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The Marriage Cliche That Is Actually True

Before Amanda and I were married, there were many things I heard about marriage. People, whether they were married or not, took the liberty of offering their golden nuggets of advice. Some advice was very helpful, other advice was not for us; however, there was a cliche that I always heard, and after I got married, I realized its validity.
Happy wife. Happy life.
It’s amazing. There’s a direct correlation to the happiness of Amanda and the happiness of my life. In order to keep a smile on her face, I do a lot of things from cleaning up around the house to bringing home roses. But there are two things that I do daily and intentionally that set the foundation for a happy marriage.
The first thing I do is love her in her love language. If you’re not familiar with the Five Love Languages by Gary Chapman, it is a must. This book will not only change your marriage, but also your personal relationships. One of Amanda’s primary love languages is words of affirmation. Mine is not. However, that doesn’t matter. The Bible states to love your neighbor as you love yourself. But I would take that a step further and say to love your neighbor as they want to be loved. I may like strawberry ice cream and she may like apple pie. If I loved her like myself, I’d give her strawberry ice cream. But instead, if I want to show her love, I give her apple pie because it is what she receives as love.
Even though words of affirmation don’t mean much to me, I practice building her up through kind words and it makes a difference in how she goes about her day. I call her beautiful, I call her gorgeous, and I call her my best friend.
The second thing is that I do this early. The key to happy wife, happy life, is implementing this concept at the beginning of the day. You would be amazed at how the first five minutes of your day can impact the rest of it. In the first five minutes, I tell her that I love her, that she’s perfect, and we kiss and cuddle (morning breath and all!). That sets the stage for the rest of her day. All day she’s thinking about how sweet, kind, loving and gentle I am. As a result, she reciprocates that and she’s happy. An old adage says “it’s not how you start. It’s how you finish.” But I’ve found that giving myself a head start makes for a much easier race.
The marriage game is easy. Love early and often. Love smarter, not harder.
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Engaged Home Marriage

Newlyweds: How to Survive and Thrive in the First Two Years

People told me that my first year of marriage would be one of the hardest years of my marriage.  I can speak from experience that the first two years were not completely conflict free.  There were several times where we had to have long deep discussions and debates.  Some were just as simple as differences in doing laundry and cooking then there were the more serious topics such as opposite sex friendships. Sometimes these discussions were followed by laughter, tears, snuggling, and anger.
You and your new spouse are embarking on new territory. You are no longer one person but two. You have been used to walking with two feet your entire life, now you have to learn to walk with four. It will be frustrating and it will take some time to learn how to act and think as one person. You can not do the same things you used to without considering how it will affect your spouse.  But it does not have to be a miserable time. These discussion brought us together on a more intimate level. I found out more of why I love him and why God put us together. I found out that I didn’t have it together like I thought. It was a humbling time period for the both of us.  Everyday with my husband was new and exciting and still to this day I can’t wait to wake up and come home to him. I love being married!!!
So what can you do to enjoy this time and work through the rough patches?

  • Pre-marital counseling can prevent so many misconceptions about marriage. Get a jumpstart on communicating and caring for your spouse before the honeymoon night.
  • Pray before you have to have those deep discussions. You do not want to be led by the flesh.
  • Find out your spouses “love language”. Find out what speaks love to them and do those spontaneously.
  • Hang out with other married friends. You will need someone to confide in and give you advice when you need it.
  • Discuss and plan out your goals
  • Establish and stick to a budget.
  • Keep people out of your business. Your family, coworkers and friends do not need to know about your household business (unless it is one of the people mentioned in #4 that you trust to confide in).
  • Go out on dates. Just because you are married now doesn’t mean that you have to stop courting each other. Your should do the same things that you did to attract him or her and keep the romance thriving
  • Have grace and patience with each other.

Enjoy each other and have fun!!

