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    Prior to Tying the Knot: Christian Marriage Essentials
    Prior to Tying the Knot: Christian Marriage Essentials
    Prior to Tying the Knot: Christian Marriage Essentials
    Ebook105 pages1 hour

    Prior to Tying the Knot: Christian Marriage Essentials

    By Saundra L. Washington D.D.

    ()

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    About this ebook

    The important purpose of this marriage preparation e-Book is to help you assess your personal readiness for marriage and to increase your repertoire of tools necessary to grow and maintain a healthy, loving, spiritually satisfying marriage. I will guide you through serious issues to consider about your relationship and alert you to those vital areas that you need to explore with your intended “prior to tying the knot.” Planning for your wedding is a wonderful and exciting adventure. But, it is not nearly as important as planning for your marriage life.

    In the society in which we live, it is paramount that couples learn as much about each other as possible before tying that “until death do us part” knot. With divorce rates escalating each year, it seems, couples need every advantage to succeed in today’s marriages. Thus, this marriage preparation guide functions as a booster shot that will boost your capacity to predict and handle potential difficulties and to accentuate awareness of the inevitable challenges of a committed relationship.

    This e-Book further seeks to help prepare you to enter into a long term relationship based upon sacrificial love for one another, and to place the needs of your beloved before the needs of self. The Christian couple is encouraged to invite Jesus Christ to be the third cord in the marital relationship: “Though one may be overpowered, two can defend themselves. A cord of three strands is not quickly broken.” Ecclesiastes 4:12.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherSaundra L. Washington D.D.
    Release dateMar 10, 2011
    ISBN9781458079909
    Prior to Tying the Knot: Christian Marriage Essentials
    Author

    Saundra L. Washington D.D.

    Greetings in the name of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ,Christian writing in particular is an expression of my passion to educate and inspire the body of Christ. I enjoy writing (and reading) and perhaps the clue that it was to play a vital role in my future can be traced to my love of writing as a child. Actually, it was not writing but scribbling (smile). I would scribble pages and pages and go show my masterpieces to my mother for her critique. She always complimented me on how wonderful my stories were and had me interpret the meaning from time to time. But, to be honest, I never contemplated writing beyond those childhood illusions and fantasies. God does indeed work His will into the lives of those committed to Him.So now, decades later, semi-retired from pastoral responsibilities, I felt the Holy Spirit's urging to write what I otherwise would probably be orally teaching or preaching.I believe you will find my eBooks interesting, spiritually strengthening, educative, informative, motivating and encouraging as you grow in your spiritual walk.You are encouraged to view samples from each eBook to get a “feel” for content.God bless you and thank you for surveying my eBooks and perusing this profile.All glory to God!

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      Book preview

      Prior to Tying the Knot - Saundra L. Washington D.D.

      PRIOR TO TYING THE KNOT

      Christian Marriage Essentials

      By

      Saundra L. Washington D.D.

      Smashwords Edition

      * * * * *

      PUBLISHED BY

      © 2011 Saundra L. Washington on Smashwords

      * * * * *

      Smashwords Edition, License Notes

      This eBook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This eBook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person you share it with. If you are reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

      Scripture taken from the HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 Biblica. Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved. The NIV and New International Version trademarks are registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office by Biblica. Use of either trademark requires the permission of Biblica. The King James Version (KJV) is in U.S. public domain.

      Disclaimer:

      Though this e-Book is neither a prescription for perfect harmony nor an assurance that your marriage will ultimately be successful; it does nevertheless, offer valid considerations for increasing a more positive marriage outcome.

      * * * * *

      Acknowledgement

      To the glory of God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit!

      * * * * *

      Dedication

      To all couples committed to a life together that pleases the Lord.

      * * * * *

      A Word from the Lord

      ‘For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh.’ So they are no longer two, but one. Therefore what God has joined together, let man not separate. Mark 10:7-8.

      * * * * *

      Table of Contents

      Preface

      Introduction: What’s Love Got to Do with It?

