3. Bad friends who are always trying to put you against your family
A true friend will encourage us to be close to our spouse and children—not the other way around. Any friend that demands more of your time and says things like, “She has you whipped,” or “He takes too much of your time,” or “She’s too controlling of you time,” or “You should be able to do whatever you want to do without calling home,” is not a good influence on us and is certainly not considering our devotion to our family.
Our friends should never expect us to choose them over our family or try to stir up a fight because they’re wanting more of our time. The bottom line is that we definitely need to spend time with our friends, but that time can never be at the expense of our own family. If we are spending too many nights out with our girlfriends, our marriage will suffer. Too many nights out with the boys will lead to a lonely marriage. It’s all about balance, but our marriage must always come first. For more on this, please read “When a Husband and Wife Don’t See Eye to Eye.”
4. Bad friends who hate marriage in general
Like I said earlier, we SHOULD have friends from varying backgrounds and life experiences. This is a beautiful thing. But, this means that all of us will most certainly have different opinions about various things. We shouldn’t end a friendship simply because we don’t agree with everything he/she says, but we can’t be close friends with someone who won’t respect our beliefs or tries to belittle our values.
We might have some friends who are divorced and currently have a very negative attitude toward marriage in general. I’m not saying that we shouldn’t support them during this heartbreaking time. We absolutely should. We just need to make sure that our conversations aren’t anti-marriage.
I had a friend who started hanging out with two divorced women who would always tell her that being single was so much better than being married. They would go out to restaurants and clubs at least one night a week together. My friend was the only married woman in the group. Eventually, she started arguing with her husband over little things and telling him that he wasn’t a good husband. After some time, she threatened divorce, and eventually she moved out of their home and into an apartment with those single women. Her husband was shocked at how fast all of this happened. The sad thing about this situation is that the couple divorced three years ago, and my friend is just now realizing where she went wrong in both her friendships and her marriage. She so desperately wants to get back together with her husband, but he is now with someone else.
Friends, I don’t want this to happen to any of us. God wants all of us to have strong marriages and beautiful friendships. Relationships make life so rich when they are healthy and in balance. Let’s be sure to seek out and maintain loyal friendships that are mutually encouraging and uplifting and bring out the best in our marriages and families.
Thanks so much for taking the time to read and share this post. Be blessed!
This article originally appeared here, and is used with permission.
