Marriage Proverbs: Guidelines for a Happy Relationship (Part 5 of 0)

Guideline #4: Having Realistic Expectations – Part 5

Marriage — a blending

Marriage is not only a union between two people: it is also a blending of two cultures. We may not realize how important this is in establishing a harmonious marriage. It has been said that in the first six months of a marriage the couple will bask in the euphoric afterglow of the honeymoon, but for the rest of their lives together reality will invariably set in. They will need to iron out all the potentially conflicting issues inherited from their upbringing that could tarnish their relationship. These kinks were always there, but generally the excitement of idealized, romantic love had kept them buried during courtship. One of the most important teachings on marriage occurs in the very beginning with the commandment that the Lord God gave to the first married couple, Adam and Eve: “Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh” (Gen 2:24 ).1The substance of this teaching is repeated four times in the New Testament (i.e., Matt 19:5, Mark 10:7, 1 Cor 6:16 and Eph 5:31) emphasizing the importance that the Word of God attaches to this principle. It should be noted that the principle involved here emphatically doesn’t just apply to the male member of the relationship, as some have claimed, but applies to the female member too. This is true not only implicitly, but also explicitly as demonstrated by the words of the Psalmist David — “Hear, O daughter, and consider, and incline your ear: forget your people and your father’s house” (Psa 45:10 ). There are several critical concepts here, but for the purpose of the present discussion we will focus on the principle that a marriage constitutes a new blended relationship, requiring that the couple establish their own identity independent of the households in which they were raised. This doesn’t mean that the couple forsakes all social interactions with their parents, siblings, other relatives or prior friendships, but it does mean that they don’t let their past adversely interfere, directly or indirectly, with the working out of their new spousal relationship.

What do I mean by expectations acquired from one’s upbringing? Whether we are always cognizant of it or not, our future behavior is always built on our past experience. Sometimes that is very good and at other times it can lead to a great deal of heartache and sorrow. Each partner brings into a marriage a mental model, based on their rearing, of what his or her expectations are for a relationship to function happily. The diversity of relationships in which children are raised these days makes it a great challenge to even begin to define what is a “normal” childhood. This point is emphasized again and again in scholarly studies on marriage. With the divorce rate approaching 50% in North America, many children are brought up in single parent homes. Depending on who gets custody, and how effectively joint child rearing arrangements are shared, a youngster may reach adulthood with no effective model for being a husband or wife. We could cite many other possible combinations of guardianship arrangements, but even if one grew up in what would nominally be described as a normal home environment, i.e. where one’s mother and father were committed to a long-term marriage, potentially conflicting expectations will be implanted. We may feel that our parents raised us in a faultless manner; nevertheless our upbringing could never have been truly perfect — “for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (Rom 3:23 ). The challenge is to bring to the new relationship, after leaving father and mother, the best of what we have observed and to discard the rest. Sounds simple — but we will find this is nearly impossible because we don’t really have a clue on what is “best” and ought to be retained and what behaviors we grew up with that should be discarded. The only perfect model we will ever have for a relationship is to measure our behavior after the patterns set by our Lord Jesus Christ.

The practical example of affluence

Let’s consider an important practical example of bringing unrealistic expectations into a marriage. Suppose one has been brought up in a fairly wealthy home where as a child you were hardly ever denied anything you wished to have. When you became a teenager you had your own credit card(s), a fancy automobile upon obtaining your driver’s license, an iPhone, iPad, iPod and an Everything as soon as they became available. Your closet overflowed with all sorts of garments and your numerous shoe fashions could have filled a railroad car, etc. When such a person marries someone with a less prosperous upbringing it can be extremely hard to match expectations to the reality of what is achievable. It can also work quite the other way around — someone brought up in rather meager circumstances may look at marriage as a road to riches that they were denied as a child, and place expectations on their spouse that cannot possibly be accomplished. Either way it has been found that financial conflicts rank very high among the reasons that married couples eventually split. In a recent survey taken in a cosmopolitan mid-west city money problems outranked infidelity and physical abuse as major causes leading to divorce.2The wedding vow “till death do us part” has become in the thoughts of many couples “till debt do us part”.

