A TOP Marriage

Is your marriage to the fullest? Do you enjoy it? I want to share with you three ingredients to enjoy a TOP Marriage.

T - Time Together
Nowadays it's so easy to keep oneself busy. It's weird to have a free morning. Even vacations are busy, that's why we come back from them tired! We take, without realizing, this lifestyle to our marriage with grave consequences.
Remember that, after God's, your time with your spouse is the most important thing. You have to understand (because we haven't been taught so) to set time apart to spend it with him/her. THAT'S PRIORITY. THAT'S URGENT. Everything else, including your children, job and the rest of your family, cannot occupy the time that's meant ONLY for your spouse.
Get a time aside weekly: a Monday night, a Sunday morning, a Friday afternoon, etc., in which he/she will know that you both will be together. That not only will strengthen the communication between you and your spouse, but also it'll make him/her feel more important.
There will be moments where there may be exception to the rule for something that comes up, but if those exceptions become often, do not deceive yourself, and recognize that you're not giving him/her the time he/she deserves. Who decides if the exception already became often? Your spouse!

O - On Prayer
A while ago I heard a statistic of divorce in the United States that said: 3 out of 5 marriages end up divorcing, but if the couple starts to attend a church, the divorce probability goes down to 2 out of 5. But if the couple not only attend the church, but it gets involved, and also take courses for marriages and seek some counsel, the divorce rate reduces to 1 out of 5. BUT if the husband and the wife pray together regularly, 1 out of 1250 couples get divorce!
And not only praying together will keep you from divorce, but also, among its many blessings, it is the key to a much deeper intimacy with your spouse and the place where our loving heavenly Father pour out of His wisdom and direction for the problems you may face, and vision for you two, as a couple, may take what He has for you.

P - Purpose to Forgive
If you want to enjoy your marriage to the fullest, you won't be able to do it if you don't learn to use the weapon of forgiveness. And I told you that you won't be able, not because I'm pessimist, but because there is a reality: as much you as your spouse are imperfect; therefore, sooner or later, and more often than you think, you two will be offending each other. That's why you have to purpose to forgive.
Forgiveness is a weapon of personal defense. It's for you. It'll take care of your heart. It'll protect it. Purpose to forgive constantly! The more you forgive, more protected you will be. If you only forgive when a big offense comes up, it'll be difficult for you to do it, you'll make excuses, you won't know to forgive. That's why you have to forgive even the small and everyday offenses.
A successful marriage is not composed of people that never hurt each other, but of two persons that learnt to forgive each other.

If you practice these three ingredients and make them yours to get a TOP Marriage, people will say eventually about your marriage: "How lucky they were to have a marriage like this!", and then you will be able to answer: "It wasn't luck, it cost me a lot of work, but my Jesus never left me."

Hope this helped you! 😉

I'm a rich man

My friends threw me a surprise party for my 40th birthday. They really surprised me! But in the middle of the celebration, I realized something: I am a rich man!

Seeing so many shows of affections of people that means so much to me, as many in the party yesterday as by phone or texts, it was just great. When I got home, my eyes were opened again to something very simple: I have a house! And then, I started to thank in my heart for everything I have: a place to sleep, food in my fridge, a fridge!, furniture, a car, a job, etc., and these are only the material stuff.

What really fills my life is the privilege of sharing my life with such good heart people, which I have as companions, friends and family, as many near to me as in other countries, from which I constantly learn and I'm able to see God's love in each of them.

I could tell how blessed I was by each of them and there are some tales to tell, but if I did, it'll be so long that you won't read this post! hahaha. Leaving jokes aside, I just want to acknowledge one person: my Ceci, my amorcito.

Amorcito, thank you for loving me and being by my side! You give so many reasons to be thankful for having you that I just don't know how to start. Your heart doesn't just make me to fall in love with you, but also it challenges me to be like you. Everyday you inspire me and challenge me to be better. With your example, you bring out the best of me. You believe in me even when I gave you reasons for not doing it. You are beautiful my love!

Romans 5:8 says that our heavenly Father loved us even when we were sinners. My amorcito, you are the person that daily shows me that love of my Father, because, after Him, nobody knows me better than you, and in spite of that, you still love me.

I am the richest man of the world for having you, the most precious possession of my heavenly Father.