Challenges in marriage.

Marriage is an institution created by God simply for a man and woman, children are addition. And for a marriage to succeed, both man and wife must learn to cope with the various challenges they may come across because after all said and done, they started the race alone and they will still be alone together after the children had all grown and gone away and the family members are tired of interfering in their affairs.

Marriage itself is a challenge, to the man because he has to make decisions that may either make or mar his family, and the wife because in marriage, a woman is always at the receiving end of things, especially the negative/bad ones. In other words, every married couple need to know the kind of challenges their marriage is faced with and how best to deal with it. Your marital challenges may be different from mine.

Challenges from my point of view are:
Marital adjustment
Adjusting to married life itself could be difficult for someone so used to be on his/her own, a loner. A good time lady or man may find marriage confining and having to report back to the home at a certain time or having to give account of his daily activities to another person even though a loved one totally unacceptable to his/her way of life.

Children
How many children do we have?
Do we start a family right away or wait a few years?
Do I even want to have any children at all?
Unfortunately most married couples don’t discuss such issues before embarking on marriage and even if it was discussed, one of them could decide to have a change of mind probably as a result of situations arising that were otherwise not foreseen before marriage. Some discussed it, come to an agreement only for one of the parties to change their mind after being in marriage. This is a challenge that must not be handled with levity, if such a situation arises in any marriage it will be best for the couple to tread with caution.

Family upbringing/Background
A lot of people don’t think that this has anything to do with marriage, but it does. A man who was raised in a home where only a man make decisions and the woman is just to accept without question will expect that his wife be subservient, and if the wife refuses to be dictated to then problem will arise. So also a person from a rich background marrying someone from a lesser, one may be prudent with spending while the other may be quite extravagant and has to have everything that money could buy even though such things are unnecessary. This challenge is not an issue you sit your spouse down and discuss before marriage, it usually crop up and so require a great deal of patience to cope with.

Accepting new family ties
Problems arise where the inlaws try to be a part of your family. Decisions about which family member can come to visit or stay, how much to give a family member who has requested assistance, what sort of gift to give at festive time and so on if not probably dealt with may lead to either the husband or the wife choosing to side with his/her family, thinking the other partner is unfair to them.

Spiritual
This is the greatest challenge a woman or man could face in marriage. You see, for a believer to be married to an unbeliever, it takes a whole lot of grace for such a marriage to be successful. First because they will never be able to have a walk with God unless the unbelieving partner repent. In a Christian marriage, devotion to God require spending time together to worship, praying together (morning devotions etc), digging into the words of God, discussing about areas of your christian life that need to be touched so that things can fall into place for your family. Please take time out to read 1 Cor. 7:12-16.

Watch out for "Coping with Challenges in Marriage."