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Engaged Home Marriage

Marriage is Forever: For Better or for Worse

For better, for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health, until death do us part. If you need to, read that sentence again and really think about what that means. Marriage is a serious commitment. Marriage is a serious commitment that is intended to end when you leave this earth.
I feel the need to write about this because I do not want to assume that everyone who reads married and young automatically knows that marriage is forever. When you commit to marry someone, you have decided to spend the rest of your life with that person. You are committing to spend the next one-hundred years with them. Much can transpire in one-hundred years and you must be honest with yourself. Use your imagination. What is the worst thing that can happen to your spouse? Are yo willing to be with them trough that situation. Use your imagination again. What if things go fantastically well for your spouse, but they don’t go so well for you? What if they are able to achieve their dreams, but you haven’t yet realized yours? Can you be as genuinely excited for them as you would be for yourself? Can you make it through the better, for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health, until you leave this earth with this person?
Irreconcilable differences are often cited in divorce settlements. Are there any areas of your life that are non-negotiable? If you’re not married, are you prepared to talk about this to possible suitors? You may not want to speak of these non-negotiable areas on the first date, but it is important to talk about them before you get far into the relationship. If you are engaged or married makes plans to speak about these topics immediately. The sooner you speak about these issues, the sooner you will be able to walk through these issues together so that they are no longer non-negotiable issues.
Marriage is not to be taken lightly and it is very important to be honest with yourself about who you are going to spend the rest of your life with. For marriage is forever.
Enjoy your day.
Joel Pearson

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5 Spiritual Roles of a Wife and a Mother

We know the lord has called the husband to lead in a lot of areas in marriage. However, it is so vital for women to understand how important their role is in marriage especially when it comes to spiritual issues. While God has called the husband to lead the wife and children in studying the word and growing in God, the wife has very important spiritual duties that the man can never fulfill. Here are 8 roles every woman should master if she longs to be a wife and a mother.

  1. Wives Discern– The gift of discernment helps you differentiate between good and evil, seasons and times, peoples characteristics and God’s heart in many situations. Women are naturally wired to sense and be discerning. God created women to be able to discern the spiritual atmosphere of the home, it is their job to learn how to discern their husbands heart as well as their children’s heart. After learning how to discern it is very important that they learn how to pray.
  2. Wives pray- When I say pray I am not just talking about a simple “thank you Jesus.” Women are called to learn the art of warfare. Because the lord has wired us to discern and understand the atmosphere of our home. It is imperative that when we discern the enemy coming into our home, we know how to deal with him in the place of prayer.
  3. Wives are warriors- When a woman marries and especially becomes a mother there is something in her that makes her a vicious protector. That’s when you see the warrior come in. In prayer and in general it is important for the woman to be able to deal with spiritual and natural issues that may come to disrupt the peace in her marriage and in her family.
  4. Wives are guardians of peace- With the ability to shift the atmosphere of a home, the woman should be able to carry peace in her spirit and release it in her home. She protects her husband’s sanity and creates a place where both her children and husband find refuge and peace.
  5. Wives teach- Women should be masters of the word, while every family is structured differently, it is important for wives who will become moms to know that the will do most of the teaching. Moms teach the children the word of God and about life. It is important for a women to walk with the Holy Spirit and to know the word of God.

 
 

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Is He the One?

Imagine meeting your prayer face-to-face, everything you’ve prayed for! Tall, fair skin, a voice that could out sing heaven’s angels, loves God, not the finest but the sweetest guy you’ve ever met. Imagine being introduced to family and friends, going to locations where you two would be “seen” together, or random phone calls stating, “I’m having a rough day and need someone to talk to”. Yeah, he’s got to be the ONE!!!
A few years back, I met and dated an amazing young man. Not only did he meet EVERY criteria on my list, but my mentor prophesied he would be the man to walk me down the aisle. I knew he was MY ONE AND ONLY.
Lets back track a bit. I met this guy and we had an amazing time for about a mouth or so, then he disappeared. Being raised around men, I knew not to reach out too much because I’d appear desperate. A few months later he resurfaced and was just as sweet as before; however, it wasn’t long before the cycle repeated itself. After three “cycles”, I was finally ready to let this “thing” go, BUT that’s when the “word of the lord” came forth. Now I’m confused, if he was meant to be my husband I should probably wait for him to come around.
So, I played the “waiting” game, after all I was really intrigued by this gentleman. I didn’t want to let him go, but I didn’t want to waste any more time with out a “sign”. He represented everything I had ever hoped for: financial stability, career driven, and at times thoughtful. Months would past and I’d send a sporadic text messages “Hey, thinking just about you (smiley face)”. The text would generate minimal conversation, but nothing that screamed “I’M GOING TO MAKE YOU MY WIFE”.
With no recent dates, no phone calls, no clue as to if we were even an item, I began to hurt. While it was nothing like past heartaches, I hurt from the mere fact that I had grown attached to the possibility of being his wife. He was the first Christian guy I ever dated, and I expected him to be my knight in shining amour. Desperate for answers, I asked God if he was my husband. NO ANSWER. I sought the wise counsel of my mentors. Finally one said to me “Whenever I find myself liking a guy, I worship! I make sure my heart is turned towards God”. And those were the words that freed me from my infamous question “Is he the one?”
Instead of going to God asking him if “he” was my husband, I sought his face, I worshiped, I prayed, I studied, I journaled, I cried, I did whatever it took to make sure my focus was back where it belonged.
After a year of back and forth, I mustered up the courage to call him and express my feelings. “Look, I like you. I’m not sure where you stand and I’m not even saying we need a title RIGHT now, but I need to know where this is going.” In the most politically correct tone possible, he stated, “When life moves me, I move with it”.
It was right then and there that I knew HE WAS NOT THE ONE!
As I looked back on the year we spent doing whatever it was we were doing, I’m reminded that the answer to my question, “Is he the one”, was there all along. It was in his actions, it was in his lack of consistency, most of all it was in the presence of God. I encourage any young lady searching for answers regarding “the one” to seek the face of Jesus and watch him make things crystal clear for you. As Christians one may say that’s a given, but it’s the simple things that gets over looked when the heart becomes overjoyed by possibility!