      Part I - Understanding the Complexities of Self

      Part II - The MUST Know Essentials

      Essential 1: Finances

      Essential 2: Values

      Essential 3: Commitment

      Essential 4: Family and Friends

      Essential 5: Dealing with Conflict

      Essential 6: Temperament

      Essential 7: Sexual Communications

      Part III - Relationship Essentials

      Essential 1: Trust

      Essential 2: Forgiveness

      Essential 3: Love

      Part IV - Communications Essentials

      Essential 1: Understanding Perception

      Essential 2: Real Listening

      Essential 3: I versus You Messages

      Essential 4: Recognizing Marriage Behavior

      Essential 5: Embrace Humor

      Essential 6: Soul Care

      Essential 7: The Reality Check

      CONCLUSION: Parable of Froggy

      * * * * *

      Preface

      Is it possible for your future marriage to be the best that God intends? Of course only you and your fiancé can know for sure because it requires devotion and many disciplines. But perhaps, more than anything else it requires companionship: the companionship of two personalities each developing to its fullest and giving and receiving the utmost that both can share. When marriage does not have that mutuality, it fails to reach its highest possibility.

      "It is not good that man should be alone." That is true in the much larger context than just the physical. The true marriage, the marriage on which Christian blessings may rest, is a marriage between a man and woman who bring their different gifts in equal honor and in equal exercise. Indeed, there can be a partnership not only in the body, but of two minds furnished with spiritual thoughts and of two spirits who both know something of the reality of married life to which you must soon adjust.

      Geoffrey Anketell Studdert Kennedy, MC, an Anglican priest and poet, wrote a book entitled The Warrior, the Woman and Christ. In it he said this:

      "Love is the joyous conflict of two or more free self-conscious persons who rejoice in one another’s individuality and… through the clash of mind on mind and will on will work out an ever increasing but never finally completed unity...And the primary school of this vital and vitalizing love is the home."

      Yet, the home as such will not produce and keep that unity. It must be a home which is held together by something larger than itself. The presence of God must permeate your home for it is His power that will hold and keep husband and wife, parents and children harmoniously together.

      Many homes that started with romance has ended in recriminations and unhappiness because neither husband nor wife had a loyalty higher and more controlling that his or her own desires. But if you both look up to almighty God, your affections are purified and selfishness is transcended in devotion and love that endures.

      The important purpose of this marriage preparation e-Book is to help you assess your personal readiness for marriage and to increase your repertoire of tools necessary to grow and maintain a healthy, loving, spiritually satisfying marriage. I will guide you through serious issues to consider about your relationship and alert you to those vital areas that you need to explore with your intended prior to tying the knot. Planning for your wedding is a wonderful and exciting adventure. But, it is not nearly as important as planning for your marriage life.

      Marriage preparation involves commitment by you and your fiancé to spiritual and relational disciplines and interpersonal skills as well as honoring God in all you do.

      I adhere to the belief that even though marriage is a contract that is legally binding; for believers it is more than a piece of paper. It is a sacred covenant that is spiritually and morally binding. To be married a man and a woman are pledging their love and commitment to each other before God and are joined together in a lasting bond that is intended to last all their days. This is the sacrament of marriage.

      In the society in which we live, it is paramount that couples learn as much about each other as possible before tying that until death do us part knot. With divorce rates escalating each year, it seems, couples need every advantage to succeed in today’s marriages. Thus, this marriage preparation guide functions as a booster shot that will boost your capacity to predict and handle potential difficulties and to accentuate awareness of the inevitable challenges of a committed relationship.

      This e-Book further seeks to help prepare you to enter into a long term relationship based upon sacrificial love for one another, and to place the needs of your beloved before the needs of self. The Christian couple is encouraged to invite Jesus Christ to be not only a personal Savior, but also the third cord in the marital relationship: Though one may be overpowered, two can defend themselves. A cord of three strands is not quickly broken. Ecclesiastes 4:12.

      * * * * *

      "When two people become one flesh by way of marriage, it is not only their hearts that are united, but their minds and souls as well." ~ Julie Donner Andersen

      * * * * *

      Introduction: What’s Love Got to

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