Strengths Based MarriageSample

To succeed in marriage you have to meet needs you don’t have. This requires a servant’s heart. The best marriages are two servants in love. The worst marriages are two selfish people in love.

Thousands of times in marriage your spouse will have a need that you don’t have. If you are only willing to meet a need in your spouse that you share, you are effectively rejecting the differences in your spouse and holding your marriage hostage to your desires. But understanding your spouse’s different needs is only the first step. It only makes a difference if you have a servant’s spirit and are willing to meet your spouse’s needs with a good attitude even though you don’t necessarily share the same need at the same time.

Some people have the mistaken notion that in some marriages, both the husband and wife share all the same needs at the same time. They operate under the misconception that if they marry their “soul mates,” then they don’t really have to work at the relationship. Everything moves effortlessly as they share their lives together in a constant flow of matching needs and easy passion.

If you believe any of that nonsense, then consider that bubble popped. A real marriage requires work and meeting needs in your spouse that you don’t have. Passion and intimacy flow out of the shared experience of sacrificially serving each other through good times and bad.