Most Couples Miss This Critical Marriage Secret by Pastor Kingsley Okonkwo: MP3 Download & Sermon Notes

Union vs. Unity

Part of why this message on marriage matters is that there is so much blessing in marriage — yet many marriages are either not working or merely existing. God designed marriage to be better than being single. The real blessing of marriage is not in the union.

It is not the union that is blessed. It is the unity that is blessed.

You get the union automatically the day you are joined — at the altar, at the court, through custom. But unity has to be worked on. You can be in the union and still have no unity. Two are only better than one if there is unity. Two are worse than one if there is no unity.

Ecclesiastes 4:9 — two are better than one because they have a good reward for their labor. One translation says: it is better to have a partner than to go it alone; share the work and share the wealth. Another says: two people are better off than one, for they can help each other succeed.

Ecclesiastes 4:12 (NLT) — a person standing alone can be attacked, but two can stand back-to-back and conquer. There is a three-braided cord that is not broken — that third person is God. When you put God at the center of this relationship, it is totally unbeatable.

The Blank Check of Agreement

Matthew 18:19 — if two of you shall agree on earth concerning anything you ask, my father will do it for you. Anything. That is a blank check. Marriage is the highest form of agreement and commitment people can make — every other relationship you can easily exit.

There is nothing in over 20 years of marriage that has been agreed upon that has not happened. Agreements about children — how many, in what order, their personalities. The house, the cars, financial seeds sown, ministry decisions. Once both are in agreement, it goes through. Anytime there was no agreement, it did not pull through.

Synergy is the interaction of two agents to produce a combined effect greater than the sum of their separate effects. If each person produces 10,000 separately, together in unity they do not produce 20,000 — they can produce 50,000 or 100,000. That is the law of synergy.

Amos 3:3 — two cannot walk together except they be agreed.

The Demonstration

Every person comes with strengths in front and weaknesses at the back — areas they cannot see. God pairs people who complement each other: spenders with savers, spontaneous people with planners, talkers with listeners, scattered people with organized ones. When they stand back to back, they cover each other's weaknesses. The union now has no vulnerability.

But if one person goes their way and the other goes theirs, their backs are open again — in a union but still as exposed as when they were single.

The Four Pillars of Unity

1. Conversation

   If you do not talk to your spouse, you can never be in unity. You cannot make decisions on your own. Men are usually guilty of this — moving without consulting, inviting someone to live with them and only telling the wife on the day the person arrives. Have those conversations. And when you do, come without a superiority complex. Your idea might need fine-tuning. When you allow your partner to talk, they always have an aspect you are not seeing. You mustn't have everything settled today — drop hints, let circumstances play, don't be in a hurry.

2. Consideration

   There are people who are borderline wicked to their own spouse — stingy, inconsiderate, and even unhappy when they see their partner enjoying life. But your desire should be to bless your spouse. Anything that stresses your spouse should stress you. 1 Corinthians 7:32-34 — the principle of marriage is that the husband's job is to please his wife, and the wife's job is to please her husband. What breaks a home most times is selfishness.

3. Compromise

   Unity does not mean you will agree on everything — it means you choose to be on the same page. There must be willingness to compromise, and with a good attitude. Do not compromise and then squeeze your face for weeks until everyone in the house is walking on eggshells. One person needs to slow down and wait for the other, or pick up their pace to catch up. You will never have unity if you always insist on having your way, when you want it, how you want it.

4. Cooperation

   You have to be intentional about working together — it will not just happen naturally. Left alone, couples naturally drift apart. Be conscious of cooperating. Maintain unity especially in front of the children — if one parent has given a direction, the other must publicly agree. Privately, you can discuss it later. Once children discover you are not united, they will exploit it constantly. It takes a conscious, daily effort to stay in agreement.

The more you build unity, a time will come when you are so much in sync that even without constant conversation you already know what you both will like. You become naturally synchronized. When that happens, even financial seeds and ministry decisions will match exactly — not by coincidence, but by the power of covenant agreement.

There is a blank check waiting for you. Stop arguing to win — start agreeing to cash it.