Becoming The Person Marriage Require
The formation of the person before the formation of the marriage.
Marriage is often approached from the outside.
How do we communicate better?
How do we resolve conflict?
How do we understand our spouse?
How do we build intimacy?
But beneath these questions lies a deeper one:
Who must I become to build the marriage I say I want?
That is where this Book begins.
Becoming the Person Marriage Requires is Book II of the Canon of Marriage, continuing the journey begun with Seeing Marriage Correctly.
If we have not first learned to see marriage rightly, we will struggle to build it wisely. But seeing rightly eventually confronts us with ourselves.
Marriage brings together two histories, two characters, desires, strengths, weaknesses, habits, wounds, convictions, and choices. Its quality is therefore deeply connected to the people within it.
This Book turns the lens inward.
THE WORK OF BECOMINGTo become the person marriage requires is not to become perfect.
It is to become responsible.
It is to learn to govern yourself, receive correction without defensiveness, become teachable without becoming weak, develop humility without losing conviction, understand your emotions without being ruled by them, and accept responsibility without constantly searching for someone else to blame.
It is to develop the character required for truth, trust, sacrifice, wisdom, faithfulness, and love to become more than ideals.
This Book examines:
Character.
Responsibility.
Self-government.
Humility.
Teachability.
Emotional maturity.
Wisdom.
Faithfulness.
These are not merely personal virtues.
They are marital capacities.
The person you become does not remain outside your marriage. You bring that person into it.
BEFORE WE CHANGE THE MARRIAGE, WE MUST CONFRONT THE PERSONOne of the easiest things in marriage is to identify what the other person needs to change.
The harder question is:
What is marriage revealing about me?
That question moves us from accusation to responsibility, from reaction to reflection, and toward accepting responsibility for our own formation.
This does not mean ignoring injustice or tolerating destructive behavior. It means beginning where responsibility begins:
with the person you can govern-yourself.
The goal is not simply to become easier to live with, but to become capable of living truthfully, loving faithfully, receiving wisdom, giving generously, enduring difficulty, and continuing to grow.
THE SECOND MOVEMENTThe five Books of the Canon of Marriage form one movement:
See clearly.
Become deeply.
Build wisely.
Stand faithfully under pressure.
Flourish together.
Book I asks us to see marriage correctly.
Book II asks us to become the kind of person such a marriage requires.
Book III turns toward the deliberate work of building.
Before we build the marriage, we must become the people capable of building it.
Becoming the Person Marriage Requires is also part of a much larger master framework of principles, ideas, and works from which the Canon of Marriage was developed. Yet each Book stands on its own.
The invitation is simple:
What kind of person must I become so that what marriage requires can increasingly be found in me?
Formation comes before construction.
Character comes before capacity.
The person comes before the marriage.
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