Marriage preparation (3):

‘A man and woman must learn to resolve their differences and recognize each other's needs and personality" (Dr. Gary Collins).

                While a single man and woman are dating each other, they do not know their differences or tend to close their eyes even though they know each other's differences.  However, after marriage, the differences they closed their eyes begin to surface as conflicts.  But the problem is that because they had not learned how to resolve their differences while they were dating, their point of view regarding their marriage conflicts due to their differences is bound to be negative.  In the end, the foundation of marriage begins to break down because they ignore or deny each other’s differences (Collins).  When the single man and woman prepare for marriage, they must naturally get to know each other’s differences.  Here, “naturally” means as they get to each other, I think they should train their hearts to accept each other’s differences.  They should never ignore or deny the differences between each other.  They should not just keep on closing their eyes on the differences between the two.  Rather, they should have honest and upright conversation regarding each other’s differences in order to build each other up.  When they learn such a conversation skill little by little while they are dating, they will be able to prevent and reduce conflicts caused by each other’s differences even after marriage.

After marriage, I began to see the difference with my wife positively.  When I was dating her, I could hardly see any difference between my wife and me.  Even if I saw the differences, I don’t think I took them seriously so I just passed over them.  However, after we got marry, I began to take our differences seriously because we were hurting each other when conflicts arose due to our differences.  In the midst of that, by God’s grace I (I am sure my wife too) began to see the positive side of our conflicts.  And that positive side is that I came to know my wife more.  In other words, through our differences, I became more aware of my wife’s needs and I began to recognize her personality more.  I began to think that marital conflicts are one of the best ways to get to know my wife in depth.  Of course, conflicts hurt each other’s heart.  But I think as much as we get hurts, conflicts can help us to become the wounded healers.  In other words, although we receive wounds from each other through conflicts, God uses those wounds to make us wounded healers.

                The single men and women who are dating must pursue God’s wisdom to resolve each other’s differences.  Of course, they must first seek God’s wisdom by faith in God.  And then with God’s given wisdom, they must study and learn their marital responsibilities.  They should read books on conflict resolution and apply in their lives.  Although they may make many mistakes in application, they must keep on learning to solve conflicts even through such mistakes.  In doing so, they will be able to develop their relationship into a harmonious one that meets each other's needs and grow into more mature relationship.