ACCORDING TO A SURVEY BY THE DIVORCE LAWYERS ASSOCIATION IN AMERICA, 73% OF DIVORCES ARE BECAUSE OF LACK OF COMMITMENT.

8 OF THE NINE RICHEST MEN IN THE WORLD ARE DIVORCED. THAT SHOWS YOU MONEY IS NOT EVERYTHING. YOU CAN HAVE MONEY AND STILL LOSE YOUR HOME.

MARRIAGE WAS GOD’S STRATEGY TO SHAPE THIS WORLD; NOT SCHOOL; NOT EDUCATION NOT EVEN CHURCH. THE CHURCH WAS A BACKUP PLAN WHEN THE FAMILY FAILED. THE WORK PASTORS ARE DOING IS THE WORK PARENTS DIDN’T DO.

YOU DON’T COME THE WAY YOU ARE INTO MARRIAGE; YOU BECOME THE WAY YOU NEED TO BE IN MARRIAGE. THE REASON MANY MARRIAGES ARE STRUGGLING IS THAT MANY PEOPLE WANT TO BE WHO THEY ARE.

A WOMAN’S NUMBER ONE NEED IS TO BE TAKEN CARE OF. THE LOVE MEN NEED IS FRIENDSHIP LOVE.

SERVING IN CHURCH AND SERVING WELL IS ONE OF THE BEST WAYS TO PREPARE FOR MARRIAGE.

Some people are successful in their profession but fail in their marriage because like the medical doctor, he spent 7 years studying medicine while zero years were spent on marriage. Where you invest is where you harvest.

The average person hasn’t put in the investment for a successful marriage. Everybody has a hope that his or her marriage will work but they don’t put in the work that will make the marriage work. People come into the marriage scene with high expectations but with low preparation.
Marriage is one of those things that will impact your life than anything else. It has the potential of multiplying your success or canceling your dreams. If God felt education would change the world he would have made Adam a principal of a school. Instead, he made him a husband and a father. If God felt the church would change the world he would have made Adam a pastor or a bishop. Instead, he made him a husband and a father.

That shows how much faith God has in marriage. Marriage was God’s strategy to shape this world; not school; not education not even church. The church was a backup plan when the family failed.
I am a pastor so I thought the church would come first. But God says No, marriage comes first. Covid 19 shut down everything even church. The only thing that didn’t shut down was family. Family always comes first. The criteria for being a pastor is to have a good home running. The work pastors are doing is the work parents didn’t do. Pastors are a backup plan. In God’s mind, evangelism should start from the home. I am only evangelizing people that their parents didn’t evangelize.

Someone spoke to me yesterday and said, Pastor, I am in my thirties but I don’t have any man. I don’t have any relationship. I said, “How many books have you read on marriage?” It is good to desire marriage but it is better to prepare for it.

Many people want to marry because of social pressure and because many people are marrying. People suffer in marriage because they entered thinking “somebody is going to serve me the rest of my life”.
Statistics show that 50% of marriages end in divorce. And the worse thing is that a large number of the 50% that remain are not doing what marriage actually is. So when we look at it technically, it is about 20%-25% of people that have something close to the real picture of marriage.

The reason for failed marriages is high expectations but low preparations. Many people spend money on attracting a man or woman but they don’t spend money keeping a man or woman. Your shape can attract him but it takes being sharp to keep him. People are spending millions on surgery. You may have a waist trainer but do you have a brain trainer?

As a man, you must talk to your wife. If you don’t talk to her willfully, you will talk to her forcefully. If you don’t talk to her, she will find something to talk to you about
and you might not like it.
Women don’t use words to communicate facts. They use words to communicate their feelings. Unfortunately, men use words to communicate facts so this is why the argument of a man and a woman never ends well because they are not even arguing about the same thing.

There are four D’s if you are going to communicate to women well.

1. Don’t disagree – Because if a woman is arguing based on how she feels, you can’t disagree with her feelings. She is the one feeling the feeling and you can’t disagree with her. The feeling might not be right but the feeling is real.
2. Don’t defend – There is no need to defend yourself as a man. You can never win.
3. Don’t debate – Because it is not the same topic two of you are discussing.
4. Don’t dismiss – A woman will feel better if she feels heard even if you don’t resolve the matter.
   If the woman feels listened to, you have already solved 50% of the problem.

Men like money and are generally disinterested in the topic of relationships. One of the things that will affect your joy most in life is marriage, not money. Most men don’t even know why they are making the money. If you lose your family because of money, you have missed the whole point of making the money. 8 of the nine richest men in the world are divorced. That shows you money is not everything. You can have money and still lose your home.

If you are a woman, time is sensitive to you. The timing of a woman is not the same as a man. A man can marry at 52 and start having children immediately. A woman can’t play around at 52. By the time a man is 40, his options of whom to marry are increasing. By the time you are 40 as a woman the options of whom to marry are reducing.

When a man is 40, he can marry anybody from 40 and downwards. The options have increased. He has a larger pool to pick from. From 30 years as a woman you usually can marry men from 30 years and above. When you are 40 years, the men you can usually marry are those from 40 years and above. Your options as a woman are reducing so let no joker waste your time.

Marriages don’t fail in marriage. Marriages fail before the marriage starts. And that’s why you have to look at how ready or prepared you are for this journey called marriage. What is your marital threshold?
Marital thresholds are things you have to have if you want to enjoy marriage.

