World Class or Second Class Relationship

Christians are often inclined to believe that a good marriage is simple. Trust God and the relationship will run smoothly. This is the prevailing notion held by too many church members. What does it take to have a successful marriage?

Have you ever attended one of those marathon marriage seminars? We did once and it was seventeen hours of lectures, group activities and couple assignments.

IS MARRIAGE THAT DIFFICULT?

Somehow it’s hard for us to think of a successful marriage as something difficult to achieve. Some things are supposed to be tough. Becoming a medical doctor is difficult. Being a skilled mathematician takes hard work. Being a professional golfer requires endless hours of practice. But marriage? Surely anyone can pull that off.

Christians may be even more inclined to simplify marriage. We tend to believe that trust in Christ should make the relationship run smoothly. Yet the New Testament never intends that faith should be a substitute for knowledge and hard work. The Apostle Paul said of his ministry:

“I worked harder than all of them.” He quickly added: “Yet not I, but the grace of God that was with me.” (1 Corinthians 15:10) We are to trust while we work, not trust instead of work.

In high school and college I was a runner. Did you know there are books just on running? What could be simpler than running? If you have a pair of legs and a decent pair of shoes, you “just do it!”

And yet I have The Complete Book of Running with over 300 pages. In the back, the bibliography lists over 300 articles and books on running. I asked myself, “Just how can anyone make running that complicated?”

I discovered that only the first part of the book is for every-other-day-run-for–health-and-fun-joggers. If the average jogger is going to be prepared for all the circumstances, there is quite a bit to know about running, after all.

Then I learned that the rest of the book is for those who really want to get into running. At this point the author prompts you to ask, “How good do you want to be?” Then he lists various classes of runners. Here is the reader’s choice: World Class, Champion Class, First Class and Second Class.

Now we are getting to the real reason for such a long book. It takes lots of information to make it to world or champion class.

Maybe the critical question about marriage is the question “HOW GOOD DO YOU WANT IT TO BE?”

What if you both decide to aim for a “world class” marriage? Then how you listen to each other, how you work out your conflicts, how you fulfill each other sexually, and your spiritual intimacy—all these take on new meaning.

Is it fair for us to suggest that all couples aim for “world class”? After all, not many of the millions of joggers end up at the Boston Marathon. It is at this point that marriage is different. In marriage, it’s dangerous to put forth little effort and aim for less. Having an average marriage is far more difficult than being an average runner. It takes a lot of effort for some people to maintain much of a marriage at all. If we aim for little, we may end up with nothing. Is it really fair to yourself and to your spouse to do that? Don’t you each deserve a partner who is aiming higher than second class? Wouldn’t it be exciting and rewarding if both of you dedicated yourselves to making your relationship“WORLD CLASS”?