So he’s finally gone. For days the condemnation grew louder and louder and yet it looked like Matt Hancock would cling on to his job as a lightning rod for criticism that would otherwise come Boris Johnson’s way. Yet in spite of the Prime Minister’s apparent support, the UK Health Secretary tendered his resignation on Saturday night.

No doubt you’ve read the story and have probably even seen the picture. There he is, one of the architects of the UK’s coronavirus restrictions, passionately kissing one of his aides in the apparent secrecy of his Whitehall office.

Thus far, the outrage has focused on the breach of public health regulations. By definition, Mr Hancock and his mistress are from two different households meaning that contact such as this was not permitted when the photo was taken. Countless citizens have rightly queried whether it is one rule for politicians and one for the rest of us.

Yet, listen to some and you would think that this is simply a matter of breaching a temporary public health restriction. In reality it goes far, far further. The most pertinent facts are that Mr Hancock has been married for 15 years and the woman with whom he has been having an affair has been married for 13. Both have three children. Hancock’s wife is reported to have had no idea that the affair was taking place; her husband only informed her when he learned that the affair was about to be exposed in the tabloid press. He has since reportedly left his wife in order to move in with his mistress.

It’s a truly ghastly sequence of events and our hearts should go out to the innocent victims of Hancock and Coladangelo’s abhorrent actions. Yet, we must be clear that the breach of Covid regulations is at most a peripheral aspect of this affair. What they have done would still be wrong even if there was no pandemic.

When it comes to electing leaders, character matters. Of course ability and policy are both vital, but a man or woman’s character cannot be taken out of the equation. To put it bluntly, if a man’s own wife is unable to trust him, how can the country be expected to do the same? Whether it is Donald Trump, Boris Johnson or Bill Clinton, when it comes to holding public office, the betrayal of one’s own spouse ought to be a disqualifying offence. To write such affairs off as “a private matter” is to misunderstand what makes a suitable leader.

Secondly, it ought to be recognised that ANY act of adultery is by definition a matter of public note. A wedding is a public event where a man and woman take public vows before God and before witnesses to remain faithful to one another. Marriage brings unmatched blessings to those who enter into it, but with these blessings come solemn responsibilities. It appears that Matt Hancock was not willing to keep his word and meet those responsibilities. It is right that he has gone.

Tags: Marriage, Covid-19, Sexual Immorality

When we marry, very often we marry someone different to us. That’s what attracts us in the first place. That’s what makes them seem exciting—they see and do things differently.

But the difference between interesting and irritating is often just a matter of time. Too soon what intrigued us can become annoying—her planning starts to cramp your ‘go with the flow’ attitude, his high flying work life clashes with your plans for a warm family life. Tensions build around these differences, and we become ingrained into thinking that our way of seeing life is right, and that the other person needs to wise up and come around to our way of thinking. All the while they think the same, if only we would see life their way, then all would be great.

There are differences that are issues of right/wrong—moral issues—that need to be dealt with rather than accommodated. But there issues of background, culture, personality—these differences are not an issue of wrong or right, they are just differences of preference.

How do we respond to these so that they do not become irritating? We have two choices. We can either embrace the differences that God has brought to our marriage. Or, we can try to be God, trying to change our spouse into our image.

Paul Tripp in his book on marriage that we have been dipping into over these last few weeks suggests five God-pleasing ways to respond to these differences:

Celebrate your Creator. The more you acknowledge and appreciate the fact that God made your spouse exactly as you need them to be, the more you will tend to esteem and appreciate them.

Refuse to see the differences as right or wrong. When you begin to think and act as though your hardwiring makes you better, more mature, or more righteous than your spouse, you will act and respond in ways that are dismissive and disrespectful.

Determine to respond to your differences with appreciation and respect. We are used to being impatient or irritated in the face of differences, used to doing what we need to get our own way. Those responses are more about your relationship with God than about your husband or wife. You disagree with how God made your wife or your husband. Marriage is about two people creating something stronger together than they are apart—that means there are two sets of strengths, and both need to be appreciated.

Learn where your differences create difficulty and work together at these areas. Do we see our differences as an opportunity for developing deeper unity and harmony or an opportunity to fight? Will we learn to work to each other’s strengths, anticipating the conflicts of interest and working around them?

Admit where these differences challenge you to grow. God uses the differences in our spouses to expose our own flaws, pride, impatience and many other sinful traits. Too often we are so busy looking at the other half with a critical eye that we don’t see where we need to grow ourselves.

Marriage is not easy. We can either attempt to muddle through on our own strength or we can look to Jesus Christ who gives strength, help and hope for broken marriages in a broken world.

Tags: Marriage

Do you remember those cheesy cards that had the little cherubic boy and girl looking slightly wistfully at each other and slightly embarrassed, with the slogan “Love is…”?

