The current sermon series “Marriage is a Team Sport” uses team sports as an analogy to help us understand how to have a great marriage. When the team wins, all the players on the team win. When the team loses, all the players on the team lose. It’s the same with marriage. Our marriage coach is God and His philosophy “we” takes precedence over “me.” We’ve already talked about the importance of having a great offense…how to bless and make your marriage better. Yesterday we discussed the importance of playing good defense…protecting your marriage from opponents or enemies that could destroy it. We looked at some boundaries that will protect your marriage from the most dangerous enemy of all…sexual attraction to someone other than your spouse. You can listen to the sermon on our church web site or app.
During the sermon I mentioned that our marriages have more enemies than I could possibly address in one sermon, so I would blog each day this week about some common enemies and strategies for defeating them. I encourage you to check this blog each day and allow God to use it to bless your marriage.
Today I want to briefly discuss the enemy of busy schedules. While all of us face this enemy at some point in our marriage, it is more common when raising our kids. Added to the demands of parenthood is the likelihood that we’re also trying to advance our career. That can be a tough combination for a marriage.
The situation is made worse when we don’t take care of ourselves physically or spiritually. Stress builds and fun evaporates. Couples who spent “all” their time together in the past suddenly are faced with “no” time for “we.” Romance wanes and conflict grows. Little things pile up and the love bank can spring a leak.
So how do you deal with it? Here are some suggestions for your consideration.
- Remember that raising your children is a season that doesn’t last forever. Also remember that if you’re like most couples, you chose to have kids. In other words, you chose to make your life more complicated. Kids are a blessing, but they also are a big responsibility. Since you chose it, you must own your responsibility for working together as a couple to get through it “together” and come out on the other side as a couple still deeply in love.
- You must work together as a team to coordinate and cover all the responsibilities in your life, or you’ll find yourselves fighting and assigning blame.
- Have a schedule for yourselves and the children. Then stick to it. Raising kids is not the ideal time to just go with the flow. You and they need adequate sleep.
- Schedule couple time. You must maintain emotional connection or intimacy, or the family as a whole will become unstable. Remember that a great marriage is a great gift parents can give their children.
- Say “no” so you can say “yes” to more important things. It may mean saying “no” to some good things you’d like to do. It may mean saying “no” to some activities your kids want to join. Children don’t have to do everything “other” kids are doing. Having the courage and wisdom to say “no” is critical to surviving the busy times in life.
I recognize that what we say “no” to is subjective for each family. I also realize that specific actions that work for one couple may not be perfect for another couple. We’re all different with different interests and personalities. Yet the principle of saying “no” applies to all of us, as does the need for all couples to work together to develop a plan for their marriage and family.
Here are some things Monieca and I did while raising our kids so we could maintain the “we” in our relationship as husband and wife:
- We put the kids to bed at a set time each night and it wasn’t late.
- We taught them that our bedroom was our private space and they were to respect it.
- Each of our children had their own bedroom and slept in them. Yes, we sometimes had Saturday morning play time and looked after them when they were sick or afraid. But our bedroom was for us.
- We dated. We went to movies, dinner, etc alone. Yes, we hired baby sitters and it was worth every dollar.
- We allowed other couples to keep our children overnight, even when they were very young. It was great for us and our kids were not afraid to be away from us.
- We occasionally spent a night in a motel while someone else watched the kids for us. Again, it was worth every dollar.
- We took one vacation a year without the kids. Our parents and siblings in KY kept our kids every summer for one to three weeks so we could have couple time. It was like an annual honeymoon. Those times in KY are now favorite memories of our adult children.
- We used a calendar. Yes it included the kid’s activities, but it also included our “couple time” dates and plans. We learned that if we didn’t plan it, it wouldn’t happen.
The bottom line is that no matter how busy you are, you need to slow down long enough to design a plan for dealing with it.
You may have other suggestions that could help another couple. Take a moment and share it with us in the comment section below.
Pastor Steve Hogg
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