Do I need to fight or pray?

Most of us have dreamed to have a perfect life when we were little kids. We loved those movies which ended with a scene where the groom kisses the beautiful bride and the end of the movie be announced with: “And they lived happily ever after” statement.

Well, we now know very well that there is no “lived happily ever after” kind of life or marriage. After we get married, we fight because we come very close to each other.

And as we come close to each other, we find out that we are after all different people with different choices and preferences. And most of the time, these differences can be sources of our fights and conflicts in our marriages.

But are all our disagreements and differences are worth fighting for?

I don’t think so. You see, most of the time, we fight to satisfy our selfish and sinful desires and cravings. We strike a fight because we want to make sure that our voices are heard; or we want to win the argument regardless of the cost; or we are just blinded by the worldly thinking which hides the truth from us.

In my own marriage, God so repeatedly convicted me of my deep seated sin that I learn to turn to Him in prayer before I open my “big mouth”. I go to Him first and most of the time, God points out of my problems right on. Yeah, God is not scared of telling us the truth.

I find “running to my prayer closet” to be the way to save me from MYSELF.

In the past, I can’t tell you how many times I marched against the plan and purpose of God, just because I wanted my way.

I now learned to run to Him who can only save me from “MY WAY”.

After finding myself, many times than I want to admit, to be the core source of “not good” fights, I learn to say to my husband things like: “My Love, maybe you’re right on this. Maybe I’m tripping here.”

Yes, “God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble.” (James 4:6).

If we tend to turn to God so that He will search our inner motives and desires before we strike a fight with our spouses (or anyone) or before we point our fingers at our spouses, we can eliminate lots of fights and quarrels which most of the time have a potential to destroy our homes, marriages and families (relations with others).

Let me leave you with the following Bible verse; the one the Holy Spirit always brings up to my attention to convict me of my own sins: “What causes fights and quarrels among you? Don’t they come from your desires that battle within you?” James 4:1 ///