Author: editor

‘Whatever is good and perfect is a gift coming down to us from God our Father, who created all the lights in the heavens. He never changes or casts a shifting shadow. ‘ James 1:17(NLT)

People who thrive, who excel to the highest levels – personally and professionally – have at least one thing in common: They know what they do best. Warren Buffett, “the world’s greatest investor,” is an easy professional example. This down-home, slightly disheveled financial titan from Nebraska may not seem like one of the wealthiest men ever, but he certainly knows how to sniff out a good investment. His patient and practical mind make this his signature strength. What makes him special, according to experts is that he became aware of it. Buffet knows what he does well and what he doesn’t.

The tragedy of life for many people is not that they don’t have enough strengths, it’s that we are unaware of the ones they have. Benjamin Franklin aptly called these wasted strengths “sundials in the shade.”

The same is true of couples. Those who go the distance and live life well, are aware of each other’s strengths. They understand and appreciate one another’s God-given personalities. The value each other’s hard-wiring and they make an effort to study it, increasing their awareness as a couple.

Well, you’re well on your way to doing just that. The two personality pages of your SYMBIS Report give you a very clear picture of your individual and relationship strengths.

Take a moment right now, each of you, to identify a personal strength in the other person that you don’t think they fully recognize. Help your partner see a God-given strength in their personality that you think they may not be seeing the way you do.

from The SYMBIS Assessment Plan by Drs. Les & Leslie Parrott

‘But the Holy Spirit produces this kind of fruit in our lives: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, ‘ Galatians 5:22(NLT)

What do you know about your grandparent’s marriage? Your great grandparent’s marriage? Of course you know plenty about your mom and dad’s relationship. After all, it was your model for marriage growing up. Whether it was happy or sad, or nearly non-existent, you observed it up close and personal.

All of us take something from the previous generation’s example of marriage into our own. It’s inevitable. We may even resist some aspect of our parent’s marriage and then find ourselves doing the very same thing. We psychologists call that an introject – it’s kind of like getting injected with ways of being from our family of origin. And this process can offer both good and bad character qualities. But make no mistake; we are all inextricably linked to our family’s lineage.

From generation to generation we are handed responsibilities and qualities that keep the customs going – whether we know it or not. So take a moment to explore what you’re apt to bring into your marriage from your bloodline. Simply talking about this “relational inheritance” will make it more conscious and shed light on your current conditions.

As you review the findings on the Expectation page of your SYMBIS Report, consider your family’s positive qualities as well as your family’s inevitable shortcomings. How are they likely to shape or impact your marriage? And more importantly, how can each of you, in spite of whatever expectations have been shaped by your family of origin, embody the “fruit of the spirit” in order to take the very best your families had to offer and allow them to be used by God in your relationship?

from The SYMBIS Assessment Plan by Drs. Les & Leslie Parrott

‘Take a lesson from the ants, you lazybones. Learn from their ways and become wise! Though they have no prince or governor or ruler to make them work, they labor hard all summer, gathering food for the winter.’ Proverbs 6:6-8(NLT)

“Why do you always make the money decisions?” Leslie asked me.

We were standing in the middle of a department store trying to choose a new couch for our apartment. And it seemed to her that I was controlling the purse strings.

“I don’t make the money decisions,” I said, “our bank account does.”

That remark was followed by a lengthy, whiny discussion — okay, it was a fight — over how we manage, or should manage, our money. Was I in charge or were we in charge? It’s an important question for all of us.

I don’t know how you would answer that question but if you are like most people we counsel you might be saying, “We can talk about almost anything except money.” And that’s understandable. Money is a touchy subject for most. The topic sometimes brings out the worst in people. We become withdrawn, pushy, or manipulative.

But it doesn’t have to be that way. With the right attitude and an honest agenda, couples can effectively communicate about getting out of debt, spending and giving, investing, and all the rest.

