors may contribute to the disparity in numbers (1) Different researchers frame their questions in different ways. If the question is "Have you been unfaithful to your spouse in the last year," the answer would be considerably different than if the question where "Have you ever been unfaithful to your spouse?' (2) A person's sexuality is very private, thus I suspect that many people either mislead or refuse to answer the questions of researchers concerning sexuality.
Your question about the penalty is much easier.
1 Corinthians 6:9 Do you not know that the wicked will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: Neither the sexually immoral nor idolaters nor adulterers nor male prostitutes nor homosexual offenders NIV.
1 Corinthians 10:8 We should not commit sexual immorality, as some of them did -- and in one day twenty-three thousand of them died. (NIV)
Galatians 5:19-21 The acts of the sinful nature are obvious: sexual immorality, impurity and debauchery; 20 idolatry and witchcraft; hatred, discord, jealousy, fits of rage, selfish ambition, dissensions, factions 21 and envy; drunkenness, orgies, and the like. I warn you, as I did before, that those who live like this will not inherit the kingdom of God. (NIV)
Ephesians 5:5 For of this you can be sure: No immoral, impure or greedy person -- such a man is an idolater -- has any inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and of God. (NIV)
Hebrews 13:4 Marriage should be honored by all, and the marriage bed kept pure, for God will judge the adulterer and all the sexually immoral. (NIV)
Revelation 21:8 But the cowardly, the unbelieving, the vile, the murderers, the sexually immoral, those who practice magic arts, the idolaters and all liars -- their place will be in the fiery lake of burning sulfur. This is the second death." (NIV)
Revelation 22:15 Outside are the dogs, those who practice magic arts, the sexually immoral, the murderers, the idolaters and everyone who loves and practices falsehood. (NIV)
I would also say this. Adultery is not the unpardonable sin. If you have been guilty, repent and turn toward God and you will find forgiveness.
Norman
WHAT OTHERS ARE SAYING ABOUT THE FAMILY
"Americans seem to believe as scholar Michael Novak puts it, that we pretty well know how to manage a market economy and a democratic government, but we don't know how to nurture a better culture and are determined to do better." - U. S. News and World Report. January 1, 1996.
"I like the attitude of Elton Trueblood's mom, who at the age of 90 plus insisted on a thirty year warranty on her new carpet. Our older years can be the time to our riches experience, our deepest insights, our most complete life." - Prentice Meador. Twenty- First Century Christian. May 1995.
"It pays to know the enemy - not least because at some time you may have the opportunity to turn him into a friend" - Margaret Thatcher. Reader's Digest. November 1994.
"Shirley teaches me about peace, forgiveness, compassion and love. I teach her about anxiety, Jewish guilt, Prozac and blurred vision." - Marty Ingles concerning his marriage to Shirley Jones. Modern Maturity. Nov. - Dec, 1995
PARTING NOTE:
Thanks for reading our first newsletter. We will appreciate suggestions for improvement. See you next month. - Norman