Posted on 09/30/2015 2:40:51 PM PDT by SeekAndFind
You want to know one reason why so many Christian marriages end up in divorce?
Ronald Reagan once quipped that the trouble with his political opponents, “is not that they are ignorant. It’s just that they know so much that isn’t so.”
Well, I’ve had a bee in my bonnet for years over something that far too many of my fellow Christians believe in that just isn’t so. I speak, gentle listener, of the whole “soul mate” nonsense, especially when it comes to finding a husband or wife.
Let me be perfectly clear: No matter how many ads for Christian dating services you hear or trendy books you read, we simply don’t have “soul mates,” at least as our confused culture understands that term. Does this surprise you? It shouldn’t. Look for that concept, by the way, in the Bible, and the only thing you can find remotely close to it is the fierce friendship of David and Jonathan. “Jonathan made a covenant with David,” Scripture says, “because he loved him as his own soul.”
Now those are soul mates, friends. But the Bible knows nothing of romantic “soul mates.” This concept is more New Age than Christian. The Huffington Post gives nine signs that you’ve found your soul mate, the first one being: “You communicate without speaking.” Okay. One New Age website, however, gives three signs you’ve “definitely” found your soul mate: “You just connect without trying,” “Your level of communication is unmatched,” and “You create your own world together.”
That’s cute, it’s nice, maybe it’s even romantic . . . but it’s certainly not biblical.
Now all of this confusion might be kind of funny if it weren’t so harmful to naïve Christians and others who’ve fallen for this idea. Because this idea implies that somewhere out there is that “perfect person” for you, and if your marriage is not exploding with intense communication, romance, and a great sex life, well then maybe it’s because your spouse is not your “soul mate.”
Men who are a little bored with their wives, or vice versa, might be tempted by a co-worker who “understands me so well and is my soul mate, or could be my soul mate.” But frankly, this is a recipe for adultery and divorce, and families end up getting dropped for “soul mates.”
Once I wrote a tribute to C.S. Lewis’s “The Screwtape Letters” called “Screwtape Proposes a Divorce,” in which Wasphead, my invented senior devil, says the following to Gallstone, the junior devil: “That [soul mates] do not exist is to be kept TOP SECRET. … Let’s be blunt: these humans are scouring the globe for someone with whom a relationship will require absolutely no work or compromise. … Many adult humans who have long ago dismissed Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny as myths somehow persist in believing this person to exist.”
The “soul mate” concept is unworkable and completely unfair to the real other person in your life. It puts enormous pressure on him or her to perform, to meet our impossible expectations. As Jerry Root and Stan Guthrie point out in “The Sacrament of Evangelism,” putting others in God’s place—expecting them to give us what only He can—is a naked form of idolatry and will only lead to deep disappointment.
Here’s another thing. The “soul mate” idea suggests that marriage is all about me, that I need to find someone who understands me perfectly, who makes me happy. Marriage should be about finding someone you can make happy. In the great teaching on marriage in Ephesians, for example, husbands are told to lay down their lives for their wives, as Christ did for the church.
As J. R. R. Tolkien once wrote to his son, “No man, however truly he loved his betrothed and bride as a young man has lived faithful to her as a wife in mind and body without deliberate conscious exercise of the will, without self-denial.”
So folks, let’s drop the whole “soul mate” talk, shall we? Marriage can be wonderfully satisfying, but that’s the result of God’s grace, hard work, and self-sacrificial love. And that is the truth.
“If you want to change the world the best thing you can do is raise as many God fearing, God loving kids as you can.”
That is SO RADICAL...and SO RIGHT!
You know the old saying: Men are from Mars, let's get liquored up, go to Venus, and get some.
Well, Mr. Metaxas, you can poo-pooh the concept of soulmates all you want, but the fact remains that I married mine nineteen years ago.
I don’t apologize for it, either, because he is a blessing.
What is your opinion of Men being raised to Love their wives as Christ loved the Church, to give up their lives for her and Love them as their own bodies?
I always figured I would complain about my wife not fully obeying me right after I got my part perfect. I find the closer my actions and decisions are to being "Christ-like", the easier it is for my wife to follow my lead.
There are soul mates but they are hand-made, not “found”, and the transformation involves both husband and wife. Plus it is not a quick process. It takes 20+ years to complete the making of a soul mate. I can honestly say my parents are soul mates (married 66 years) and my husband and I are also (married 30 years).
No, they are independent of each other in the sense that it is between the individual and Lord, not between each other. The wife honors the husband as unto the Lord. The husband loves his wife and gives himself to her, as Christ did the church.
