(by Lee Wilson)
Source: crosswalk
If a close friend of yours has gotten married, you probably already know that this causes certain changes to take place in your relationship.
Perhaps you used to pop over whenever you wanted but now you have to call to get on the schedule. It seems activities together now must include your friend's husband or he's notified of plans. In many ways, it seems an intruder has entered your friendship. It's as though you have given up your right to an exclusive friendship with your long-time friend because now you must also befriend his/her spouse. Sometimes it seems you can't have one person without the other.
This is a common description of what happens when friends get married. Some of it is good and some is not. It is good that marriage brings two people together as one, but that does not mean that newlyweds alienate their friends. It also does not mean his wife must be with him at all the football games with the guys. As with most things in life, a balance does exist.
Here are my suggestions and insights for relationships with friends who have gotten married.
During the early days, give your friend time alone with his/her spouse. It might be difficult, but it will be best for them because they need time to develop the oneness spoken of in the Bible. (“And the two shall become one flesh …” Genesis 2:24 and Mark 10:8). They need a period of isolation for them to develop an identity as a couple. They will appreciate your respect for their privacy.
When the time is right, invite your friend and his wife (or her husband) to a movie, dinner or other activity. You will know the time is probably right not just when the two of them return from their honeymoon, but when they are once again participating in normal activities like going to work and church.
It is very important you involve the spouse because most newlyweds go through a period when one or both are insecure in their relationship. This is somewhat normal in the early stages of a marriage because of the seriousness of the commitment and the realization of the vows they have made to each other. The results are often feelings of vulnerability and jealousy.
When you involve the spouse, you are telling him/her that you are not a threat, but a friend. Likely, when the couple feels more secure, you will once again have some time alone with your friend without objection or insecurity from the spouse. It is, however, very important not to rush this.
Understand that you have not lost your friend, but that the conditions of your friendship have changed. The relationship between a husband and wife should be the most intimate and important relationship experienced by human beings. It takes precedence over friendships and even other family members. That is how God instituted marriage and all should respect that fact.
Though second place may not sound fair or encouraging, understand that your friend has not replaced you. Depending on the intensity of your friendship, your friend will likely never replace you, though her commitments and responsibilities have changed.
Preserving Your Friendship
Perhaps the best way to keep a friendship strong after one of you marries is to be the best friend you can be at that stage in life.
As time goes on, your friend could have children. If you are there to baby-sit or be a good role model for her children, you will be an important part of her life forever. Her commitment is now to her new family; therefore, showing respect and consideration to them is your duty as a friend in this new chapter of life.
If God blesses you with a spouse, your friendship will take on even new roles and dimensions as you extend the friendship between the two of you into your growing families.
If you remain a loyal and considerate friend, your friendship will likely continue and, perhaps, become even stronger as long as you value and are respectful of your friend’s marriage.
Saturday, January 10, 2009
Tuesday, January 6, 2009
Will We Ever Get What We Want?
Apparently... not...
At least not exactly like the way we want it...
Lately I've been thinking about few things... about my wishes and the reality... Then I tried to position myself as somebody else I know, well actually few of my friends.... It reminded me that almost all of them, yea... including me, are not getting what we want or wish... Reality doesn't go in line with our thoughts (and hopes) about how things should be...
in our family
in our relationships
in our job
in our financial condition
...in almost everything you can mention!
But as one of my friend said, "There's a way for everything..."
That's true... in Him, there's a way for every problem... for every trouble... for every struggle...
But the point is... by contemplating about this matter, I came to realize that we can't deny the fact that He is really God, The One and Only God of everything... He is God of our life, He created and had plans upon every life, every single person... We just have to remember that our life isn't about our agenda, but about His agenda. It isn't about our timeline, but about His timeline... not about what we want, but about what He wants... because we are His creations.
...even though what we want is a good thing, but if it isn't His plan upon us, then it's just our plan for ourselves... It's just that simple actually...
So, if we call Him "God", if we admit that He is our Heavenly Father, is it reasonable if we asked Him, "Why don't we get what we want???" or "Why don't we get what we want the way we want it???"
At least not exactly like the way we want it...
Lately I've been thinking about few things... about my wishes and the reality... Then I tried to position myself as somebody else I know, well actually few of my friends.... It reminded me that almost all of them, yea... including me, are not getting what we want or wish... Reality doesn't go in line with our thoughts (and hopes) about how things should be...
in our family
in our relationships
in our job
in our financial condition
...in almost everything you can mention!