Many young people today expect to have immediately available all the accouterments of life that their parent(s) worked for over an extended lifetime. To be fair to this generation, that is not really a new phenomenon; in a way it is ingrained in the culture of America and has spread pretty much around the globe. In my generation, born in the Great Depression, it was not as difficult to expect to do as well as our parents, if not better than. Relating to my own upbringing, my parents did not have very much in the way of material wealth and neither did my grand par­ents for that matter. How can young couples resolve this problem of wanting and wanting beyond their ability to pay? Time and again I have seen young married couples get into huge credit card debt from spending for a plethora of things they just had to possess. Many years back when Mary and I had our first two children, I took a new job that paid about 50% less than I had been making working for the phone company; then unexpected medical bills hit us very hard. In no time we found ourselves with a large credit card debt that literally could have forced us into bankruptcy. This had nothing to do with buying luxury items, but rather that we were not insured or prepared from past savings for unexpected medical bills that had arisen, and also from the burden of paying off education debts. We took some drastic measures, chief among them was to cut up all the credit cards and pay only in cash for whatever we needed. Helped by a consolidation loan we dug out of the debt over the next couple of years and never faced that problem again. Admittedly this was a drastic step and I don’t recommend it for everyone, but it is something to consider. Another alternative is not to use credit cards at all if possible, to restrict spending to debit cards3and cash. This way you can only spend what you actually have. We also got into the habit of making sure we only lived on at most 90% of our income (and sometimes even less) and putting that extra 10% (or more when possible) into our savings. This way we would have a cushion in the future to handle unexpected financial issues. Many financial advisers suggest that a couple should have at least enough savings to live for at least six months without external income to cushion against job losses or other possible financial pitfalls.

However, none of this financial advice works if one’s desires outstrip the couple’s ability to pay. A couple has to be able to wisely appreciate that what one wants is not the same thing as what one needs! It doesn’t work if we come into a marriage and are not willing to believe in a vow, that we have taken our partner “for richer or poorer.” One would be far better off coming into a marriage with the frame of mind that the Apostle Paul espoused to the Philippians: “Not that I am speaking of being in need, for I have learned in whatever situation I am to be content” (Phil 4:11). If we adopt this as our mantra rather than embracing the attitudes fostered by a very materialistic world, we would be better off in our relationships. The Apostle expounds on this point further in his letter to Timothy: “Now there is great gain in godliness with contentment” (1Tim 6:6) and “But if we have food and clothing, with these we will be content” (1 Tim 6:8). We can add to this advice by also recalling the words written to the Hebrews: “Keep your life free from love of money, and content with what you have, for he has said, ‘I will never leave you nor forsake you’ ” (Heb 13:5). These Scriptures provide a correct balance for us not to ignore, because the values that the world has for success are “material things” epitomized in the very satirical bumper sticker sometimes observed on very ostentatious luxury cars — “the one with the most toys wins”. Wins what? Presumably, the envy of one’s neighbors, but surely not the approval of our heavenly Father. The Lord God, on the other hand, values the things of the spirit. If our love for our spouse is predicated on the material wealth they can supply us then we have indeed lost sight of the fruits of the spirit which are: “…love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law. And those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires” (Gal 5:22-24).

On the practical side, it a good idea for a newly married couple to make out a budget and resolve to stick to it. The United States government may be able to print more money and raise the nation’s debt limit to trillions and trillions of dollars, but the rest of us cannot do this if we let our personal finances get out of balance.

It is also wise to assess what things are really necessary at any point in our lives, and what things we think we need, only because advertising aimed at consumer passions has convinced us we ought to buy them. There are also many ways one can stretch a budget by taking advantage of many community resources such as Goodwill stores, Salvation Army resale places and others.4Instead of buying on credit why not budget a need and only purchase it after one has saved the amount needed? And if you do use a credit card, for convenience, resolve to never charge more in any payment period than you can pay in full at the end of the month. This kind of thinking has always been the way our family has functioned since tearing up our credit cards 40 years ago and it has kept us on a sound basis.5Most importantly it is based on sound Scriptural advice: “Owe no one anything” (Rom 13:8), which we would do well to heed.

Next: Striving to be simpatico.

  1. All references are from the ESV.
  2. USA Today, September 28, 2011. Article reported that 40.3% filed for divorce because of objections on “How spouse handles money”, 34% because of infidelity and only 12.7% for physical abuse.
  3. They didn’t have “debit cards” in the 1960’s.
  4.  A brief worksheet with suggestions on how to save money can be obtained by emailing let­ters@tidings.org with the heading “Money Saving Ideas”
  5. Don’t want to leave the impression that we never again used Credit Cards. They can be a convenient way to consolidate bills, for use when traveling, and some credit cards provide travel credits or cash payback that can be useful. However, we have stuck to the practice of paying in full at the end of each monthly period, which is a practical means of not allowing debt to get out of hand.