Marriage, Failure In Marriage

Marriage is simultaneously the most challenging relationship in life and potentially the most fulfilling. Marriage was designed by God for the human race with mandates to make the marriage successful. Because marriage is a divine institution, God designed it for both believers and unbelievers. He also designed marriage to be very successful, especially between two believers.

God established responsibilities to make marriage successful. The first responsibility of marriage is for the husband to love his wife. The second responsibility of marriage is for the wife to obey her husband. The third responsibility of marriage is for the husband and the wife to forgive each other. We all have sin natures, so when we give in to the pressures and temptations of our sin natures, marriages can encounter troubles that can lead to failure.

No relationships in life are more dramatic than the relationship between the man and woman in marriage or between parents and children. What you have made highest priority in your life will determine the status of your marriage. If the consistent intake of Bible doctrine teaching is the number one priority of both husband and wife, that marriage has the highest potential for long-term success and happiness in life.

Why Do Marriages Fail?

Marriages fail because the husband and wife first fail in their spiritual lives. Marriages fail because believers think that marriage will be a state of happiness. If they have been unhappy all of their lives, they look to marriage to create happiness. Many believers marry with unrealistic expectations, illusions, and myths that marriage will make their problems go away.

Where there is a marital failure, there is usually a mental attitude lacking in the husband. When believers have problems in their marriage, the husband (who holds 51% of the stock) had better hold a stockholders meeting and find out with their wife what to do about the situation.

Marriages fail because people get married for the wrong reasons. Many get married for security, for legalized sex, because of peer pressure, because of unrealistic expectations, to escape from unpleasant circumstances, or even for a meal ticket. Marriages fail because people are failures as human beings. Believers are no better in marriage than they are as people. Marriages fail because believers marry for the wrong reasons resulting in them marring the wrong person.

Marriages fail because believers do not obey the mandates of 1 Corinthians 7:3. God invented marriage and the duties that go with marriage. It is much easier to learn the duties before marriage from spiritual growth than to get married and have to learn the rules of marriage.

“The husband must fulfill his duty to his wife, and likewise also the wife to her husband.” (1 Corinthians 7:3, NASB)

Marriages fail because believers get married believing that marriage will solve their problems, not realizing that marriage always makes their problems worse and even generates new problems. Some expect the other spouse to solve the problems they brought into the marriage. They try to unload their problems on each other. They are also completely unprepared spiritually to handle their disappointments, frustrations, and disillusionments.

Marriages fail because believers make bad decisions while out of fellowship or because they have rejected Bible doctrine and are in reversionism. Marriages fail because the husband or wife try to change the other person. Marriages fail because they believed the misconception that children will save a marriage.

Man was designed to have sex with one woman in marriage. Premarital sex destroys marriage and the biblical love needed for marriage and romance. Eccl. 7:25-29.

“I directed my mind to know, to investigate and to seek wisdom and an explanation, and to know the evil of folly and the foolishness of madness. And I discovered more bitter than death the woman whose heart is snares and nets, whose hands are chains. One who is pleasing to God will escape from her, but the sinner will be captured by her. "Behold, I have discovered this," says the Preacher, "adding one thing to another to find an explanation, which I am still seeking but have not found. I have found one man among a thousand, but I have not found a woman among all these. "Behold, I have found only this, that God made men upright, but they have sought out many devices."” (Ecclesiastes 7:25-29, NASB)

The man looking for the right kind of woman to marry should first grow spiritually so that he will become the right kind of man that the woman would want to marry. Looking for premarital sex guarantees that you are not the right kind of man.

Marriages fail because of the arrogance of unhappiness. The woman and the man are both capable of this. The arrogance of unhappiness seeks to control others by making them feel guilty for alleged neglect, thus gaining attention through guilt. This also results in attention given to your self-pity by trying to get others to feel sorry for you.

You cannot build happiness on pleasant environment or the details of life, such as money, success, power, pleasure, sex, approbation, social life, friends, health, or marriage. You cannot build your happiness on self-gratification, drug abuse, beauty, sex, or attractiveness.

You cannot build your happiness on someone else’s unhappiness. Happiness does not arrive in a moment of time, a moment of pleasure, a moment of power, a moment of success, or a moment of stimulation. Marriage cannot make you happy. Only epignosis Bible doctrine in the right lobe of your soul under the filling of the Holy Spirit can produce true happiness.