But as one of my friend said, "There's a way for everything..."
That's true... in Him, there's a way for every problem... for every trouble... for every struggle...
But the point is... by contemplating about this matter, I came to realize that we can't deny the fact that He is really God, The One and Only God of everything... He is God of our life, He created and had plans upon every life, every single person... We just have to remember that our life isn't about our agenda, but about His agenda. It isn't about our timeline, but about His timeline... not about what we want, but about what He wants... because we are His creations.
...even though what we want is a good thing, but if it isn't His plan upon us, then it's just our plan for ourselves... It's just that simple actually...
So, if we call Him "God", if we admit that He is our Heavenly Father, is it reasonable if we asked Him, "Why don't we get what we want???" or "Why don't we get what we want the way we want it???"
Monday, January 5, 2009
Isn't It About Time You Got Married?
(by Wendy Widder)
I've got a few unanswered questions about my life. I'd like to know if I'll ever be a homemaker and homeowner. I'd like to know how to sell and buy, as well as manage maintenance on, a car as a single woman. I'd like to know if I'll ever walk down the aisle as the main attraction instead of as a member of the supporting cast. I've discovered, though, that I rarely have to ask questions like this. There are plenty of other people in my life asking them for me.
At a church event one evening, I was serving punch, stocking cookie trays, and cleaning up messes, when a mere acquaintance asked one. Punch ladle in hand, attention focused on stirring pink sherbet, I heard his voice. "So, isn't it about time you got married?" Glancing left and right with the desperate hope that he was speaking to anyone else, I slowly looked up. Nope, I was the lucky target, and he hit the bull's-eye.
"Isn't it about time you got married?" He voiced one of those questions that lurks in the heart of every single adult who desires to be married. It resides next to half a dozen others we've been asked over the years--questions for which we either don't have the answers or don't like the answers:
* Do you have a boyfriend?
* You're a nice girl; why aren't you dating anyone?
* How's your love life? [Would you dare ask a married person this?!]
* Are you looking for a husband?
* So, you're still single?
* Do you want to get married?
If you are single, you've fielded most of these and countless other remarks for which any answer seems inadequate. You've probably mastered the courtesy laugh and polite smile, and chances are you're an expert at shifting conversations away from your marital status.
While I laugh at both well-meaning friends and rude acquaintances for asking such bold things, they are really only voicing questions I have in my own head. I just don't ask them because I know there aren't answers.
If I'll marry, who I'll marry, when I'll marry, are some of God's question marks in my life, unknown obstacles in my race. That's the way God planned it. After wrestling repeatedly with these and other questions about singleness, I've resigned myself to the fact that God is the only One who knows the answers, and He's not telling. Most days I can live with that. Not everybody in my life has struggled through these issues, though, and so for them, I sometimes just don't fit into a preconceived mold.
One of my sisters is an expert puzzler. She holds the box in one hand and stirs through it with the other, looking for certain pieces. When she strikes, she's rarely wrong. Her practiced eye knows where pieces fit without even trying them. I love puzzles, too, and while I learned much of my skill from watching my sister, I can't compete with her prowess. I have a knack for picking a piece that looks like it should fit, but no matter how many times I try, it doesn't. I turn it and try again. Nope. I set it down in the corner of the board and when I come back to it, I think all over again that it must fit in that place. Like a dull-witted dog chasing parked cars, I keep putting the same right piece in the same wrong place. It makes no sense to me--how a piece with the right coloring and the right shape just doesn't fit.
To married friends and relatives, singles are sometimes those puzzle pieces. It looks to them as if we should fit in a certain place. In attempts to make us fit, they often ask bold questions. At times they answer their own questions when our responses fall short of what they hoped to hear:
* God has someone very special for you.
* You just wait--your day is coming.
* You'll make somebody a perfect wife.
* He just doesn't know what he's missing.
* You never know who you'll meet.
* I hope you meet someone special; I really want you to be happy.
Begging the forgiveness of my friends and family, I don't have nearly as many problems with the unanswered questions in my life as I do with their answers! I wholeheartedly recognize their good intentions. They never mean to be invasive or rude; they really want only the best for me. I love them for it, and I've learned to laugh at them for it, too.
