The Sunday Mail
Pastors Gwen & Davison Kanokanga
THERE is no one who does not have a past. Everyone has a past.
You are a product of your past. Some of the things that you do in your marriage are a result of your past experiences. Your childhood experiences as well as any experiences you may have had from previous relationships can affect your marriage today. What you bring into your marriage is what your marriage will be. Perhaps you have painful memories of your upbringing or you have painful experiences from a previous relationship.
If you bring into your marriage your pain from the past, you will have a painful marriage. If you bring sorrow into your marriage, you will have a sorrowful marriage. What you bring in is what you get. Garbage in, garbage out! You may be depriving yourself and your spouse of marital joy by digging into you awful past and dwelling on it. Stop it. Let the past be the past.
The Apostle Paul says: “Brothers, I do not consider myself to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do, forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heaven ward in Christ Jesus.” (Philippians 3:13)
Stop living in the past. Focus on where you are going and not where you are coming from. Do not allow your mind to focus on the negative.
Pay heed to the advice which the Apostle Paul gave when he wrote: “Finally brothers, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable – if anything is excellent or praiseworthy – think about such things.” (Philippians 4:8)
Perfectionism
Perfectionism is a disposition to feel that anything less than perfect is unacceptable. Everything must be perfect. You must be perfect. Your spouse must be perfect.
Your children must be perfect. Everything about you must be perfect. Your in-laws must be perfect.
Everything about you must be perfect. There must be no room for mistakes. You expect a lot from yourself and from others. All that you want is perfection.
The fact of the matter is that no one is infallible. No one is perfect. It does not matter how spiritual you or your spouse may be. The fact remains that both of you have your own weaknesses and shortcomings. There is absolutely no basis upon which you can expect perfection from people who live in a fallen world in which all men have sinned and fallen short of the Glory of God.
If you are a perfectionist, marital joy will elude you. Perfectionism is an unreachable goal. It sets you up for a life stress, tension, anger, disappointment, frustration and depression as you continually fail to reach your unrealistic standards.
Annoying habits
A habit is a pattern of behaviour acquired through frequent repetition. It is not every habit that is good. It is not every habit that is pleasing. Some habits are bad, annoying and irritating.
In your marriage, your annoying habits are those things which your spouse frequently complains about. It is those things which you do without giving any thought to them and without any regard to how your spouse feels.
It could be such things as leaving one’s clothes scattered all over the floor instead of putting them in the laundry basket, wetting the bed at night or habitual lateness.
Annoying habits are not edifying. They speak of insensitivity and resistance to change. Annoying habits and joy cannot co-exist.
Ignorance
There are different types of ignorance. Amongst them is a type of ignorance known as marital ignorance. This kind of ignorance has nothing to do with social status. The poor and the rich suffer from it. It has nothing to do with education.
The educated and the uneducated suffer from it.
Marital ignorance has nothing to do with one’s religious convictions. Christians and non-Christians alike suffer from it. Marital ignorance refers to the absence of knowledge about marriage. You cannot enjoy marriage if your knowledge of marriage is distorted or non-existent. You cannot enjoy marriage if you do not know how to build a fulfilling marriage.
The Bible says: “By wisdom a house is built and through understanding it is established, through knowledge its rooms are filled with rare and beautiful treasures.” (Proverbs 24:3-4)
The ugliness or beauty of your marriage does not depend on your academic knowledge but on your marital knowledge. This explains why you find that one marriage may be thriving while another marriage next door may be collapsing.
Pride may be the reason why you are ignorant. You have an inflated opinion of yourself. You think of yourself more highly than you ought to. You are too proud to attend any marriage seminar. You reason in your mind that, “I cannot be taught by another woman what to do in my own house.”
You are too proud to ask those with triumphant marriages what their secret of success it. Even though you know that you have challenges in your marriage, which you and your spouse have failed to deal with, your pride stops you from asking for help.
You refuse to receive counsel. You are too proud to receive correction from your spouse. You are too proud to apologise to your spouse when you do something wrong. Remember, pride comes before a fall. God resists the proud but gives grace to the humble.
It may be that you do not see the need to buy good marriage resources like Tapes, DVDs, CDs, books, etc. You think that these are for people with struggling marriages. You consider yourself to be okay.
Davison & Gwendoline Kanokanga are founders and trustees of The Marriage Centre (www.themarriagecentre.com). They are also the founders and senior pastors of Impact Christian Centre (www.impactchristiancentre.net)
