August 18, 1998
Back in the 80's, a computer wasn’t considered one hundred percent compatible with IBM unless it could run Microsoft’s Flight Simulator. How technology has changed! Computer usage has become far too complex to evaluate with such a simple comparison.
Word usage changes too. “Compatible” once referred to human relationships. When a man and a woman considered themselves compatible, they got married. Today, lack of compatibility is still given as a reason for marital breakdown.
Like two computers, in a compatible relationship two people have similar dispositions or tastes. They get along because they think alike or have learned to understand one another. Sometimes they anticipate one another’s words and finish each other’s sentences.
What couple does not want to be compatible? While some might settle at both cheering for the same football team, wives and husbands want to be understood by a partner who shares their interests and ambitions, yet married couples know this takes effort.
Compatibility of interests is more apt to draw people together, and even without shared hobbies or interests, two people can cultivate at least one mutual interest. Understanding another person’s character and deepest desires takes more work.
If being happily compatible in marriage involves hard work, what about compatibility with God? Is it possible to be involved in a relationship with Him that includes sharing a similar disposition? Can we be interested in the same activities and goals as He is?
Many people try to enter a relationship with God on their terms, supposing He thinks like they do. In their minds, He will wink at their lifestyle, support their ambitions and help them reach their goals. However, we err if we think God’s character is like our own or that His plans and desires are like ours.
The first clue is that the Bible is clear on how to enter a relationship with God. It must be on His terms. Jesus said, “I am the way, the truth and the life; no one comes to the Father except through me.” The Apostle Peter adds, “Salvation is found in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given to men by which we must be saved.” God tells us how to know Him; we cannot decide this for ourselves.
Secondly, God does not think or act like we do. He says, “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways. . . .” Although we were made in His image, He is holy and we are not. Although He took on human flesh and became a man, those who observed Jesus said no man ever spoke or acted like He did. So how can we be compatible with God? We are not like Him in character or the way we behave.
Some say you simply do the things Jesus would do, imitating His actions. Some actions may make us give us an outward appearance of being like Him, but just as compatibility with your spouse involves far more than acting like them, so does being in harmony with God.
Our problem is with both “doing” and “being.” We have trouble doing godlike things because of who we are. It is a matter of the heart. To conform to His character or have the same interests as He does, we need to “be” like Him, think like He does. Who can say they know for sure the thoughts of God? Remember, God said His thoughts are not like ours.
Nearly every married person seeking compatibility has said silently or aloud, “I wish I could get into her (or his) heart—then I would know what she thinks and feels.” We might think if we could get into God’s heart, we would know Him, but we cannot do that.
However, God can get into our hearts, not to understand our thoughts and feelings because He already does, but so we can know His. Oddly enough, that is how to be compatible with God; we need to invite Him in.
Showing posts with label compatible. Show all posts
Showing posts with label compatible. Show all posts
Friday, June 30, 2017
Wednesday, January 18, 2017
Compatibility cannot happen without glue! .......... Parables 538
December 24, 1996 ?
These days, marriages are not expected to last. Maybe that is why the demise of Elizabeth Taylor’s eighth union was not a significant headline. What gave the story some attention was the unusual settlement demands. Her latest ex-partner, Larry Fortensky, asked the millionaire actress to increase his monthly pay of $5,000. He claimed this amount only covered “bare expenses.”
According to Taylor, she filed for divorce because of “irreconcilable differences.” This usually means neither one of them would bend. Personal likes and dislikes were more important to them as individuals with “rights” than was harmony in their marriage, so they ended the marriage.
Traditionally, insistence on one’s own way is considered a mark of immaturity. Fortensky at a mere 44 years old, and Taylor who is 63 prove that maturity is not something that comes with age. Neither have learned to make personal sacrifices to benefit a relationship. For them, it seems easier to find someone else with whom to be compatible.
However, after eight tries, Taylor should know by now that compatibility is not an accident or a discovery. It takes work. Besides, if another person totally agrees with everything we think, say and do, one of us is unnecessary. Compatibility is not the key to a happy marriage anyway. Genuine commitment has far more “glue.”
However, commitment is not easy either. It requires work and determination. Incompatibility will always rear its wedge-shaped head. It has been a problem from the beginning of marriage. Genesis says God made man and woman, both in His image. They were like God and they loved each other, just as God loved them. However, their relationship did not stay that way.