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Engaged Home Marriage

Refusing the Generational Curse

I didn’t learn about generational curses until 5 years ago during a Deliverance service. Generational curses are negative things that follow a family for generations. It is a cycle of regrets, rejections, addictions, and pain. Though your marriage may seem perfect, there are curses that may follow you, if you allow them to.
Growing up, I was surrounded by dysfunctional relationships, including that of my parents. I saw the phony happiness as well as the blatant disrespect on both parts. How is a child ever to know what love is? In my eyes, love was not something I thought I’d ever have but I felt I needed. It scared me because I thought that if I sought love then it would hurt. And it did.
Love was treacherous for me from high school, when I first started (secretly) dating up to the time I met my husband. Even though I was not allowed to date, I snuck around and I am kind of glad that I did. I was able to get the ugly out of the way and now I have more time with the man made for me. I am not advocating pre-mature dating or disobedience. I should have listened to my mom but my stubbornness has helped as well as it has hurt me.
My generational curse was the idea that love was supposed to be “painful, difficult, devastating, life-changing, extraordinary,” like Olivia Pope thinks it should be (Scandal Season 2). Love is supposed be the feeling of “peace in the middle of the storm,” being empty and full at the same time, being inexplicably happy, and yes extraordinary. But that wasn’t what I saw in my household or in the generations before my parents. I had to let go of the memory of my forefathers and embrace the vision God gave me.
Before getting married, I spent time studying 1 Corinthians chapter 7, where Paul discusses sex and marriage. I struggled with fornication and I wanted things to be perfect in my relationship. I studied and studied until I started to look past the sex aspect and learned that marriage is about sacrifices; it is about the positive bondage. I didn’t realize that this type of connection or “oneness” existed because it wasn’t anything I had ever experienced or witnessed. The “bondage” puts an end to that curse because it required me to cling to my spouse. I had to shake off the old single me AND the old curses I was raised under.
When I started attending church on a regular basis, I witnessed happy marriages. Spending time around marriages that were strong, broke the curse and created a blessing. I threw away the curse of brokenness and clung to unity. I am determined to have an 80 year marriage as crazy as it may seem. I had to combat the mistrust, the desire to give up, and the painful past in order to step into my future.
 
 
 
 

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Dating/Courting Home Physical Intimacy

Sin Issue or Purpose Issue?

 
Sin Problem or Purpose Problem?
In a world where purity can almost be unheard of amongst many people, you have to ask yourself: why is purity so hard to obtain and maintain? Whether you are a new believer, mature believer, nonbeliever, or anything in between, the reality is that maintaining purity in relationships can be very challenging.
Unfortunately, purity is often times absent not only in the lives of unbelievers, but also in believers themselves. What causes people to get into relationships and forfeit their purity with people who they are not married to? Though there are several things that can attribute to this issue, I feel like a major one is not so much dealing with sin itself, but dealing with purposeless relationships and purposeless lifestyles.
The enemy loves to convince people that just because they slipped up and compromised their purity, that they are plagued with an unbreakable sin issue. The thing is, we are all plagued with this same issue with sin. So why is it that some can beat it and others cannot? Just because we were born into sin does not mean that we must be slaves to it according Romans 6.
If you find yourself in a relationship in which you are compromising your purity, I would challenge you with this question: Do you have a sin issue or a purpose issue?
I believe that when people fall into sin it’s usually due to a lack of understanding or a lack of being in purpose. When you are in a purposeful relationship and you know that the relationship has a reason to stand for purity, it makes it a lot easier to fight temptation, because you understand the purpose behind it. Think about Jesus, He knew the pain that He was about to experience on His way to the cross, yet endured every aspect of it because He understood the purpose of His actions. What are the purposes of the relationships you are in? Are there people waiting on the other side of your experiences for you to help and walk them through similar situations?
If you understand your purpose in being in a relationship, it makes it easier for you to fight the temptations that come. I can endure anything if I fully understand the purpose behind it. So the next time you find yourself in a relationship or even spending time with someone of the opposite sex, you should ask yourself, is there a purpose behind this? If there is a Godly purpose behind it, the fight for purity becomes a little easier. We are no longer just hanging out with idle time or even dead end situations. We can now have meaningful and purposeful conversations that lead to growth and honor of God. Just because you have fallen into sin before, does not necessarily mean you have some deep rooted sin issue. It could just mean that you have a purpose issue and lack an understanding of your own purpose and the purpose for the relationship you are in. Find the purpose and fight and endure everything else with an understanding of the purpose at the end.
 

