A Healthy Marriage By Complementarity Of Spousal Roles ( Kostenberger & Jones )

Summary: Dr. Hawkins has done a wonderful job in presenting the essential elements of what it takes to have a Biblically sound intimate and committed marriage. In Strengthening Marital Intimacy (1991), he has captured the two foundational truths, intimacy and commitment, makes a good marriage into a great marriage. It is not enough to know the Word of God intellectually there must be a real surrendering to the sovereign will of God. To do it will transform a life of commitment to God and to the marriage. The key concepts presented in this book cover marital intimacy, commitment, wisdom, reality, God’s sovereignty, the person, sexuality,

In her book Marriage a History Stephanie Coontz explains the male breadwinner family model and its dominance in family life during the 40’s, 50’s, and early 60’s. An illustration of the male breadwinner model is composed of a father, mother, and two children; typically a boy and girl close in age. Funded by their father’s well paying middle class salary, the wife and children live a comfortable life in suburbia and participate regularly in consumer trends. Perceived as the head of the household, the father was the sole financial provider. On the other hand the mother was the head of domestic life and was responsible for the children. The popular 1950’s TV show The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet exemplified this family model. With regard to the male breadwinner family model, imagine having eight other brothers and sisters. Imagine growing up without a mother, and with a father who worked constantly. Then consider living this life alongside your peers who come from the “normal” male breadwinner families Coontz describes… How would your family differ from your peers? What would be your thoughts and feelings towards family life? More importantly, how would these unique circumstances change your perception of the nuclear family?

    Additionally, the authors assert that the values we hold have enormous implications for the establishment of boundaries, they state, “your values make sure that certain bad things are not present in the marriage and that certain good things are” (Cloud & Townsend, 1999, p.107). As this is the case Cloud and Townsend (1999) identified six values that are promoted in scripture and that they believe produce great boundaries in marriage. Those values include, “love of God, love of your spouse, honesty, faithfulness, compassion and forgiveness, and holiness” (Cloud & Townsend, 1999, p.112).

Marriage has been constantly changing over the past centuries. Currently, trends in marriage have adopted a new way of getting married through splitting responsibilities and work, resulting in social freedom for individuals. "The Myth of Co-Parenting,” by Hope Edelman demonstrates the difficulties of taking all the responsibilities while in “ My Problem with Her Anger,” explains the needs of having a better understanding of each other. Due to marriage changing over the last centuries, marriage couples desire individuals’ expectations and freedom to be met in marriage.

In the play Tartuffe, Molière portrays marriage in a unique way. He expresses a different perspective on marriage that most people would disagree with. In the play, marriage never seems to base around love but rather seems to be a very serious part of their life. Mariane submits to her father because during this time period the father was able to choose whom his daughter would marry. This submission is not based on love but rather who her father enjoys the best. It puts a great deal of pressure on the father to make the right decision. Marriage to Tartuffe would have caused Mariane a lifetime of discontent and it would have also associated the

females are not at home as much to look after children and do all the

Part1. During our time in class we discussed different types of marriages, such as traditional, modern, and egalitarian. In traditional family styles it is expected that the man is in charge, has total control of what goes on in the house and the budget, along with the wife being in charge of only things involving the housework or motherly duties. As the world has evolved so has the idea of what a marriage should be. Marriage is now seen closer to a partnership, rather than an ownership as it has been seen like for hundreds of years.

After reading the article called, “What is Marriage For?” by E.J. Graff I completely agree with the article and I also relate, as well. The reason is I’m part of the LGBTQ community and from the moment I realized I was, I knew when I decided to get married it would be a huge obstacle because I would have to leave the state I was born and raised in which is North Carolina. The reason why I had to leave would be before the law was made in North Carolina same sex marriage wasn’t allowed but only few states allowed it. So, I was truly happy when it was legalized. In addition, in some of the states the only way I could really get married is by civil union which has far less benefits when compared to actual marriage. In the article, it even talks about some of the stories that same sex couples had to deal with the

14. What is it like to tell her how it makes you feel when you feel rejected?

Chaney, C. (2009). Beyond the Healthy Marriage Initiative: How Extension Agents can promote healthy relationships among low-income, cohabiting African American Couples. North Carolina State University Extension.

"Wives submit to your husbands as to the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is head of the church, his body, of which he is the Savior."

Because the Lord values the relationship of a man and his wife, he also gives us instructions as to how husbands and wives are to treat each other through Paul’s teaching in Ephesians 5:21-33. The subject of Paul 's teaching in Ephesians 5:21-33 is that of submission in the context of marriage. Paul 's instructions here create a clash with the beliefs and practices of our culture today. However, a closer study of what God really intended sheds much light on what is really being taught in this hard saying of Paul. Paul is talking about the different roles the both the husband and wife has with each other in relationship with their relationship with Christ.

Marriage requires effort and work. Many newlyweds come into a marriage thinking it is easy but do not consider the consequences of marriage that heavily rely on balances and partnership. Marriage is all about compromise. It is important to engage in a premarital program to allow both partners to learn what to expect within a marriage, how to face certain roadblocks, and to better communication when conflict is aroused so that divorce does not become an option. Gottman’s research (2009) has made a significant contribution to the study of relationship and marriage tying unity, harmony, and communication together to make relationship and marriage work. When a couple who does not have consummate love (intimacy, passion, and commitment), they often portray the six indicators of divorce: harsh startup, the Four Horsemen, flooding, body language, failed repair attempts and reflecting on bad memories (Gottman, 2009). Divorce often occurs within the first two years of marriages and almost half of divorces end within the first seven years (Bhutto-Ramirez, 2015).

Although Baxter and Montgomery’s Relational Dialectics provide a framework to understand opposing forces within close relationships, and their constituents use them to understand dialectical tensions within close relationships like marriages, scriptural integration is lacking, and further research is needed to understand why dialectical tensions occur. According to Ebert (2000) conflict and dialectic tensions are distinct concepts, he explains, “…the relationship between conflict and dialectical (antagonistic or non-antagonistic) and or non-dialectical” (p.641). Most importantly, some research seeks to understand how marital relationships work through dialectical tensions, circumstances that present dialectical tensions, and the various stages or turning points that dialectical tensions occur. In other words, dialectical tensions work differently from conflicts,

Contemporary Home, by Jack O. Balswick and Judith K. Balswick comprise of various approaches in biblical, theological, cultural, and sociological perspectives. The author focus is strictly to “integrated view of contemporary family life based on current social-science research, clinical insights, and biblical truth. The background of the author’s work is from a previous edition upgraded with current changes in our “modern society including a section on marriage, mate selection, cohabitation, expansion of family life, parenting, rearing children, adolescent, challenges of the later-life premarital cohabitation, recognition of the importance of biosocial influence, and the interactive effect of bio-psycho-socio-cultural factors to understand family dynamics. The audience of this book are for families and marriage in conflict, every life stage, maintaining balance through the joys, pains, ups, and downs,