By: Gienie Assink, Springfield Oregon
Maybe you’ve heard that a woman needs to be loved by her husband and a man needs to be respected by his wife. Seems simple enough; however, if you’re like the average man or woman, you’re thinking “Sure, that all sounds great, but what does it mean?”
Men often define love differently than their wives, while women often don’t know how to define respect. If both you and your spouse have these needs, but don’t know what they are, how can you satisfy each other? Without a definition, it’s like trying to throw a dart at a board you cannot see.
Marriages today face a mountain of challenges. Busy schedules, family-of-origin issues, work expectations, addictive behaviors, affairs and dwindling romance all conspire against healthy marriages. Often the mountain of marital problems seems insurmountable, prompting too many couples to give up and consider divorce as their best option.
Marriage in our culture has weakened, since the 60’s the divorce rate has nearly tripled.
In a recent study of divorcees, the majority wished they had tried harder to salvage their marriage. Before making any life changing decisions contemplate this; is there another way to escape the tragedy of divorce and recover hope for your marriage?
For any woman who may be reading this, I would like to recommend a book that literally saved my marriage from disaster.
After 6 years of marriage, it became clear to my husband and I our communication “gap” was more like the Grand Canyon. We needed to take action but weren’t sure what it was we needed, what questions to ask, or where we would even receive answers. We couldn’t even pin point what was wrong, we just knew we needed help.
Our pastor asked us to join a marriage seminar at our church and through that; we were introduced to a wonderful book called Love and Respect by Dr. Emerson E. Eggerichs.
Excited and burdened about male and female communication in relationships, Emerson launched the Love and Respect Conferences in August 1999 to serve husbands and wives and has been doing so every since. I can personally testify to how successful the concepts he points out are.
I would encourage all women (and men) to research this book; while your at it, go a step further and purchase it for anyone you know who struggles with understanding and implementation of fundamental principles for marriage, whether it is your daughter, son, parents, friends, or even yourself. I’m so thankful my husband and I did. This summer we’ll be celebrating 9 years together, and I owe a lot of our success to Love and Respect.
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