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Household Chores as a Punishment: Pros and Cons

The parenting can be a heavy job sometimes, especially when your kids are misbehaving and you have to think of different ways to make them reconsider and change their bad behaviour in the future. The punishments are the most used ways for the shaping of the mind of the children but they have to be created wisely, in order to be achieved the right effect. Making the kid do the dishes, vacuum the carpets or take out the laundry are among the common punishments which the parents use every day. This is a smart strategy which will either make the child more responsible or will end up making the little one even more rebellious than before. That is why you have to consider all pros and cons of the punishment you are planning to give to your kid in advance, if you want to avoid dealing with the bad side effects of your decision.
Cleaning your entire home might be of great importance for the reshaping of the behaviour of your child. Since the good order and the presentable look of your property have to be maintained any way, making your kid participate in your daily or weekly cleaning routines will definitely teach him or her a good lesson and it will also help you in a way. Before you make the important decision of burdening your children with various cleaning task or other household chores, it will be very useful to sit down and make a list with the pros and cons which come with your choice. In this article we will present to you some examples for the common advantages and disadvantages of using the different chores as a punishment tool.

 The Pros

In the category with pros of punishing your children with the performing of different household chores could appear several things. Undoubtedly, the most obvious pro is the fact that by helping around the house, even without wanting, the child will learn to be more responsible. What will begin as a punishment might develop into an important habit which will help to the child later in his life to plan and accomplish easier the maintenance of his personal home.
 
Another pro is that in the course of the punishment, the kid will learn to work with various utensils, appliances and products. For instance, if you decide to punish your 13 year-old daughter with ironing the clothes, she might not like it but will definitely remember how to use the iron.
 
The punishing will definitely make the children respect you more. This will teach them that every bad decision they make and the following actions from it have consequences in life. Even though they might not realize that immediately, they will certainly understand you later when they are more mature.

 The Cons

As good as the punishing with household chores looks to you, you have to consider also the bad sides of that decision and it certainly has such. One of them is burdening the mind of the child with negative experiences. If the kid has never done any work around the house before, making him or her do it by force might lead to the hating of this type of work in the future.
 
Another thing you should consider for your list with cons is whether or not your child will be able to handle the cleaning, the washing or some other type of household task you are planing to give. If your kid is too small, this type of jobs might seem too complicated and he or she might not even understand the meaning of the punishment. You should also think about whether or not it will be better and more productive to think of some other way to teach your little one a lesson.
 
Author Bio: Kathleen Crane is a busy mother and housewife but her busy schedule at TenancyCleaners NW5 don’t leave her children without the daily dose of hugs and love.

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Dating/Courting Engaged Home Marriage

Why I Needed Marriage (And Still Do)