As you consider the information on your Money Matrix from your SYMBIS Assessment Report, what troubles you most and why? Also, what do you see on this page that gives you the most optimism about how the two of you will manage your money? And what do you think this passage from the sixth chapter of Proverbs has to say about your relations when it comes to finances?

from The SYMBIS Assessment Plan by Drs. Les & Leslie Parrott

‘Come, let us worship and bow down. Let us kneel before the Lord our maker,’ Psalms 95:6(NLT)

‘And let us not neglect our meeting together, as some people do, but encourage one another, especially now that the day of his return is drawing near.’ Hebrews 10:25(NLT)

A friend of ours told us a funny story about two guys who were fishing fanatics. On a recent Sunday morning they arose at 4:00 a.m. and drove more than a hundred miles into the mountains expecting to catch trout in their favorite secluded stream whose location had been kept secret by them for years.

After hiking two miles in from the road their enthusiasm was dampened and the expedition aborted when they saw that rains farther up stream had produced silt which muddied the waters and made fishing impractical. In their disgust one said to the other, “You might as well have stayed home and gone to church,” to which his companion retorted with a straight face, “Oh, I can’t go to church anyhow; my wife is sick.”

The church where we worship is a place of support and spiritual refueling. Singing hymns, learning from Scripture, worshipping God, and meeting with friends who share our spiritual quest is comforting and inspiring. Worshipping together buoys our relationship and makes the week ahead more meaningful.

How we choose to incorporate the church into our marriage is critically important to our relationship. Paul recognized the idea of the church as being God’s family when he said we are “members of God’s household” (Eph. 2:19). When Jesus taught his disciples to pray he did not say “my Father”; he said, “our Father.” We cannot live the Christian life in isolation. Even a loving couple needs a community of worship.

As you begin your married life together how do you see the church as a part of it? Be as specific as you can about how you each imagine your involvement in church together as well as individually. How do these Bible passages relate to what you plan to do?

from The SYMBIS Assessment Plan by Drs. Les & Leslie Parrott

‘Two people are better off than one, for they can help each other succeed. If one person falls, the other can reach out and help. But someone who falls alone is in real trouble. Likewise, two people lying close together can keep each other warm. But how can one be warm alone? A person standing alone can be attacked and defeated, but two can stand back-to-back and conquer. Three are even better, for a triple-braided cord is not easily broken.’ Ecclesiastes 4:9-12(NLT)

‘so ignore them. They are blind guides leading the blind, and if one blind person guides another, they will both fall into a ditch.”’ Matthew 15:14(NLT)

The well-being of your relationship, like every couple on the planet, depends on the well-being of each of you. In other words, your relationship can only be as emotionally and spiritually healthy as the two of you. We make this foundational point nearly anytime we give a seminar for couples.

Most attributes of mental health are found in the middle of a continuum that signifies a “balanced life.” Self-worth, for example, is the midpoint between too much humility and too much pride. Delayed gratification is between too much compulsive restraint and too much free-wheeling indulgence.

The attribute of self-awareness, on the other hand, is unique. At one end of an imagined continuum of this trait we would find the person in denial, seeing themselves without any flaws, exaggerating their own abilities and dodging feedback at all cost. This person is riddled with blind spots and is the common view of the narcissist. On the other end of this imagined continuum, however, well, we are at a loss. Is it possible to have too much self-awareness? Is it undesirable to be too open to feedback?

Perhaps this healthy trait could be taken to an extreme but we’ve never seen it. No matter how self-aware we are, we can always benefit from continued critique. We can always improve by being more conscious, more alert to our emotions, our motives, our thinking and our behavior. Too much of a good thing? We don’t think so.

