Thread: for lack of a better term: "arranged marriages"
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for lack of a better term: "arranged marriages"
Posted : 5 Jan, 2011 09:22 AM
Ok I didn't want to hijack one of the threads in the moral standards category, so I am starting a new one. Cobbler made a good point about people just being honest and wanting to get married and that is what they are persuing.
I have thought about I Cor 7:9 before.
but if they cannot exercise self-control, let them marry. For it is better to marry than to burn with passion.
What interest me is "let them marry". It is just being matter of fact. Just go find a wife. It doesn't have the US model of marrying for love (how far has that got us with a 50% divorce rate?). Hey you want a US husband, I want a wife. Ok, lets make an arrangement. Here are some agreed about grounds. We can both live with those agreements? Ok, lets get married. We will both commit to working at it and making it work.
Laying aside the whole trust issue for a moment (is she lying just to get here and then will abandon the marriage), what would be wrong with that? I'm with Cobbler, if I could get past that trust issue, I may very well be up for it. Your thoughts?
wow, Shawn, bold question! Hoping for Lots of discussion.
In the meantime, a true story:
My son was ~just a "kid" at left home to become a Marine. He did well and first in his class a became a sniper. (he was saved at 12yrs btw)
When asked how he was really doing during a phone call while still in boot camp, the answer I got was:
"Ma...I am the only one of 75 men who doesn't drink and sleep around and now they all know it, how do you THINK I AM?!?! I can laugh now, but I could Feel that kids emotions!
And Praise God for his testimony. Anyway, two tours in Iraq. One early visit home was becasue he took gunfire at close range.(he was point man) His men thought he was dead and proceeded to take the enemy and killing the man who shot my son w/ his own knife, they brought the knife back to my son's body. Another testimony as he later told them God must not be done w/ him...only a bullet to the thigh, missing the bone, and losing his thumb! the bullet that knocked him down was stopped by his ammo thing on his jacket (sorry guys, don't know the terms). SOOO, the story goes:
Ma, you need to find me a wife when I come home.
"ugh, yeah, hon, sure" . I Had been praying, but this was a bit a pressure!
I found her at church. She lived in another town, but worked near me, but renting a room for the wk working close and then going home on wkends.
I brought her to my farm (he wasn't back yet). Couldn't believe how she just 'fit'. Invited her to 4th of July when he got back. they went out the next night. They actually kinda interrogated each other~down to what kind of pizza they liked, how many kids, etc. etc. They married the following June. They compromised on the pizza ingredients.
God answers prayer~and He likes to answer when we are obedient.
Chevy, just to clarify, I do mean chose your own wife, but more of a pragmatic almost business relationship. Here in the US, we have this notion/model for marriage that we find a partner and fall madly in love THEN get married. What if we just found some one who want to be married and so lay out some terms, and get married, THEN fall in love or at least be glad to be around each other. Again this is in the context of the verse from 1 Cor.
Though I would be open to someone fixing me up like in Sheperdess story.
That is a really amazing story shepardess. Thanks for sharing.
I say it's all comes down to one thing and one thing only: Commitment. And I think we overcomplicate things to avoid accepting responsibility. It's really not that hard to love somebody.
Shawn, I want to start off by saying that I am not necessarily picking on you, you are just one of many that misinterpret what I say. No hard feelings.
When I said why can�t people just be honest with each other and say that they are pursuing the possibility of marriage, I wasn�t thinking of a self-arranged marriage. I see and hear so many times where women date a guy who has no intentions of ever marrying, but they lead the woman on and end up breaking her heart. All I am trying to say is that I am not one of those guys, my intentions are purely honorable. I am in no way trying to obligate anyone in to a commitment to marry, the only commitment I want is to be open and honest with each other and not to play games. The only time I will obligate a woman to a marriage is when I stand before God, the minister, and my family and make a pledge of matrimony to my intended wife, and she pledges her commitment to me. But it doesn�t matter what I say, it always gets twisted into something ugly. You can�t start a relationship with the truth, you have to start it with the lie of �just wanting to be friends�, and I don�t know how to perpetrate that lie.