I was still a teenager when I officially “went crazy,” according to my friends. I literally went from graduating from high school to planning a wedding with my beautiful young fiancée. Six months later I was waiting for her at the altar.
Why did my friends think I was crazy? Because in their well-pondered logic, I was still in the infatuation phase of the relationship. From their perspective, there was a likelihood that I was marrying Sarah because I still had the “warm fuzzies.” Good analysis, guys, but your logic was flawed!
We had invested seven years of friendship into this relationship already. We had fights where we got so mad at one another that we couldn’t even speak. We laughed so hard that we gasped for precious oxygen between intervals of embarrassingly high-pitched guffaws. We wiped away tears that we had caused one another to shed.
My point? Infatuation was not the engine driving our decision. Love was. Love anchored me to her bedside when she had her wisdom teeth removed and I helped her up from her bed to the bathroom door because she was so nauseated she couldn’t stand. Undiluted, ever-increasing love planted her feet before that altar and emboldened her tear-jerking vows to me—me—on our wedding day. Yes, it was love, but also peace. It was the perpetual peace of God in us that evaded well-intentioned skeptics and hand-wringing nervousness of people around us.
Though the objective of marriage is not to fulfill my needs, these are five reasons that I needed marriage—and still do:
1. I need what God hid for me to find in my wife. God has graciously and humorously deposited attributes of Himself throughout creation. My wife is a treasure trove of beauty that contains pieces of the mysteries of God that I am privileged to unearth, through the inexhaustibility of Christ in Sarah. (2 Corinthians 4:7)
2. I need to love someone even when there isn’t immediate gratification. Godly marriage is an invitation to invest into a something big that doesn’t only benefit us. I need to love outside of myself, my ambitions, my rewards. I need marriage because it evokes an “other-worldly,” supernatural, bond-breaking love that “covers a multitude of sins.” (I Peter 4:8)
3. I need my wife’s tenderness. I need my wife’s feminine tenderness. I get into “warrior mode,” slaying dragons, and hunting beasts to protect and provide for my family. But God gifted man with wives to bring the beauty and tenderness of His nature to man. My wife does that for me.
4. I need my wife’s relationship with the Lord. My wife is such a worshiper! She is prone to enter into the presence of God and man, waving the banner of His majesty. She brings to my relationship with the Lord the reverence and awe of Him that I so often neglect.
5. I need my wife’s friendship. I need an encounter, in the flesh, with true unconditional love. My wife knows things about me that none know, besides God Himself—and she loves me and approaches my weaknesses with patience and faith in the God Who “works all things together for the good of those who love Him.” (Romans 8:28)
Every night I kiss the face of a fellow pilgrim who nudges me ever-closer to the shores of Heaven. In the end, we will reach those shores together and look more like Jesus because of our journey in marriage. I needed marriage then, and I need it today. And I accept this certainty with a smile on my face.
Does marriage provide God-ordained solutions to your shortcomings? How does it push you closer to Christ?

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Dating/Courting Home Marriage

Let Your Husband Find You: Part 2

In the previous article, I described some tips a pastor gave to find (or not find) a husband.

  • Let your husband find you.
  • Make a list of all of the things you want in a husband.
  • Trust the word that God gives you.

I followed these steps and my husband of almost four years has every quality I desired from height to ethnicity to personality.
When I heard the sermon I was only 19 and the story seemed far fetched but I was so desperate for relief that I was ready to try anything. I must have sat in that bath tub for more than two hours listing all of the things I desired and trying to be honest with myself and God. There were many times that I said what I thought I wanted and then had to mentally erase these so-called qualities that have gotten me in trouble in the past. After praying, I sat silently, waiting for God to speak to me. It wasn’t long before I heard a quiet voice tell me that I will meet my husband in a year and six months after, I would be married. He said that the devil will send people in my way but not to get distracted.
The very next day, I met a Packaging Designer for Fisher Price. He was sexy, strong, had money and was a little mysterious, every girl’s superficial dream. I tried to turn him into the man I asked for but in the end, I realized he was like every other “man” I dated: selfish and abusive. Even with that experience, I still tried to force three more relationships, including one with my ex…and his baby….and his baby-mama and each were utter failures. June 2010, a year after my prayer, I decided that I wasn’t going to get married; I’d just focus on my writing career. The next week, I met Robert Crewe. His best friend introduced us because we were both writers. We spoke everyday for three days before we actually met. I was convinced that we were going to be friends at most. Three days after meeting him, while on our first date, we stood at the Promenade Downtown Brooklyn (New York).
I said to him, “There’s something that I want to say but I’m afraid to say it.”
He said, “I want to say it too.”
Instead I told him, “I want a daughter with your eyes.”
Three years later, I gave birth to Jael Octavia Crewe, a beautiful little girl with daddy’s eyes and mommy’s nose.
There are no words to explain God’s miracles but I want you to know that you can and will experience them. I was a woman with very little faith in what God spoke into my life but I always kept it in the back of my mind because I knew that maybe, one day, it would be true. Everything He spoke into my life has happened thus far. Even though I had naysayers, including my spiritual counselor, I held on to God’s blessing. As we move toward a new year, I want you to sit down with God and discuss your future. Don’t be afraid to claim your destiny and declare your victory.
Revelation 21:6-7New Living Translation (NLT)
6 And he also said, “It is finished! I am the Alpha and the Omega—the Beginning and the End. To all who are thirsty I will give freely from the springs of the water of life. 7 All who are victorious will inherit all these blessings, and I will be their God, and they will be my children.