MY LENTEN EXPERIENCE (DAY 2): CARRYING A 'CROSS' IN MARRIAGE

Sorry guys for just posting this today. Believe you me (or is it believe me you?...oh! whatever!) when I say, "I was EXTREMELY FAGGED OUT YESTERDAY" or should I say "I was RAPED TIRED, from too much work.

Ok back to the matter, let me just go ahead and share what I learnt yesterday (and trust me when I say 'fasting' no easy but God dey sha)...

I learnt that "there is no true Christian without the 'Cross'! Just like you can't say as a wife, that you have a good marriage without having gone through problems, trials and tribulations. Passing through these trial period is a true test of a good marriage. So literally, you don't qualify if you guys haven't been to hell and back!

I also learnt that, one of the clearest symptom of 'abandonment' of the Cross is LUKEWARMNESS. Lukewarmness in everything such as in prayer, getting house chores done at the right time, etc. It's like a cancer that slowly eats us up, thereby destroying our relationship with God.

We married couples really shouldn't go a day without embracing daily crosses. We must and should make sacrifices for each other. Examples include:
- Not quitting the marriage because a spouse has a terminal illness
- Sticking to each other in a childless marriage and not blaming each other.
- Quit trying to change an 'untidy' spouse and just do the tidying up yourself.
- Husbands being a 'manny' just for once in their miserable life!
- Wives staying up a bit late for husbands that like to come home late.
- Spouses paying each other compliments even if it kills you!
- Taking turns in doing school runs.
- Husbands cooking and serving breakfast in bed to their wives (please not the cursed and probably-dead-already girlfriends!)
- Husbands mopping, cleaning, sweeping, doing laundry...ok. I better stop now, getting carried away with my imaginations!
...but you get the drift sha!

When we abandon our marriage/homes in God's hands, He frequently permits us to taste sorrow, loneliness, opposition, slander, defamation and ridicule, inwards and outwards, just to mould us into His own image and likeness.

For every disappointment we get from husbands or kids, we should learn to accept the situation and then offer it up to God without complaining. A lot of wives have lost out in the experience of joy, because they simply abandoned their 'cross'. Not accepting your cross will bring you nothing but pain.

Therefore, let us please, please, please, learn to embrace our 'cross' with courage, asking our Lord to help us every step of the way, and I can assure you of a great end result. (Everyone knows, it's normal human nature to avoid anything that demands effort)

*So, my 'Cross', where art thou?...I so badly need you...to love and to cherish!*