Life’s relationships must be based on principle. For the marriage of two believers to continue and grow, there must be an understanding of the principles of Bible doctrine. You cannot build a marriage on human viewpoint, practical humanistic ideals, or secular philosophy. You must learn and apply biblical principles.

No marriage will grow or even survive without unconditional mental attitude love. This is because no believer can advance to spiritual maturity without unconditional love. This can only be developed through the renewing of your thinking from Bible doctrine in the soul and the filling of the Holy Spirit. Rom. 12:2.

“And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, so that you may prove what the will of God is, that which is good and acceptable and perfect.” (Romans 12:2, NASB)

From unconditional love comes true personal love for your spouse. Personal love in marriage depends upon the stability of unconditional mental attitude love based on your own divine viewpoint thinking when problems are encountered or when your spouse is not acting as you wished and may have even disappointed you.

As the husband and wife age, the outward attractiveness of each begins to fade. Flaws that were hidden by youth and attractiveness become manifest as we age. In a good marriage, as the two people grow older and become less attractive, the relationship becomes sweeter and more resilient.

Why the First Marriage Failed

The first marriage of Adam and the woman in the Garden of Eden failed because of rejection of the divine wisdom taught them daily by none other than the Lord Jesus Christ. Adam and the woman both had free will in their souls and were responsible for their own decisions just as we all are in the human race. The woman thought that she would be happier and more fulfilled by greater knowledge. Adam thought he would be happier with a sinful woman than without her.

The woman wanted more than what she had in the perfect Garden and more knowledge than what she was being taught by our Lord. The Lord Jesus Christ taught the woman and gave her the knowledge she needed, but that knowledge was not enough for her. She had deceived herself long before the serpent deceived her into sinning. It did not take much effort for Satan to deceive her. She had convinced herself in her dialogue with Satan that the knowledge of good and evil would make her happier than she was.

The woman believed the serpent’s lies because this is what she wanted to hear. As a responder and in a state of reaction or rejection of her husband’s authority, the woman wanted to hear certain things. The Satan-possessed serpent simply told her what she wanted to hear and thus deceived her.

She was free to decide for or against God's single prohibition in the Garden. She decided against God’s mandate and sinned. At that instant, she became spiritually dead. Adam was standing beside Eve when she first sinned by eating the fruit. Gen 3:6.

“When the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was desirable to make one wise, she took from its fruit and ate; and she gave also to her husband with her, and he ate.” (Genesis 3:6, NASB)

Adam looked at his wife as the first sinner and was also free to decide for or against God's single prohibition in the Garden. Adam also decided against God’s mandate and sinned. He chose his wife in her spiritual death over remaining in fellowship with the Lord Jesus Christ. Adam knew he could only remain with her through his own spiritual death, so he followed her in sin. He had rejected all of the Bible doctrine in his soul when he sinned. He chose fellowship with her in sin over all of the spiritual norms and standards of Bible doctrine he had learned.

By application, when you compromise or reject the Bible doctrine in your soul to have rapport with friends, then you have lost the basis for true happiness in life. Rapport with God is infinitely more important than rapport with people, even in the most intimate relationship of husband and wife. If you have not developed rapport with God through spiritual growth, you will never be happy in life.

God has designed our spiritual life to be a system of thinking. Your thinking is either within the spiritual life with the Holy Spirit controlling your soul or outside the spiritual life with your old sin nature controlling your soul.

The first and perfect marriage failed because their thinking became corrupted. The thinking of the woman became corrupted resulting in her sinning in ignorance. The thinking of the man then became corrupted resulting in his sinning knowing fully that he was rejecting God's single prohibition.

No matter who you are, your thinking may become corrupted. Believers protect themselves by remaining filled with the Holy Spirit in the spiritual life and applying epignosis Bible doctrine to the situations and decisions in life. When you think with divine viewpoint, you use God's grace resources to handle many of life’s problems. When you reject Bible doctrine, your thinking becomes corrupted. The perfect marriage in the Garden failed from corrupted thinking. Phil. 2:2-5.

“make my joy complete by being of the same mind, maintaining the same love, united in spirit, intent on one purpose. Do nothing from selfishness or empty conceit, but with humility of mind regard one another as more important than yourselves; do not merely look out for your own personal interests, but also for the interests of others. Have this attitude in yourselves which was also in Christ Jesus,” (Philippians 2:2-5, NASB)

Mental Attitude Sins Destroy Marriage

Most of the failures in marriage are a result of mental attitude sins. Most people cite unfaithfulness, arguments over money, or general personality incompatibility for failure in marriage. These are merely symptoms and have not revealed the real root cause which is the mental attitude of arrogance.

