Body: | In-Law Trouble & the Bible
Marriage is the closest, and should be the happiest relationship we know in
this life. As Jesus says in. Matthew 19:9, and elsewhere, it is also a
relationship that should never be broken except for the extreme disloyalty
of fornication. Yet in spite of the closeness of the marriage tie, about
one out of every three marriages in our country break up, and a very
frequent cause of divorce is the interference of parents or other close
relatives interference of which the parents themselves are often
unconscious.
The reason for this is easy to understand. Family relationships developed
over many years ideally are very close and very enduring. Parents by nature
love their children. They guide, teach, discipline them, and help form
their sense of values, their way of thinking and acting. In a sense, they
come to idealize their own children in comparison with those from other
homes, who may not have the same sense of values and may not think and act
in exactly the same way.
Children also by nature love and admire their parents. Over the years, they
begin to think and act much as they do, and to have the same sense of
values. But when two young people marry, they bring into the new home the
cultures from two different families, whose sense of values and ways of
thinking and acting may be quite different. In such case, it is easy for
the parents of the groom to feel that his bride does not quite meet the
standards they had expected in a wife for their son. It is just as easy for
the parents of the bride to feel that the young man is not all they had
wanted in a husband for their daughter.
Furthermore, the young couple who are establishing a new home feel that
they have a right to manage it in their own way. But since they come from
different family backgrounds, if they are sensitive it is easy for the
young wife to feel that her husband's parents interfere with them too much,
and for the husband to feel the same way about his wife's parents.
Ann Landers has said that "80 per cent of the letters I receive pertaining
to in-law problems are complaints against the mother-in-law. And 80 per
cent of the mother-in-law beefs are against the husband's mother - not the
wife's". Evidently the complaints Mrs. Landers receives are from the young
wives, who seem to be more sensitive then their husbands about parental
interference. They also identify the husband's mother as the chief trouble
maker. Whether such complaints are actually justified or not, they at least
breed resentment in the young wives and may start dissension's between them
and their husbands.
What then is the solution for this conflict of relationships - a conflict
which arises from the natural affection of parents for their children and
of children for their parents? Jesus himself suggests the solution when, in
Matthew 19:4-6, he quotes God's intention when he established the
institution of marriage and the home. "Have you not read," he said, "that
he who made them in the beginning made them male and female, and said, For
this cause shall a man leave his father and mother, and shall cleave to his
wife; and the two shall become one flesh? So that they are no more two, but
one flesh. What therefore God hath joined together, let not man put
asunder." Mark 10:9.
God's statement places the primary responsibility on the young couple to
see that their love and their commitments to each other are always above
the commitment to their parents, no matter how deep the family ties may
have been. - The term "leave" father and mother, however, does not mean a
complete break or abandonment. Instead, Jesus in Mark 7:10-13 states
plainly that children are to honor their parents and, when necessary, even
support them financially. The establishment of a new home does not release
them from this obligation. But the term does mean that the intimate
relations which have formerly existed between parents and children must and
should change when the children marry.
This change places new obligations on both the parents and the children.
Naturally, the young couple want to be independent and manage their own
home. But they need also to recognize that their parents have a deep
interest in them and want to help them to be happy. They might also
remember that these parents have had many more years of experience than
they have had and might be of help in solving some of their problems. What
they may at times consider as criticism or interference in their affairs,
they might consider as a perhaps unwise desire of their parents to help
them. If there is a difference in point of view, they might be patient and
try with love and kindness to win their parents to their view; or,
surprisingly, they might see their parents' view the wiser.
On the other hand, though parents still have a deep love for their children
and want to help them, they should realize that the young couple now have a
right to be independent and to work out their own problems. Even though
they think the youngsters are making mistakes in managing their home, their
children, or their finances, they should be extremely tactful and kind in
making suggestions or in giving unasked advice. They should not expect them
to do everything exactly as they themselves would do. They should by all
means not impose their own views on their children. (I Corinthians 13 (not
insist own way). The relationship between parents and the new home should
no longer be one of expected obedience, but of warm cooperation, in which
each respect the independence and ideas of the other. There cannot be the
same closeness of association, the same amount of attention parents have
formerly enjoyed, for their children now have other responsibilities which
must claim their time and attention.
But if both parents and children are Christians, and try to exercise the
love and compassion, the kindness and understanding which Jesus always
showed for others, there should be no in-law trouble, but both the new and
the parental homes will have a mutually happy relationship.
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