Daly Focus Blog
Have you ever had a shirt with a loose thread? It seems like such a small thing, doesn’t it? But all it takes is one quick tug for you to realize that thread is part of a much larger problem. The next thing you know, your clothing is unraveling right before your eyes.
A marriage can have loose threads, too. A husband and wife don’t see eye-to-eye, or they’re not communicating very well, or little resentments start to crop up here and there.
Do you like football?
Not everybody does, of course, a reality that can lead to frustrations in marriage.
My wife, Jean, isn’t a raving fan of the game, but she appreciates the enjoyment the boys and I get from both playing and watching it. That said, we’re not overly “plugged in” to a regimen of watching on television. Because we don’t watch regular TV at all, catching a Sunday afternoon game is a treat.
But what about the husband or wife (women make up 45 percent of the NFL fan base) for whom football is a major passion?
Owners of Ashley Madison, the infamous adultery-facilitating website, bill themselves as being a source of “online personals & [a] dating destination for casual encounters.”
They’re also a site and source of misery and lies. And now, thanks to hackers, millions of their users have had their private sins made public.
During my career as a minister and clinical psychologist, I’ve worked with hundreds of couples grappling with the excruciating pain and heartbreak of infidelity. The reality is there’s nothing new about sexual sin.
Do most men know the difference between love and sex?
A lot of men assume they have that distinction pretty well settled – until they realize the lines are more blurred than they thought, and their marriage suffers because of it.
The fact is, struggles related to sex and intimacy within a marriage are one of the top reasons we’re contacted here at Focus on the Family. So it’s an important issue for us to address.
When you walked down the aisle, what was your vision for you and your spouse? Did you want a “nice” marriage? A “friendly” marriage? A “we get along” marriage?
Probably not.
Most couples are searching for intimacy, connection, romance, and excitement. But years into their marriage, many husbands and wives are bored. Life has settled into a routine – a rut, really – and they’re not connecting like they once did.
If you’ve reached that place in your marriage, you might be thinking, “This isn’t what I had in mind.”
Well, that’s not what the Bible says God has in mind for you, either.
One of our nation’s leading Christian publishers conducted a survey asking respondents to name the most influential book they had read in the past year. A startling number of women – Christian women – said “Fifty Shades of Grey” was their favorite book of the year.
Why is that so noteworthy?
Because the “Fifty Shades of Grey” books are a written form of pornography, plain and simple. It’s a book series that’s become nothing short of a cultural phenomenon, having sold more than 100 million copies in just a few short years.
For many of us, the issue of physician-assisted suicide was brought to our attention last year with the very public illness and death of Brittany Maynard, a 29-year-old woman who chose to end her own life with a lethal prescription after receiving a diagnosis of an aggressive form of cancer.
This pains me in so many ways, not the least of which is that it compounds the heartbreak of a horrible, terminal illness with the tragic choice of a young woman to take her own life.
My wife Jean always knows when I’ve taped a broadcast with author and speaker Dr. Gary Chapman.
It’s uncanny. I’ll walk through the door and, inspired by my time with Dr. Chapman, I’ll ask her something like, “What’s one thing I could do to help you today?” And she immediately knows who I’ve spent time with.
And that’s how God uses Dr. Chapman. He’s a relationship expert, and he helps couples create and maintain an emotionally safe environment in their marriages that is conducive to positive growth.
Why would a photo of an elderly man eating lunch with his wife go viral across the Internet? Maybe because the simple image captures the true richness of love and intimacy within a marriage like few things can.
The photo first appeared on social media along with the unnamed man’s story. He met his wife when they were 17. It was love at first sight. They dated for a short time but lost touch when he left to serve in World War II, and her family relocated to another part of the country.
Doris Amrine called the police after her husband went missing.
Her worry was understandable. Three years after Melvyn’s diagnosis of Alzheimer’s, he needs help to accomplish tasks like walking around the block. With his memory slipping away, Melvyn has trouble remembering how he had proposed to his wife of 60 years.
But the story I want to share with you today isn’t about what Melvyn has forgotten – it’s about what he remembered on the day he left the house.
Jim Daly is a husband, father and President of Focus on the Family and host of its National Radio Hall of Fame broadcast. His blog, Daly Focus, is full of timely commentary and wisdom designed to help you navigate and understand today’s culture. His latest book is Marriage Done Right.
