Romantic accents, fanciful customs and exotic trips make cross-cultural relationships particularly exciting, but when novelty fades into reality, ambiguous cultural nuances and unspoken taboos become like relationship landmines. Distinctly different backgrounds and native languages often lead to misunderstandings and misaligned expectations. Despite these very significant challenges, cross-cultural relationships can be uniquely fulfilling and satisfying. When cross-cultural couples embrace their differences as assets, they are able to combine the best parts of their cultures. Leveraging the strengths of their cultural backgrounds they can build strong, healthy, connected family units. Below are the stories of three cross-cultural couples who have successfully navigated […]

If you ask people what they think is really important in life, having quality friendships is usually high on the list. The Bible says, “It is not good for the man to be alone” (Genesis 2:18). Although this line refers to Adam and Eve, it also conveys the importance of not doing life alone. It is good to be friends with your spouse, but why is that not enough? Why do we need friendships beyond the love of our family? While friendships are important throughout life, there are two time periods in life when friendships have a more leading, and […]

Valentine’s Day, hearts and love are what people associate with February. Of course there is also Groundhog Day and Presidents Day rounding out the month. But, for most, love is the theme. Now “love” is a word used a lot in our culture but its meaning can lose some of its meaning. Why? Because of how we act towards one another. Love is often professed but then is not shown to the one we are professing it to. Life is primarily about relationships. Jesus was asked what the greatest of all the commandments was and his answer was to love […]

“Why can’t marriage always be like that?” We had just finished watching Pride and Prejudice with Kiera Knightley and were preparing for bed. My wife was deeply moved by the noble and passionate love of Mr. Darcy that is revealed in the end. I was mildly suspicious that this was a set up to expose my lack of romanticism. “Because it’s unsustainable,” I stated, a bit too matter-of-factly. This launched a conversation that spanned two nights in which we explored my wife’s longing for and my own dismissal of this expression of love. It was a circular route, this conversation, […]