I’ve been reading a book on marriage recently and came across a list of definitions of the kind of love that marriage requires. We live in a world where people believe that the emotional feelings they mistake for love are enough to hold a marriage together. Instead marriage is a commitment of the will (although not devoid of emotion!) to the good of the other—for better, for worse etc.

Here are some of Paul Tripp’s definitions of the love that is called for both in husbands and in wives. They’ll probably not make it as far as the card shop, or grace a range of fridge magnets, but they will doubtless help form the basis of lasting marriages.

“Love is being willing to have your life complicated by the needs and struggles of your husband or wife without impatience or anger”—Is your marriage just about having someone there for you when you need them, or are you prepared to serve them and their needs?

“Love is being unwilling to make any personal decision or choice that would harm your marriage, hurt your husband or wife, or weaken the bond of trust between you.”

“Love is the willingness to make regular and costly sacrifices for the sake of your marriage without asking anything in return or using your sacrifices to place your spouse in your debt”— Love requires us to say no to our selfish instincts, and to look for specific ways to serve, support, and encourage, even when busy or tired, without saying “look at all I’ve done for you”.

“Love is staying faithful to your commitment to treat your spouse with appreciation, respect, and grace, even in moments when he or she doesn’t seem to deserve it or is unwilling to reciprocate”—Lovey dovey conversation is all fine over a romantic dinner, but what is the conversation like when the dinner is burnt, the car has a fresh dent, and tempers are running high? Love means speaking kindly and gently, even in moments of disagreement, refusing to attack your spouse’s character or assault their intelligence.

“Love is being unwilling to flatter, lie, or manipulate, in any way in order to co-opt your spouse into giving you what you want or doing something your way”—The foundation of a marriage is where both partners trust that the other loves them enough to want what is best for them.

“Love is always being willing to ask for forgiveness and always being committed to grant forgiveness when it is requested.”

It’s a high standard, and one we have drifted far from. But it’s not possible simply to try harder in order to improve our marriages. We need more—we need to have experienced ourselves what unconditional, sacrificial, forgiving, servant love is like. And the only place to find that is in Jesus Christ.

(Quotes taken from Paul Tripp “What did you expect - Redeeming the Realities of Marriage”)

Tags: Marriage, Family

Malcolm Gladwell in his book Blink quotes University of Washington psychologist John Gottman who studies couples and their interactions. For years he has taped couples chatting about topics and studied a whole range of indicators from the tiny facial movements to posture to tone to verbal content. Piecing it all together after watching and analysing an hour of conversation on any subject between husband and wife, he is able to predict with 95% accuracy whether or not they will be married in 15 years or not.

Watching only 15 minutes still allowed him to predict with 90% accuracy. In fact, watching only 3 minutes of a conversation contains enough clues.

That’s phenomenal—especially when you take into account that when they gave the same tapes to 200 psychiatrists and marriage counsellors they had only a 54% success rate of predicting success or failure—little better than tossing a coin.

But Gottman is able to narrow it down even further. Amidst all the welter of data about a marriage there are four key factors—Four Horsemen he calls them—that are signs that a marriage is in a critical situation.

The Four Horsemen are criticism, defensiveness, stonewalling and contempt.

Criticism—“You don’t appreciate me”, “You never do anything about this place”, “You’re stupid/ugly/lazy.” Personal generalised sweeping statements that aren’t designed to be helpful, just to hurt.

Defensiveness—It’s often the response to criticism, you know how it goes, you’re in the wrong, but you won’t admit it. She says “You never take the bin out” and you retort with “I would do, but you never put anything in it, just leave it lying around here looking like a tip.” “You’re always in a foul mood”—“That’s ’cos I’m married to you.” And so on—excuses and blame-shifting are the order of the day.

Stonewalling—Another response to either legitimate issues, or to illegitimate criticism. There is no spitefulness, just a tuning out. 85% of time it’s the husband. He hears the issue and refuses to engage—sighs and changes channel, or walks out of the room or house. It says, “I don’t rate your opinion, I don’t rate this as an issue worth my time or effort to solve. I’m done.” It’s unspoken contempt.

Contempt—The insult, the name-call, a sneer, the mocking taunt, the rolling of eyes, scorn, treating your spouse with disdain in front of family or friends. They all communicate disgust. The aim is simply to belittle, to score points.

Of the four, Gottman says contempt is the worst. You might have thought it would be criticism. Criticism is about what a person does, and will cause them to react defensively, but contempt displays disgust for who a person actually is.

Where’s your marriage at? Do any of the horsemen inhabit your home? The good news is that it isn’t too late. Hard work will need to be done—the hard work of repentance and forgiveness. But we need to start with the vertical relationship between us and God—with repentance and forgiveness from Jesus—then we find him enabling us to repent and forgive each other on a horizontal level, and our marriages transformed and relationships healed.

Tags: Marriage, Family