Arrogance leads to many other mental attitude sins such as jealousy, bitterness, vindictiveness, anger, malice, hatred, desire for revenge, self-pity, guilt, and hypersensitivity. These become symptoms of the real culprit - arrogance.

People can improve and change, but that requires that they make the consistent learning Bible doctrine their top priority in life. Only spiritual growth can produce the divine solutions to marital problems.

People are no better in marriage than they are as people in their own. An arrogant person in marriage is an arrogant person out of marriage. Arrogance is a far greater factor than anything else in life and that self-centeredness is the major problem. See category on Arrogance.

Bitterness in Marriage

Bitterness is a serious mental attitude sin of emotional arrogance. It combines arrogance with emotion that can easily cause the believer to remain in carnality in a downward spiral of reversionism. Bitterness destroys any possibility of a successful marriage.

In Colossians 3:19, “Husbands” is ἀνήρ (anēr) and means nobleman and refers to the husband who must represent the concept of honor, integrity, and nobility. “Love” is ἀγαπάω (agapaō) and is a mental attitude unconditional love. You love someone because of your character and Bible doctrine in your soul, not because of the attractiveness of the one you love. For example, you should still love your wife with an agapao love when she is not behaving nicely. You stay in fellowship and continue to love her in spite of any unattractive behavior or words said.

“Husbands, love your wives and do not be embittered against them.” (Colossians 3:19, NASB)

“Do not be embittered” is πικραίνω (pikrainō) means to stop being bitter which is a sign of the mental attitude sin of arrogance. When people are bitter they often slander, malign, and criticize others. Bitterness is an arrogant habit of self-centeredness that keeps you out of fellowship. Eph. 4:31.

“Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you, along with all malice.” (Ephesians 4:31, NASB)

Bitterness is one of the worst mental attitude sins because it turns love into hatred, happiness into malice, and blessing into cursing. Bitterness is the fuel that produces self-justification, self-deception, and self-absorption. When you turn to bitterness, you will never take responsibility for the cause of your bitterness nor will you take responsibility for your failures. Bitter people become irrational and think they have no flaws. It’s always someone else’s fault. In Ephesians 4:31, “bitterness” is πικρία (pikria) and means bitterness, bitter hatred. This word is also used in Hebrews 12:15.

“See to it that no one comes short of the grace of God; that no root of bitterness springing up causes trouble, and by it many be defiled;” (Hebrews 12:15, NASB)

In Ephesians 4:31, “wrath” is θυμός (thumos) and means passionate outbursts of anger that boil up then subside, an angry temper. “Anger” is ὀργή (orgē) and means agitation of the soul, the violent emotion of anger. “Clamor” is κραυγή (kraugē) and means shouting, loud verbal fighting and brawling. “Slander” is βλασφημία (blasphēmia) and means slander, detraction, speech injurious to another’s good name. “Malice” is κακία (kakia) and means malignity, malice, ill-will, desire to injure, depravity, wickedness that is not ashamed to break laws, and evil. Malice is the lust to hurt someone because of your bitterness, anger, and hatred. You seek revenge on the object of your anger, hatred, and wrath. This destroys what is left of the marriage.

A wife becomes bitter when she is continually disappointed with her husband. A husband becomes bitter when he is continually disappointed with his wife and wishes he had married someone else. Bitterness is a constant threat of mental attitude sin in the relationship. Bitterness destroys the marriage even if neither spouse initiates divorce or separation.

The divine solution to bitterness is forgiveness. Kindness is the opposite of bitterness. If you are bitter, you are out of fellowship and the old sin nature is in control of your soul. If you are kind, the Holy Spirit is controlling your soul. When you are kind, you are thinking about someone besides yourself. You are not filled with your own self-importance. Every Christian spouse in marriage is mandated to be kind to their spouse. Unconditional agapao love for all mankind is being kind. Personal love for God the Father and personal love for a select few in your life is exhibiting kindness. Eph. 4:32.

“Be kind to one another, tender-hearted, forgiving each other, just as God in Christ also has forgiven you.” (Ephesians 4:32, NASB)

If you are being tender-hearted or compassionate, you are no longer thinking about yourself but thinking about your spouse. Compassion is a synonym for kindness and is a mental attitude, not an emotion.

