RE-PAIR – REVIVE – RESTORE
There is an old saying that marriages are made in heaven. If that is true then we have a major problem. From the looks of whats happening on GROUND ZERO, either the assembly line of heaven is getting faulty or God is getting bad at this job or the more probable reason is that we humans are really making a mess out of the most beautiful thing that God has given us mankind.
Marriage is definitely God’s plan as it seems to be a norm in every religion, culture, tribe, and tongue. Marriage leading to family is the way things are made to be. Stable marriages leads to stable families leading to stable societies. It would be then be dangerous to play with the foundations, i.e. marriage relationships.
The Holy Scriptures ( which I feel is a good reference on these issues ) says the following:
- Gen 2:21 So the LORD God caused a deep sleep to fall upon the man, and while he slept took one of his ribs and closed up its place with flesh.
- Gen 2:22 And the rib that the LORD God had taken from the man he made into a woman and brought her to the man.
- Gen 2:23 Then the man said, “This at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man.”
- Gen 2:24 Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh.
By the way, if these Holy Scriptures are true, that would be the first wedding the world has ever seen and that definitely was awesome. The Woman was made out of the Man and today Man comes out of the Woman. God really messed it up. May be he knew that marriage relationships would be at risk.
Marriage Today
If a person is being recruited for a crucial job, he has to first undergo training for several years to earn a degree and another key area is the years of prior experience one has to do the job effectively. The most experienced and the most qualified is always selected to get maximum results for the position. He has to pass several rounds of interview and if all works, then recruitment happens. But for something as crucial and life destiny determining as marriage, no training and definitely and absolutely no experience is expected. Even then from the first day, perfection is expected from the couple by the peers and society. Can you imagine, a man and a woman from two different families, never known probably to each other before, over a month or two, after several deliberations get married without any counsel or training. Let us consider the differences:
- Gender differences: Men and women are wired differently as they perform different task in the marriage and family.
- Temperamental differences: As humans, our personality also has blood type, and these differences can be sometimes exactly opposite
- Genetic differences: Being from two different lineages, their genetic differences make them different with different wiring.
- Environmental Differences: Both the man and woman have had separate and unique experiences that have molded them over the years making them different and unique individuals.
- Worldview differences: Everyone from life experiences or from our religious background or even our economic backgrounds develop default worldviews and it is possible that the worldviews will contrast and may even contradict.
- Education differences: We are different because of the education we have received.
Those are just a few of the differences mentioned but even with just these, marriage looks like a recipe for disaster and that is exactly what we get. Once the honey moon is over life begins, and when reality strikes, these differences start to pop up and create havoc. Now with no training and experience, every marriage is expected to perform well. Strange and funny as it sounds, yet it is the norm that we have been following for years. To this you add interfering in laws, the situation becomes explosive. To this explosive situation you add a heavy tight scheduled job ( look at the note in Center for Care and Counseling link, under portfolios) and you can see that the marriage becomes a potential disaster. Our culture is very conservative and does not have mechanisms for marriages to vent to release increasing pressures inside. The worst thing is that most marriages going through crises put a very good and rosy front and no one within family or friends realize the troubled waters. But one fine day, there is an explosion………. broken heart pieces everywhere, flood of tears, uncontrollable emotions……
The worst consequence of marital discord, considering a marriage stand alone, is violence. Men are made with rage. Men are not trained to handle this gift which is useful for protection and defense, but gets misplaced and the wife turns victim. Women sometime bear this for years before it actually comes out in the open or they turn for help. This is a crime and should not be tolerated but at the same time it has to be handled with care.
Men sometimes resort to alcohol due to discord at home, and this can further damage the situation where the women lose respect for the leader of the home leading to further imbalance, violence and marital ineffectiveness.
Dowry, the famous social evil ever haunts Indian marriages no matter how smooth things have been. It is there in the system. For long we have been fighting with this. There has been some success, but the war is still to be won.
At Center for Care and Counseling we work with marriages to re-pair marriages, revive the dead emotions and restore the marital passion. Marriage Garage is an interactive seminar that is conducted three times in a year by the Center for Care and Counseling. The Seminar happens in two formats namely a single day format and a three-day camp format! During these seminars, the fundamentals of marriage is discussed in a very caring and soothing environment. Topics covered are as follows:
- Marriage – definitions
- Communication in Marriage
- Conflict in Marriage
- Temperamental Analysis
- Love languages
- Sexual relationship
- Finance in Marriage
- Roles and responsibilities
- Heavens Perspective on Marriage
- The power of forgiveness
- The need for reconciliation
- Parenting – how to raise godly children
- The Power of Marriage
The camp model covers all these with personal counselling time in the evenings with experienced counselors.
If you would like to register for the next Marriage Garage, please contact 9483505515 or write to info@nlfecity.com
At the Marriage Garage, marriages are overhauled, repaired and serviced!
This seminar is not just for troubled marriages, but for all marriages.