Strengthening Marriage Part 4 - Why We Need Unity

 

Be united like Stevie Wonder and Frank Sinatra

 “Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh” (Genesis 2:24).

God wants us to be united in heart and mind, to have a similar outlook and direction in life. 

Knowing our eternal nature, we can see the most important goal should be to be united eternally. We need to find peace with our wives and children if we want to spend eternity with them. 

We all go through some degree of union and separation as we live life. We are first united with our parents and siblings, then move out on our own. We get married and have children of our own, we may go through a divorce, we may remarry or spend time with grand kids. We eventually die (usually alone). As long as we get along with our family, we are happiest with them. By following the principles laid out in the Bible, we can get along with our family and have a desire to be with them. In the afterlife, we may be reunited again. This is good, if we get along with them.

Through his sacrifice, Christ made it possible for us to be together in the afterlife. An addition to his sacrifice, he also taught many things that would make being with others more desirable.

“That they all may be one; as thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be one in us: that the world may believe that thou hast sent me” (John 17:18–21).

Being unified as husband and wife enables us to raise better kids, without nearly the problems of drug abuse, broken homes for their own families, crime rates and a slew of other social issues. It will benefit our society in general to have stronger, more productive children. The statistics alone for the outcomes of children raised with single parents are staggering. 

63% of all youth suicides,
70% of all teen pregnancies,
71% of all adolescent chemical/substance abusers,
80% of all prison inmates, and
90% of all homeless and runaway children, came from single mother homes.

Aside from the social issues, there is the general happiness overall. It is no fun to carry around a spirit of contention, especially if it is with someone you love. We can better enjoy life and help make it more enjoyable for those around us.

The Family is the Building Block of a Strong Society

A strong, healthy society has strong, healthy families. It is in those families that people learn values such as integrity, honor, virtue, and ambition. We feel safer in neighborhoods with whole families. Men who grow up in nuclear families and marry an tend to be more productive citizens. Women who do the same tend to raise better children who will in turn, raise better children of their own. 

For this reason, I believe that those who have a disdain for the principles and ideals of civilized western society are working so hard to destroy those values at the basic unit, the family. As families crumble, so does the value system of the individual. People will be controlled, that is a fact of nature. If an individual is unwilling or unable to control themselves, then their neighbors will beg the government to do the job for them. Hence, if a society has a population that lacks ethical values, then that society is ripe for a tyrannical government. Their neighbors will beg the government to step in and stop their unruly neighbors.

“If Men were angels, no government would be necessary. If angels were to govern men, neither external nor internal controls on government would be necessary. In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies in this: you must first enable the government to control the governed; and the next place, oblige it to control itself.” - James Madison

As citizens, we need strong families and a strong internal values system in order to stave off the need for an overpowering government. Is it any coincidence that those who want a powerful government to take care of them from cradle to grave are the same people who put in measures to destroy the family? We see this in example after example from legalizing drugs, gay marriage, divorce courts, media, porn, attack on American traditions, the disdain of church.....every where a policy or idea is put forth to attack the traditional family, there is a strong negative ideology supporting it.

Assignment: Take your wife and kids all out for a treat of some sort as a family "date". Whether hiking, a trip to the ice cream parlor, or to a sports event, make it something fun. Repeat at least monthly. In addition, apologize for any misdeeds you may have done. Work on minimizing contentious behavior. 

Also, work on minimizing things in your life that take family unity. That may be habits, certain media, viewing pornography, or attitudes. While by yourself, write a list of things or behaviors that limit unity within your family and work on them.