Awareness does not guarantee psychological health, but psychological health is impossible without it. Self-awareness is one of the most significant keystones to emotional health – and thus to your relationship. So we ask: What are you doing today that will help you become aware of who you are in the context of your relationship? How do these biblical passages shed light on this?

from The SYMBIS Assessment Plan by Drs. Les & Leslie Parrott

‘And now, dear brothers and sisters, one final thing. Fix your thoughts on what is true, and honorable, and right, and pure, and lovely, and admirable. Think about things that are excellent and worthy of praise. Keep putting into practice all you learned and received from me—everything you heard from me and saw me doing. Then the God of peace will be with you.’ Philippians 4:8-9(NLT)

Specialists in biofeedback call them “hot thoughts” – images of hot scenes, such as being in the desert or on a beach on a warm and sunny day. And they literally increase blood flow and warmth to cold hands and feet. Just conjuring a mental image amazingly determines your body’s temperature.

Mental imagery is also a practice that today’s top athletes are certainly using. Studies on everything from golf, to basketball, to swimming have revealed that those who use positive mental imagery consistently improve their performance. They have an arguable edge over athletes who don’t do this.

When we mentally rehearse running a marathon, for example, we are likely to evoke muscular changes without ever leaving our chair. Our blood pressure will go up, our brain waves will alter, our sweat glands will become active, all in the absence of physical activity.

Equally amazing, if not more so, is the power of picturing ourselves in general. Our self-image determines the level of joy and fulfillment we experience every day. And that self-image is created through our attitude and self-talk.

In the same way, everyone comes to the idea of marriage with a set of attitudes – a marriage mindset. This page of your SYMBIS Assessment reveals your marriage mindset and shows you how your two mindsets on marriage mesh.

As you consider the insights on this page, discuss how you might “take captive every thought” (II Corinthians 10:5), and be sure to reflect on how your two marriage mindsets can benefit your covenant of marriage together.

from The SYMBIS Assessment Plan by Drs. Les & Leslie Parrott

‘Then the Lord God said, “It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper who is just right for him.” So the Lord God formed from the ground all the wild animals and all the birds of the sky. He brought them to the man to see what he would call them, and the man chose a name for each one. He gave names to all the livestock, all the birds of the sky, and all the wild animals. But still there was no helper just right for him. So the Lord God caused the man to fall into a deep sleep. While the man slept, the Lord God took out one of the man’s ribs and closed up the opening. Then the Lord God made a woman from the rib, and he brought her to the man. “At last!” the man exclaimed. “This one is bone from my bone, and flesh from my flesh! She will be called ‘woman,’ because she was taken from ‘man.’” This explains why a man leaves his father and mother and is joined to his wife, and the two are united into one. Now the man and his wife were both naked, but they felt no shame.’ Genesis 2:18-25(NLT)

Congratulations!

It says so much about you and your commitment to each other – right at the start of your preparation for marriage – that you are taking it seriously. You wouldn’t be reading this if you weren’t.

After all, you’ve presumably taken the SYMBIS Assessment and you’re now walking through the results with your SYMBIS Facilitator.

Because you’re using this reading plan, we also know that you’re invested in finding God’s best as you launch lifelong love. This plan will add value to your SYMBIS Assessment by pointing you to a relevant Bible passage with each page of your SYMBIS Report. Read them in tandem with the pages you’re covering.

We begin with your “Marriage Momentum” – the aspects of your relationship that are working in your favor. Whether you scored high or low on this measure, or somewhere in-between, you need to know that the true momentum for marriage is found in knowing that marriage was God’s idea (see Genesis 2:24). He also made it clear that marriage was designed to be permanent (see Matthew 19:6).

And crucial to increasing your marriage momentum is knowing that God views marriage as a covenant, not a contract (see Malachi 2:14; Proverbs 2:16-17).

The difference? At least three:

• A covenant is based on trust between parties while a contract is based on distrust.
• A covenant is based on unlimited responsibility while a contract is based on limited liability.
• A covenant cannot be broken if new circumstances occur while a contract can be voided by mutual consent.

So as you begin your marriage preparation – and perhaps prepare for your wedding ceremony – what can you do in practical terms to ensure that your marriage is built on a covenant and not just a contract? How does this Bible passage speak into that?

from The SYMBIS Assessment Plan by Drs. Les & Leslie Parrott