1. WHAT IS YOUR SELFLESSNESS THRESHOLD?
   How selfless are you? Marriage is not for selfish people. Selfish people will struggle in marriage because they expect everything else their partners will do for them without thinking about what they will give to their partners. Most humans are born with a selfish streak. Church Gist. It takes the Spirit of God and experiences to help you become more selfless. How okay are you with doing things that you won’t get anything from? Do you look out for what it is in it for you before doing things?
   You only think about me, myself, and I. You get home and you think about what only you will eat among your siblings, you are likely to get issues in marriage. Start practicing now thinking about others.
2. HOW FLEXIBLE ARE YOU?
   “This is who I am” people will suffer in marriage because another word for marriage is adapting and adjusting. You don’t come the way you are into marriage; you become the way you need to be in marriage. The reason many marriages are struggling is that many people want to be who they are.
   Once you are single you can do whatever you like. When you marry, you must consider other human beings. It is easier to be happy when you are single than when you are married. Once you marry, never say never; in marriage, you have to try.

There is no scriptural ground for divorce in the eyes of God. Nothing is too strong a reason. Even in the instance where the unbelieving partner departs, God allows it because the person is already gone. That is when the person wants to go and has gone. Every other thing, God wants to do what He will do. And do you know what God does? Everything you want to claim that your spouse has done to you, you have done to God and He forgave you.
Some say, “He neglected me for two weeks”. But there are times you don’t even pray to God for a whole year. There are times you don’t read your Bible but God is still there.

Others too say, “He cheated on me”. But you know you commit adultery against God all the time because you worship other gods. You trusted in other men. Every time you leave your first love –God and go and love another, it is adultery. But God is still here.
Marriage is a covenant. This is why you can’t jump into it anyhow. The scripture people quote to support divorce was what Jesus gave about adultery. But Jesus was answering a question and He mentioned that “in the beginning, it was not so”. That license of divorce was given because of the hardness of men’s hearts. And it was Moses who issued that and not God who started it. So in the eyes of God, there is no justifiable reason for divorce.

The only law that comes above the law of scripture is the law of life because God created life before He created scripture. It is because we have life we can have scripture. So anytime life is being threatened, it overrides scripture. For instance; “Thou shall not kill” is only on the platform that you are not trying to kill me. If you are trying to kill me, then thou shall kill.

So if somebody is putting your life under threat, you can first escape.
The law of free will is part of the law of life. When we were coming to this world, what everybody was given was free will. You can do everything you want to do. So if your unbelieving partner wants to depart, then you are free to divorce because the departing partners are operating their choice based on the law of life. Other than that, nothing else is valid for divorce in the eyes of God.

3. COMMITMENT THRESHOLD – HOW COMMITTED ARE YOU?
   Marriage is for committed because many times you won’t feel like it; many times you won’t be in the mood. Nobody is in the mood all the time. Church Gist. It is your commitment that matters. Don’t marry a quitter. The Divorce Lawyers Association in America did a survey. They said the number reason people divorce is a lack of commitment, and that takes 73%; abuse- 25%; lack preparation for marriage – 41%; lack of equality in marriage – 44%; unrealistic expectations – 45%; marry too young – 48%; infidelity – 55%; argue too much – 56%. The number one is lack of commitment and it is 73%. And Jesus confirmed that same thing when he said – because of the hardness of your hearts. So it is not your inability, it is your unwillingness.
4. WHAT IS YOUR FORGIVENESS THRESHOLD?
   It is difficult to be with someone and you people will not step on each other’s toes or offend each other. It is normal. Forgiveness is what makes a marriage work and not that we don’t offend each other. People hear me say that my wife and I don’t quarrel. It doesn’t mean we don’t offend each other. We have decided not to turn out disagreements into quarrels.
   What you do when you feel offended is what makes a marriage work or not work. Forgiveness is not a feeling; it is a decision. Forgiveness doesn’t mean you forget. You don’t get Amnesia because you forgive somebody. Church Gist. Forgiveness is not because the person deserves forgiveness. Forgiveness is because you deserve compensation. If you are holding a grudge, you don’t deserve what God wants to give you because you are already holding something. God wants to compensate for those who hurt you but when you don’t let go, there is no hand to receive.
5. WHAT IS YOUR TOLERANCE THRESHOLD?
   People who say, “I can’t live with anybody. I can’t stand anybody in my space” should forget marriage and be like Apostle Paul, or else they will have trouble in the flesh.
6. WHAT IS YOUR SERVICE THRESHOLD?
   How great are you at service? If you are here and you are not serving in the church you are in, you are missing a great opportunity to prepare for marriage. In marriage serving another person is what we do; not receiving service but giving service. One of the reasons marriage is working for me is because I have been serving people all my life so serving one person is a small-do. Church Gist. Serving in church and serving well is one of the best ways to prepare for marriage.
   I remember I was a very bad sinner when I was an unbeliever so when I became born again I said I must serve Jesus with all my heart. I used to be a very bad boy; Indian hemp smoking; prostitute carrying; pistol carrying from secondary school; stealing. So when I gave my life to Christ I said the way I served Satan I will double it for God. So I volunteered myself for everything that need to be done in church.
7. WHAT IS YOUR PATIENCE THRESHOLD?
   How patient are you? It will take a process and time for your spouse to become the perfect spouse. The problem we have is that we are marrying people that are raw materials and we think they are finished products. It takes a while for a man to mature emotionally. Women mature emotionally faster. And these are scientifically proven. Church Gist. A woman’s number one need is to be taken care of. They want that father-daughter love. The reason men don’t give that love is that men don’t need that love. The love men need is friendship love. Men don’t need face-to-face love. They need side-by-side love; shoulder-to-shoulder love. Women on the other hand like face-to-face love.
   And that’s what Christ did for us and said husbands should love their wives and give themselves up for them”. You give up yourself; your natural inclination. Church Gist. Women like take-care-of-me love. So scientists found out that once you call a woman “baby”, it gets her emotions juggling. It is psychologically proven.
   Men need friendship love. So women should try letting their men talk to her without getting emotional; without making it about themselves.