The Career and Family Dichotomy

Listen to counsel…That you may be wise the rest of your days. (Proverbs 19:20)

My desk is stacked with trial exhibits and deposition transcripts when the phone rings. The caller identification reads HAINES, AMBER—my wife. Our youngest, Titus, has not been gaining weight for six months and even our pediatrician is desperate. I know why Amber is calling before I answer.

“They are admitting Titus to Arkansas Children’s Hospital,” she says.

“When?” I ask, hoping she would say later in the week.

“We need to leave in two hours.”

Today I’m writing about the career/family dichotomy for The High Calling. It’s a sticky wicket, I know, but I hope you’ll join me there for a conversation touching on marriage, family, and career. 

Image by Michael Heiss. Used with permission. Sourced via Flickr.

On Marriage (and Sexuality) – A New Survey

As you know, some time ago I posted this survey on marriage.  The questions were simple, relating mostly to the factors that coincided with the respondents perceived marital satisfaction. After receiving over 500 responses, predominantly from evangelical Christian women, I have to admit that I was surprised by the results.

For instance, we found that sexual and emotional affairs do not necessarily negatively impact marital satisfaction. In fact, marriages in which affairs have been confessed and grace has been extended seem to thrive, and the individuals in these marriages indicate a high level of marital satisfaction. It was a hopeful, astounding revelation and it proved what I conceptually knew–confession and grace pave the way for liberation.

But there were other surprising findings. For instance, couples indicating marital satisfaction of 4 or 5 (on a 5 point scale) did not note struggles with sexual intimacy. However, those indicating marital satisfaction of 3 or below overwhelmingly noted that sex posed a significant marital struggle.

It is nearly impossible to prove cause and effect, but when the majority of ”average” marriages struggle in the realm of sexuality, we think it’s time to examine the issue more carefully. Perhaps the sexual struggle is a simple issue–he’s overworked, tired, lacking in energy. Or perhaps the story is deeper–she struggles with over-sexualized image issues, past guilt, unconfessed shame and regret. Either way, it’s time to get to the root of these issues, to discover the core truths that create sexual barriers in marriage.

A few of us have formulated a completely anonymous survey dealing with marriage and sexuality. And here’s the deal–we’ve run this survey for a couple of days and already have a statistically significant sample size… of women.

Gents, can you help us out by taking this survey? (Feel free to pass it on to you other gent friends).

 [click here to take the survey]

And ladies, feel free to take it too.

Thank you so much. As you know, I’m in the middle of a bit of a blog break.  I’ll share the results when I come back in a couple of weeks.

Thanks.

New Marriage Survey – A Deeper Story

You may remember that I formulated a marriage survey a few weeks ago.  The results were very interesting to say the least.  You can read more about them today at Deeper Story, and while you are there you can take another survey.

Would  you join me at Deeper Story?

Marriage Letters – On Outside Influences

We continue our Marriage Letters  series. Today Amber and I write on the topic “On Outside Influence….”  Will you write your spouse today? Will you speak the truth?

***

One evening David got up from his bed and walked around on the roof
of the palace. From the roof he saw a woman bathing. The woman was
very beautiful, and David sent someone to find out about her. The
man said, “She is Bathsheba….” Then David sent messengers to get her.
~2 Samuel 11:2

Dear Amber,

I remember the look in your eyes when you told me you had discovered that outside influences were competing for my affections.  You sat on the edge of the bed, seething.  You were a woman on fire, a broken reed, scorched earth.  I remember that you told me, “never again,” then you stormed out, slamming the screen door behind you.

To date, it is still the worst day of my life.

It’s a brave new world with instant access, easy communication, microwaved gratification.  The images that objectify the fairer sex entangle the race of men until we are tripped and crushed by the weight of our flesh.  The devil has been dancing in the details of enticement since long before David and Bathsheba.  He knows our kind well, knows that a midnight stroll is always good bait.

We’ve battled through those dark days, the days when we were as likely to believe the sexy lies as we were the truth of the Spirit.  Now, we’re more more proactive–we have the same sleep schedules, practice openness and confession, erect walls against the influencers.  Pragmatic?  Maybe.  But when we crawl into bed at the end of every day, when I put my hand on your waist, you know I’m not on some rooftop stroll, and I know that your at peace.

I wish I could have learned these lessons an easier way.  I wish I would have been challenged in the pragmatic slogging out of the faith, of my roll as the gatekeeper of our home.  I wish I would have been warned against Princess Leia’s metal bikini when I was a kid, but I suppose that even in all of that there’s still grace.  There’s still sanctification.  And you love me still.

Help me tell this story, Amber.  Help me remind the young married couples at our church.  Help me remind our boys.  Help me remember because remembering is protection against the outside influence, the one that seeks to lead us to the killing fields in the moonlight.

Good night and good peace,

Seth

***

Please join Amber, Joy, Scott, and me as we celebrate the truth about marriage. Every Monday in April we’re writing letters because we believe that when we bless our own marriage, we bless the marriages of others. If you write a post, share your link at Amber’s place today. Thank you for joining us.

The Holding Together

Amber wrote about hope and it was good.  Our hope is built on nothing less, she said, and I suppose I agree.  Hope is more than me with grey hair, her snuggled under my arm in a sun-shaded porch swing, she wrote. Hope is something more eternal, more resurrected, more platinum maybe.

I agree with all that; I really do.  But yesterday evening the wind blew long through the tops of the oaks staggered on the hill.  They bent in union with the wind, leaves swooshed like landlocked waves.  The way the wind rolls leaves up in contagion, it’s a miracle.

The way old lovers bend in union is a miracle, too–the sixty-year olds in porch chairs with his and hers lap dogs; the ones who hold the church up with prayer, and a few choice words; the lovers who haven’t used the word “lover” in decades, but use the word “friend” instead. It takes years to develop that kind of flexibility, that kind of sway.

For in him, all things were created… He is before all things, and in him all things hold together.  That’s what the scriptures say.

I hope for the porch swing, for the lazy days of watching the dance of the oak trees with my wife.  I’m sure it won’t be perfect, but it will hold together. It will hold together like hope fulfilled, like the hope of glory. It will hold together like creation.

What if hope is found in the holding together? What if?