No marriage is a successful marriage without forgiveness. You do not forgive unless you put behind you forever the wrongs other people do to you. You are told to forgive everyone. The motivation for this is personal love for God the Father, not your spouse, and not your emotion.

When a person truly forgives, they truly love. There is no love in the person who forgives and then brings that failure back up again. Everyone will be tested at one time or another on whether their love is true or not. True love forgives.

Husbands are commanded to have unconditional mental attitude love for others that stabilizes the personal love they have for their wives. It is the stability of the unconditional mental attitude agapao love for others motivated by their personal love for the Lord Jesus Christ that enables the Spirit-filled believer to forgive their spouse and others they interact with in life. This love in the spiritual life and exhibited by a maturing believer is described in 1 Corinthians 13:4-7.

“Love is patient, love is kind and is not jealous; love does not brag and is not arrogant, does not act unbecomingly; it does not seek its own, is not provoked, does not take into account a wrong suffered, does not rejoice in unrighteousness, but rejoices with the truth; bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.” (1 Corinthians 13:4-7, NASB)

Unconditional mental attitude agapao love can overlook faults, is full of trust, hope, and endurance. Personal love is dependent on unconditional agapao love for its success and stability in relationships with friends, while dating, with your family, and with your spouse. In marriage, unconditional love for others in the spiritual life provides the capacity and power for a husband to love his wife as Christ loved the Church and gave Himself for it, and vice versa. Eph. 5:25.

“Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself up for her,” (Ephesians 5:25, NASB)

Unconditional agapao love for the entire human race from the filling of the Holy Spirit stabilizes personal love in marriage and provides the consistency, endurance, and permanence in the relationship.

Adultery Destroys Marriage

Adultery refers to sexual relations with other partners while married. The Word of God prohibits adultery. Exodus 20:14; Deut. 5:18.

““You shall not commit adultery.” (Exodus 20:14, NASB)

“‘You shall not commit adultery.” (Deuteronomy 5:18, NASB)

In Ephesians 4:19 πλεονεξία (pleonexia) is translated “greediness” and refers to believers building scar tissue through adultery. Greediness can be translated “insatiable desire.”

“and they, having become callous, have given themselves over to sensuality for the practice of every kind of impurity with greediness.” (Ephesians 4:19, NASB)

Fornication referred to sexual relations in the heathen temples making the sex act a form of religion. Fornication is said to “wage war against the soul” in 1 Peter 2:11.

“Beloved, I urge you as aliens and strangers to abstain from fleshly lusts which wage war against the soul.” (1 Peter 2:11, NASB)

Marriage protects the human race from self-destruction as a Divine Institution. That is why God's divine discipline for adultery is so severe. Prov. 3:12; Heb. 12:6.

“For whom the LORD loves He reproves, Even as a father corrects the son in whom he delights.” (Proverbs 3:12, NASB)

“FOR THOSE WHOM THE LORD LOVES HE DISCIPLINES, AND HE SCOURGES EVERY SON WHOM HE RECEIVES."” (Hebrews 12:6, NASB)

Adultery is a destroyer of the soul. Prov. 6:32.

“The one who commits adultery with a woman is lacking sense; He who would destroy himself does it.” (Proverbs 6:32, NASB)

Sexual love (eros) is sanctioned only in marriage. 1 Thess. 4:3; Heb. 13:4.

“For this is the will of God, your sanctification; that is, that you abstain from sexual immorality;” (1 Thessalonians 4:3, NASB)

“Marriage is to be held in honor among all, and the marriage bed is to be undefiled; for fornicators and adulterers God will judge.” (Hebrews 13:4, NASB)

Adultery has an adverse effect on the body. Repercussions of the soul extends into the body. 1 Cor. 6:13-18.

“Food is for the stomach and the stomach is for food, but God will do away with both of them. Yet the body is not for immorality, but for the Lord, and the Lord is for the body. Now God has not only raised the Lord, but will also raise us up through His power. Do you not know that your bodies are members of Christ? Shall I then take away the members of Christ and make them members of a prostitute? May it never be! Or do you not know that the one who joins himself to a prostitute is one body with her? For He says, “THE TWO SHALL BECOME ONE FLESH.” But the one who joins himself to the Lord is one spirit with Him. Flee immorality. Every other sin that a man commits is outside the body, but the immoral man sins against his own body.” (1 Corinthians 6:13-18, NASB)

The result of adultery is sex frustration and a frantic scramble for sexual experience. This can cause nymphomania, frigidity, etc. However, the principle goes beyond adultery and into mental attitude sins.