Like I said, most days I can live with God's absence of answers. But sometimes, I allow myself to listen to the well-meaning advice of bystanders, and I choose to hear their answers above the silence of God. When I filter their pieces of intended encouragement through my emotional sieve, I want to believe them. I want to take their statements as divine wisdom.
Maybe time will prove their words correct in my life, but I can't afford to live with that expectation. If I do, chances are good I will park myself on the side of the road or hoist a heavy bag over my shoulder and squander this leg of the race.
Source: Crosswalk
I've got a few unanswered questions about my life. I'd like to know if I'll ever be a homemaker and homeowner. I'd like to know how to sell and buy, as well as manage maintenance on, a car as a single woman. I'd like to know if I'll ever walk down the aisle as the main attraction instead of as a member of the supporting cast. I've discovered, though, that I rarely have to ask questions like this. There are plenty of other people in my life asking them for me.
At a church event one evening, I was serving punch, stocking cookie trays, and cleaning up messes, when a mere acquaintance asked one. Punch ladle in hand, attention focused on stirring pink sherbet, I heard his voice. "So, isn't it about time you got married?" Glancing left and right with the desperate hope that he was speaking to anyone else, I slowly looked up. Nope, I was the lucky target, and he hit the bull's-eye.
"Isn't it about time you got married?" He voiced one of those questions that lurks in the heart of every single adult who desires to be married. It resides next to half a dozen others we've been asked over the years--questions for which we either don't have the answers or don't like the answers:
* Do you have a boyfriend?
* You're a nice girl; why aren't you dating anyone?
* How's your love life? [Would you dare ask a married person this?!]
* Are you looking for a husband?
* So, you're still single?
* Do you want to get married?
If you are single, you've fielded most of these and countless other remarks for which any answer seems inadequate. You've probably mastered the courtesy laugh and polite smile, and chances are you're an expert at shifting conversations away from your marital status.
While I laugh at both well-meaning friends and rude acquaintances for asking such bold things, they are really only voicing questions I have in my own head. I just don't ask them because I know there aren't answers.
If I'll marry, who I'll marry, when I'll marry, are some of God's question marks in my life, unknown obstacles in my race. That's the way God planned it. After wrestling repeatedly with these and other questions about singleness, I've resigned myself to the fact that God is the only One who knows the answers, and He's not telling. Most days I can live with that. Not everybody in my life has struggled through these issues, though, and so for them, I sometimes just don't fit into a preconceived mold.
One of my sisters is an expert puzzler. She holds the box in one hand and stirs through it with the other, looking for certain pieces. When she strikes, she's rarely wrong. Her practiced eye knows where pieces fit without even trying them. I love puzzles, too, and while I learned much of my skill from watching my sister, I can't compete with her prowess. I have a knack for picking a piece that looks like it should fit, but no matter how many times I try, it doesn't. I turn it and try again. Nope. I set it down in the corner of the board and when I come back to it, I think all over again that it must fit in that place. Like a dull-witted dog chasing parked cars, I keep putting the same right piece in the same wrong place. It makes no sense to me--how a piece with the right coloring and the right shape just doesn't fit.
To married friends and relatives, singles are sometimes those puzzle pieces. It looks to them as if we should fit in a certain place. In attempts to make us fit, they often ask bold questions. At times they answer their own questions when our responses fall short of what they hoped to hear:
* God has someone very special for you.
* You just wait--your day is coming.
* You'll make somebody a perfect wife.
* He just doesn't know what he's missing.
* You never know who you'll meet.
* I hope you meet someone special; I really want you to be happy.
Begging the forgiveness of my friends and family, I don't have nearly as many problems with the unanswered questions in my life as I do with their answers! I wholeheartedly recognize their good intentions. They never mean to be invasive or rude; they really want only the best for me. I love them for it, and I've learned to laugh at them for it, too.
Like I said, most days I can live with God's absence of answers. But sometimes, I allow myself to listen to the well-meaning advice of bystanders, and I choose to hear their answers above the silence of God. When I filter their pieces of intended encouragement through my emotional sieve, I want to believe them. I want to take their statements as divine wisdom.
Maybe time will prove their words correct in my life, but I can't afford to live with that expectation. If I do, chances are good I will park myself on the side of the road or hoist a heavy bag over my shoulder and squander this leg of the race.
Source: Crosswalk
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)