Marriage…and divorce. Last time I read our newspapers here in Malawi, they said the court records showed something like 10,000 divorce/separations/disputes per month. That got me thinking why. After some time of thinking and pinging my opinions this way and that I, I recalled where I began.

I had always wanted to be a family man. Really, I remember how my mom and pop used to dance and let us watch. That was cool. Really cool. Now I do it with my wife. Anyway, somewhere down the line I got reading about where it all started in the book of Genesis and came to the conclusion that it was God’s idea. Yep, I blame him squarely for it. It is a great idea. My premise went like this (and I was 5 years away from being married), if marriage is his idea, then he certainly has got some guidelines on how it should be run right? I thought of the analogy of car makers, they always come with manuals (at least ones you could read!) and they tell you the obvious things like where the indicator switch was, how to wear your seat belt and believe it or not where the dashboard clock is!

I kind of figured out that an intelligent God did something like that for an institution he started and I began searching for his principles and all. Eight years down the line and I can safely say that his way exists and it works. Sure, we’ve had our share of knocks and bad words we shouldn’t have said and bad things we shouldn’t have done but…it is enjoyable. There is a popular saying in Malawi that says “Banja ndi kupirira” Loosely translated, “marriage is all about endurance”. I think it is an all out sweeping statement that is not true. Some say “Banja ndi mavuto” (marriage is problems) and I ask myself, why would God create something so problematic? And bless it? I am not saying we don’t need endurance or will not meet problems but that is not all there is to it! And that is where I think we need to start changing if we are to see our marriage lifestyles change: we need to change some of the lessons we have been taught.

Marriage is God’s idea and it is a blessing. Did I mention that I went on my quest of the origins because I did not want to become a court statistic?

If I am making you think, I will have done my job. Comments?