Scar tissue on the soul leads to a frantic search for happiness in all of the details of life. For the believer minus Bible doctrine, the details of life compound their misery. There is no capacity for happiness of love apart from Bible doctrine in the soul. Therefore, believers with scar tissue are left with frustrated desires and insatiable lusts. Mental attitude sins continue to result in self-induced misery. Scar tissue is only removed by confession of known sins to God the Father followed by consistent intake and application of Bible doctrine and the buildup of the edification complex of the soul. Therefore, to remove scar tissue means a crash program of intake of Bible doctrine under the enabling power of the Holy Spirit.

David Teaching His Son Solomon about Adultery

David was teaching his son Solomon with a warning about the evils of an adulteress called “the foreigner” in Proverbs 7:1-5.

“My son, keep my words And treasure my commandments within you. Keep my commandments and live, And my teaching as the apple of your eye. Bind them on your fingers; Write them on the tablet of your heart. Say to wisdom, “You are my sister,” And call understanding your intimate friend; That they may keep you from an adulteress, From the foreigner who flatters with her words.” (Proverbs 7:1-5, NASB)

She was a married woman out on the street as a prostitute. Prov. 7:16-19.

““I have spread my couch with coverings, With colored linens of Egypt. “I have sprinkled my bed With myrrh, aloes and cinnamon. “Come, let us drink our fill of love until morning; Let us delight ourselves with caresses. “For my husband is not at home, He has gone on a long journey;” (Proverbs 7:16-19, NASB)

She used seductive and persuasive flattery to seduce and makes the prospect of sex very attractive. However, the end result of following her was destruction. Prov. 7:21-27. See category on Adultery.

“With her many persuasions she entices him; With her flattering lips she seduces him. Suddenly he follows her As an ox goes to the slaughter, Or as one in fetters to the discipline of a fool, Until an arrow pierces through his liver; As a bird hastens to the snare, So he does not know that it will cost him his life. Now therefore, my sons, listen to me, And pay attention to the words of my mouth. Do not let your heart turn aside to her ways, Do not stray into her paths. For many are the victims she has cast down, And numerous are all her slain. Her house is the way to Sheol, Descending to the chambers of death.” (Proverbs 7:21-27, NASB)

The Divine Solution For Marriage Failure

Married couples with difficult problems to deal with don’t need subjective and relative humanistic solutions that do not last. They need divine solutions. The Word of God provides permanent objective divine solutions to difficult marital problems. The married couple should focus on consistent daily intake and application of Bible doctrine.

Christian couples who fail to expose themselves to the teaching of Bible doctrine cannot resolve their marital problems. The secret to success in marriage is reaching maturity in the spiritual life and the renewed thinking that the filling of the Holy Spirit brings. Rom. 12:2.

The husband and the wife must each take responsibility for their own sins. One of the most important factors in marriage is use of 1 John 1:9. The more time logged in spirituality, the better off the marriage will be. Deut. 24:16.

“If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” (1 John 1:9, NASB)

“"Fathers shall not be put to death for their sons, nor shall sons be put to death for their fathers; everyone shall be put to death for his own sin.” (Deuteronomy 24:16, NASB)

The filling of the Holy Spirit and knowledge of Bible doctrine are essential for a good marriage. The grace apparatus for perception must function daily. One of the expressions of the filling of the Holy Spirit is the expression of love and companionship in the daily walk. The stability which is derived from the application of doctrine in the filling of the Holy Spirit in the marriage relationship, is the basis for a tremendous witness for the Lord Jesus Christ.

Wherever domestic tranquility exists, the unbeliever is quick to notice and it is often the springboard for the declaration of the Gospel. Conversely the declaration of the Gospel is neutralized by failure in this realm. Marital strife hinders prayer, which is one of the greatest responsibilities in the life of a believer. 1 Peter 3:7.

“You husbands in the same way, live with your wives in an understanding way, as with someone weaker, since she is a woman; and show her honor as a fellow heir of the grace of life, so that your prayers will not be hindered.” (1 Peter 3:7, NASB)