All I ever want is to do the right thing, but it always comes out as being wrong. Even if I do the right thing, I am accused to doing it for the wrong motivations.
Now, onto the subject at hand:
I believe that if two people follow the principles in the Bible then they can be happily married and truly love each other. If you listen to people who have been happily married for 15, 20, 30 years or more they will usually tell you that when they first got married they thought that they truly loved each other. But, over the years they learned that what they had was not real love at all, but simply an infatuation. Real love takes a lot of time and effort. Real love requires an intimate relationship where the couple works through the difficult times together. That can only come in a marriage relationship.
That is why for me I think that a self-arranged marriage will work as long as both are committed to learning to love each other. I wish I could find a wife that way, but instead I have to play head games.
I find dating to be so hard because you have to be very careful about what questions you ask and when. It�s not that you ask the wrong questions, it�s that you asked them at the wrong time, and people will misinterpret it as desperation. What is so wrong about discussing certain topics early on. Why wait to get involved with someone before finding out. But if you start off as �just friends� you can�t ask those questions, because that would imply that you want to be more than just friends. You can�t speak freely, you can�t be open and honest.
Shepherdess: I am a bit of a fan of military history, and it was great to hear of your son�s experience in Iraq. It is a blessing that God brought him home to you (mostly intact). What you did for your son was a great thing. One of the most critical decisions you make in your life, besides accepting Jesus Christ as you savior, is to marry. Bringing him and his wife together was one of the most important things you could have done for him.
It really isn�t that hard to bring people together. I don�t understand why people make it sound so difficult, I have helped bring two couples together myself. It really is a lot like internet dating, you simply find out what the person likes and you try and find someone with those traits. People just over complicate things.
I have asked for help, but my family and friends all have blinders on. For the last 20 years they have never met a single woman who could possibly be my wife. Nobody knows anybody. I have even been told that they are not willing to help me because they are embarrassed of me.
I have asked for help, but my family and friends all have blinders on. For the last 20 years they have never met a single woman who could possibly be my wife. Nobody knows anybody. I have even been told that they are not willing to help me because they are embarrassed of me. "
Cobbler they are CRAZY. Are they believers? Because to profess Christ and not believe he can do ANYthing is totally hypocritical. If this is the case, you might want to thank God for the protection of a potential mate they WOULD have suggested!
From the comments from you on the forum, I wanted to know if you had an older, available brother!! (now, not so much, he is probably not like you!)
Be strong and of good courage! Our God is in control :applause:
Actually my family are all Christians. They just all believe that God will bring her to me when he feels that I am finally ready to be married. The fact that I have difficulties finding someone is proof in their eyes that there is something spiritually wrong with me, and therefore they don�t think I am good enough to introduce me to someone. Nice circular logic. The only way I can prove to them that I can be a good husband is if I can find a wife on my own.
I do have an older brother, but he is only three years older and has been married for about 19 years.
I've started telling my friends, "If you meet someone who could be my future husband, please introduce us!" I don't meet guys my age at work or church, so my friends are probably the only other option. (Online hasn't worked out so great either.) I'm one of those people who believes that if a guy and girl really like and respect each other, have some similar interests or at least are compatible in some areas, and are willing to work at it, a marriage between the two will work. I'm not saying that an arranged marriage between two strangers is the way it should be done. I just agree with Cobbler that many people think they are in love, but find out later that it was only infatuation...after working on a marriage for a couple decades, they realized that they finally are really, truly, completely in love with each other.
I also run into the problem of guys getting scared off when they find out that I'm not into dating for the fun of it. I'm ultimately looking for a husband, and that seems to really bother/scare them. I don't see what the big deal is, personally. It's not like I'm asking them to commit to marriage before we go on the first date! I just want to have something more concrete in mind than "someone fun to do things with on the weekends." Even if we date for a while and realize that we aren't meant to get married, that's fine...but I wouldn't want to keep dating at that point.
