MARRIAGE TIPS!

Young people, I want to share my heart with you this day. Please take time to understand me. I am not claiming to know more than you do, I just feel my thoughts will benefit you tonight. I know the society has not helped many of you. You have not been taught the right values from Day One and many of you have seen bad examples among the elderly enough to corrupt your thinking for a lifetime. Some of you have been taught that it is only the present that matters and that what is seen and immediately beneficial is more important than what is not seen now but holds a promise for the future. By this reverse thinking pattern, many have expended their energy in things that will not add lasting value and have spent their young lives pursuing shadows. They only discover the truth when it is much late. One of the issues on my mind is the attitude of many young people to the institution of marriage. It seems many of you do not realise how important your preparation for marriage is and thus give little attention to it. Many young people seem to confuse the one-day wedding ceremony with the life-long marriage life. Many go to great lengths to prepare for wedding days when they have not prepared at all for the marriage life. And so after much money is spent on a wedding ceremony, the married couple discover themselves to be strange bedfellows in the same house. Marriage now becomes like a besieged city... Those outside want to come in while those inside want to come out. Some now see the greatest emblem of love - the wedding ring - as the smallest handcuff ever made! God did not intend marriage to be so from the beginning. Some have made wrong choices in marriage because they set wrong parameters. They wanted their partners to be perfect while they never saw anything imperfect in their lives worth working on. Some chose to marry based on social status, while others consider economic and political connections. Still others make choices based on their academic attainments not knowing that the average person likes to use others for personal gain. Some others have been pushed into unfulfilling marriages because they were counting years while their years were not counting. They measured themselves by the calendars of others and once they think they are getting old, they become desperate to marry and in most cases, they do not have any joy more than the excitement of the wedding day. It is strange that people compare themselves to flowers that easily fade. Maybe tonight you are about getting married... It is possible you have concluded plans and you are about to sign the dotted lines and concede your independence and liberty to another. You feel you are late after-all all your classmates and age-mates are married. You have abandoned the person you began with because you met someone who appears to be ready to settle down while your old friend is still struggling to find his feet. I urge you to look at this issue critically and sincerely ask yourself how prepared you are for the marriage life. If you are in a courtship, will the "court" justify you or condemn you eventually? What is the endpoint of your relationship. Have you really examined yourself? Are you preparing only for the wedding ceremony that people will come for and leave after some hours? Or you are preparing to leave and cleave with your spouse for a lifetime? I hope the Lord will shed more light in your hearts... BERNARD OLUWAFEMI JEMILOHUN