But the big issue today, which is almost totally ignored and/or avoided is the problem with women. For a long time now, popular culture has castigated manhood and perverted womanhood to compete with men. This is Satan’s work and is nothing new - it is exactly what he did in the Garden. First he deceived the woman, and then the man went along with it.
That is one reason why the word goes first to the wife. The woman is the heartbeat of the home. She holds the key. If she doesn’t surrender to and honor her husband as to the Lord, the husband, sooner or later will resent it. He can love her heroically by God’s grace, but there will definitely be an emptiness there. A lot of guys just give up at some point. It is sad but true. I’m not saying guys don’t have their issues (porn, etc.) but that is often the only focus in marriage seminars, etc. and is really not the key issue in today’s marriage, family, or society.
It seems no one wants to risk the kind of unpopularity and contempt they will receive if they actually began to tell women their true place, position, and DISPOSITION in the home, which is exactly where they will be the happiest, most fulfilled they can possibly be as a married woman. Economic need is not the point here. It is a heart issue and is a very big deal.
“Fifty one years here .....”
Dang, Twinkie.. I was just going to write that my husband and I just celebrated 25... now I sort of feel like newlyweds compared to 51. :)
Congratulations! Wonderful post.
Shaunti Feldhahn has done research that shows the divorce rate has never been half of marriages, we only saw a spike in divorces where marriage rates fell in the late 1970s so it was briefly half the rate per thousand that people got marrked.
From the article, Divorce Shocker: Most Marriages Do Make It
http://www.cbn.com/cbnnews/us/2014/May/Divorce-Shocker-Most-Marriages-Do-Make-It/
“First-time marriages: probably 20 to 25 percent have ended in divorce on average,” Feldhahn revealed. “Now, okay, that’s still too high, but it’s a whole lot better than what people think it is.”
Shaunti and Jeff point out the 50 percent figure came from projections of what researchers thought the divorce rate would become as they watched the divorce numbers rising in the 1970s and early 1980s when states around the nation were passing no-fault divorce laws.
“But the divorce rate has been dropping,” Feldhahn said. “We’ve never hit those numbers. We’ve never gotten close.”
And it’s even lower among churchgoers, where a couple’s chance of divorcing is more likely in the single digits or teens.
later
I am not sure what soul mate encompasses but I believe that you have made an excellent point about a long term marriage involves transformation of both husband and wife and is not a quick process. The journey has many twists and turns, ups and downs, and is worth the effort whatever term is applied to the love of the spouses for each other. Overall, I would say to everybody in a relationship, just be fair with one another. The road gets rocky fast when distrust sets in.
“True. Looking for unconditional love? Get a Labrador Retriever.”
Loving someone unconditionally takes a heck of a lot of effort. No one ‘deserves it’.
I just found out my wife is my reward for all my meaningless toil or moving rubble as I call it.
Ecc 9:9 Live happily with the woman you love through all the meaningless days of life that God has given you under the sun. The wife God gives you is your reward for all your earthly toil.
Exhibit A for this article is former governor Mark Sanford of North Carolina.
Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ also loved the church, and gave himself for it; That he might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the word, That he might present it to himself a glorious church, not having spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing; but that it should be holy and without blemish.
Because even Christians occasionally let the wrong organ do their thinking for them.
Along the same lines...
The definition of a “confirmed bachelor” is a man who hates every bone in a woman’s body ...but his own. ;o)
Sanford was from South Carolina
I suspect Christians will make up an increasing share of divorces as more and more others simply don’t bother getting married anyway (co-habituating instead), thus effectively removing themselves from any divorce statistics. I’m surprised not just at how many of my children’s classmates have divorced parents, but how many of them have unmarried parents.
Time does fly! It doesn’t seem like long since John & I had
our 25th; but we’ve stayed busy and time just got by SO fast or so it seems. - It’s the daily “annoyances” that can pull you down if you let them. - We aren’t any sort of an
“example”; but we just get up every day and keep on keeping on. - He’s had some major physical challenges; but that’s life - even for BIG movie stars!
To stay humble, I get in front of the full length mirror occasionally first thing in the morning - before I wash my face, or brush my teeth, or comb my hair. I ask myself, “Twinkie, who’s gonna go for THAT today?” - No answer. No answer. - Then, PLOP!, I can’t hold in my belly for another second; and now the belly’s sticking out
even under my granny gown. - I face facts. I NEED A BATH, MY BREATH STINKS, I NEED TO BRUSH MY HAIR & MY TEETH!! - I glance out the window and catch a glimpse of the rear end of the white horse on which my imaginary Prince Charming is riding (on his way back to his castle where his Cinderella is ensconced). Then, I turn back to REALITY!
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