Along came the tempter in the form of a serpent. He deceived Eve and both she and Adam turned away from God and fell into sin. They immediately realized their guilt and hid from God. When He sought them out, He told them their sin would have consequences. One of these was to Eve; God said that, “Your desire will be for your husband, and he will rule over you” (Genesis 3:16)
This “curse” has been interpreted in various ways but because it has the same wording as something God says to Cain in the next chapter, the best meaning seems to be, “You will desire to rule your husband but he will rule over you.”
Remember, this is a consequence of sin and a curse, not the marital harmony God intended. Some people call it the battle of the sexes. Despite our attraction to each other, there is something about the marriage relationship that proves Genesis 3:16 is a reality and it is actually sin, not gender differences, that is behind “irreconcilable differences.”
Sin makes people want their own way. Sin makes people manipulate and dominate others. For some reason, sin makes us think that we must have our own way or we will not be happy. Therefore, husbands dominate wives and wives resist by trying to have their own way.
How can this battle come to an end? Some don’t bother trying; they just fight. Others agree to disagree pleasantly. Some call a truce “for the sake of the kids.” Others put on a happy face and cover up their war. Liz and Larry ended it by divorce. None of these are God’s way.
God brings peace by dealing with causes. If sin causes wars, then the remedy for the wars is His remedy for sin, His Son, Jesus Christ. The Bible says, “God made Him who had no sin (Jesus) to be sin for us, so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God.”
Liz and Larry could take their irreconcilable differences to the Cross and give them to Jesus. He takes sin on Himself and bears it for us (even though it killed Him) and is then able to give to us His righteousness, a new nature. With it comes “love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control”, the kind of stuff that makes marriages work.
These days, marriages are not expected to last. Maybe that is why the demise of Elizabeth Taylor’s eighth union was not a significant headline. What gave the story some attention was the unusual settlement demands. Her latest ex-partner, Larry Fortensky, asked the millionaire actress to increase his monthly pay of $5,000. He claimed this amount only covered “bare expenses.”
According to Taylor, she filed for divorce because of “irreconcilable differences.” This usually means neither one of them would bend. Personal likes and dislikes were more important to them as individuals with “rights” than was harmony in their marriage, so they ended the marriage.
Traditionally, insistence on one’s own way is considered a mark of immaturity. Fortensky at a mere 44 years old, and Taylor who is 63 prove that maturity is not something that comes with age. Neither have learned to make personal sacrifices to benefit a relationship. For them, it seems easier to find someone else with whom to be compatible.
However, after eight tries, Taylor should know by now that compatibility is not an accident or a discovery. It takes work. Besides, if another person totally agrees with everything we think, say and do, one of us is unnecessary. Compatibility is not the key to a happy marriage anyway. Genuine commitment has far more “glue.”
However, commitment is not easy either. It requires work and determination. Incompatibility will always rear its wedge-shaped head. It has been a problem from the beginning of marriage. Genesis says God made man and woman, both in His image. They were like God and they loved each other, just as God loved them. However, their relationship did not stay that way.
Along came the tempter in the form of a serpent. He deceived Eve and both she and Adam turned away from God and fell into sin. They immediately realized their guilt and hid from God. When He sought them out, He told them their sin would have consequences. One of these was to Eve; God said that, “Your desire will be for your husband, and he will rule over you” (Genesis 3:16)
This “curse” has been interpreted in various ways but because it has the same wording as something God says to Cain in the next chapter, the best meaning seems to be, “You will desire to rule your husband but he will rule over you.”
Remember, this is a consequence of sin and a curse, not the marital harmony God intended. Some people call it the battle of the sexes. Despite our attraction to each other, there is something about the marriage relationship that proves Genesis 3:16 is a reality and it is actually sin, not gender differences, that is behind “irreconcilable differences.”
Sin makes people want their own way. Sin makes people manipulate and dominate others. For some reason, sin makes us think that we must have our own way or we will not be happy. Therefore, husbands dominate wives and wives resist by trying to have their own way.
How can this battle come to an end? Some don’t bother trying; they just fight. Others agree to disagree pleasantly. Some call a truce “for the sake of the kids.” Others put on a happy face and cover up their war. Liz and Larry ended it by divorce. None of these are God’s way.
God brings peace by dealing with causes. If sin causes wars, then the remedy for the wars is His remedy for sin, His Son, Jesus Christ. The Bible says, “God made Him who had no sin (Jesus) to be sin for us, so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God.”
Liz and Larry could take their irreconcilable differences to the Cross and give them to Jesus. He takes sin on Himself and bears it for us (even though it killed Him) and is then able to give to us His righteousness, a new nature. With it comes “love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control”, the kind of stuff that makes marriages work.
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