The Proper Care and Feeding of Each Other
Consider the possibilities of why men and women are so different from each other? Misleading opinions in society say loud and clear- to get on each other’s nerves, to be a source of incompatibility. Someone who was your enemy would want you to think that about marriage relationships. Consider maybe why the wonderful possibilities of differences. God described it this way in Genesis 2:18, “And the Lord God said, It is not good that the man should be alone; I will him an help meet for him.” The word “meet” here, comes from the same root word as the word complete. Men and women complete each other.
Have you ever taken on a big project like building a house or sewing a dress, packing up to go camping or decorating for a holiday, going through all your records to fill out your tax forms, or building a fence? How much preparation, knowledge, resources, planning, revising, frustration, accomplishment of baby steps, does it take for you to complete a huge project like that? Becoming complete as man and wife is an even bigger project and much more rewarding, Marriage and family life is designed to bring the ultimate reward of joy, peace of mind, peace of conscience. The ultimate reason we are in families is to learn how to be selfless and grow in love. Marriage requires our best efforts over a very long time span. You have your whole life to work on it.
Preparation, Knowledge, Resources
In the world we live in most people get misinformation, the wrong preparation, incorrect knowledge from unreliable resources about men and women and the role of intimacy in our unions as husband and wife. If you are working off the wrong information or lack of information- you are going to really get on each other’s nerves, cause hurt and shame, and be left confused and frustrated. This week we studied correct information about the physical and emotional differences in men and women that, when understood make a perfect union.
Blessing of Physical & Sexual Differences
There is danger in putting down the opposite sex for the very differences that are innate within men and women that design them to need each other, emotionally, mentally, physically and sexually. Here we will take a look at what the differences are and then how they are meant to draw us together.
Men Women
Easier, quicker arousal time Need to be emotionally prepared for arousal
Can compartmentalize their thinking Consider everything at once, hard to turn off thoughts
Biological clock- Men’s sexual desire Women’s sexual desire peaks at age 35
peaks at age 18 or 19.
Need sex to feel safe, warm & close Need to feel safe, warm and close to
desire sex
Time to climax is quick Time to climax is extended
Requires self-control to please mate Requires emotional wellness to be
pleased by sex
No oxytocin (bonding a choice) Oxytocin (bonding hormone is produced
at each physical contact. Touch,
look, kiss, sexual intimacy.)
The advantages of these differences are God given to help us each grow. The greatest thing about being human is we get to choose what we think! We get to choose truth or not. The world’s way is not a truthful depiction of marriage, love and sex. God’s way demands the best that is in us to be allowed to grow and develop over time.
Husbands how can you best help prepare your wife for intimacy together? Help her feel safe, warm and close to you by showing kindness, gratitude and respect all day long, from the moment you wake up in the morning. Before you leave the house make sure she knows she is loved by you and that you appreciate her. Reinforce that during the day. Wives how can you best invite your husbands to show you kindness, appreciation and caring? Prepare yourself to have physical intimacy with him. He needs sex to feel close to feel safe, warm and close. Can you see what a perfect circle that is within the relationship God has designed to complete us?
Warnings
Those same physical stirrings feelings can be misattributed for love to people other than your mate. As married spouses, and even as single individuals, set your boundaries clearly with others, especially those of the opposite sex.
In Genesis 2: 21-24, husbands and wives are told to cleave unto each other. “And the Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall upon Adam, and he slept: and he took one of his ribs, and closed up the flesh instead thereof;
And the rib, which the Lord God had taken from man, made he a awoman, and brought her unto the man.
And Adam said, This is now bone of my bones, and aflesh of my flesh: she shall be called bWoman, because she was taken out of Man. Therefore shall a aman leave his bfather and his mother, and shall ccleave unto his dwife: and they shall be eone flesh. In the scriptures the word cleave is used to describe only two of our relationships; our relationship with God and our relationship with our spouse.
There are many opportunities for “wanton” eyes in this world. We are warned about this in Isaiah 3:16. Wanton eyes means unrestrained, wandering, roving in gaiety or sport, flirtatious. The boundaries with which we are to exercise these physical urges and actions is clearly defined by God. Know where your boundary is, if it is amiss, reset it. Do not fall prey to the decay of morals and erring opinions in our carefree world.
Gordon B. Hinkley warned people: “Uncouth-looking entertainers draw big crowds of our youth. They grow rich from high admission prices. Their songs, so many of them, are suggestive in nature.
Pornography is everywhere with its seductive invitation. You must turn away from it. It can enslave you. It can destroy you. Recognize it for what it is—tawdry and sleazy stuff created and distributed by those who grow rich at the expense of those who see it.
The sanctity of sex is utterly destroyed in its salacious portrayal in the media. That which by its nature is inherently beautiful is corrupted in its popular presentation.”
Wonderful Advantages!
The differences between male and females were designed to facilitate selflessness from both husband and wife. As husband and wife learn about their own body and their spouse’s body together, they grow in understanding and respect. How do we treat each other differently when we know how to capitalize on these differences to show love to each other both emotionally, mentally, physically and spiritually?
The power to create new life together elevates us to as close as we can get to God. Someone who loves you completely would want you to know that, God. To demean the power to create and debase sexual desire purely for lust is to miss out on the most glorious relationship possible that God has designed for us. Only your worst enemy (the adversary) would want you to have misinformation and purely lustful desires for such a beautiful gift. That would be the natural man approach. God wants to elevate our relationships to the supernatural, to draw us closer to each other and closer to Him.
What can you do?
I love the parable of the Good Samaritan in the New Testament. Let’s look at how that parable applies to our marriage. In Ephesians 5:25 it reads “husbands,” but it applies to spouses, both husbands and wives, are admonished to “love your (spouse) even as Christ also loved the church and gave himself for it.” In his book, “Drawing Heaven into Your Marriage,” Wallace Goddard teaches this principle. In the parable of the Good Samaritan we each are the wounded traveler who needs saved on the roadside. The Good Samaritan is the Savior, through the Atonement of his perfect love can we each be saved. So, if you apply that you are to love your spouse as Christ loved the church, you are to be the Good Samaritan for your spouse. They are your wounded traveler to care for not just in passing. Remember what great lengths the Samaritan went to care for the wounded traveler. And they were very different from each other. They were from cultures that weren’t supposed to even speak to each other! Christ is teaching us to overcome those cultural differences of being male or female and completely care for the other anyway, without complaining.
Don’t assume what you think, is true about your mate. Sometimes they are wounded. Sometimes you are both wounded at the same time. Each of you wants to be loved by the other. Don’t assume that the great instant bonding that happens in movies and media is a correct portrayal of reality. Social opinion would have you believe that if you marry the “right” person, sex will be great, life will be great, all your fantasies will come true. Those are marital myths. There is no such thing as a soul mate. The secret to a successful marriage, great sex, and ability to work through problems is “learn to love the soul of your mate.” (Mort Fertel, Marriage Fitness)
Rather than complain about differences, thank God for them. Ask Him to help you learn how to love the soul of your mate, physically, emotionally, mentally and spiritually.
"In His grand design, when God first created man, He created duality of the sexes. The ennobling expression of that duality is found in marriage. One individual is complementary to the other. As Paul stated, 'Neither is the man without the woman, neither the woman without the man, in the Lord' (1 Corinthians 11:11). There is no other arrangement that meets the divine purposes of the Almighty. Man and woman are His creations. Their duality is His design. Their complementary relationships and functions are fundamental to His purposes. One is incomplete without the other."
- President Gordon B. Hinckley
Comments
Post a Comment