When Being Right is All Wrong

Meet Justin and Paula. They’ve been married for nearly 15 years, most of which have been wonderful years. Recently, though, conflict has been the order of the day. Not war-to-end-all-wars conflict. Just little skirmishes here or there over this small thing or that. Right now, as you read this, they are at the end of another conflict. Paula is in the privileged position of being right…there is no doubt left for either of them that Justin is wrong.

As they go back to their neutral corners (Justin to the TV room and Paula to the bedroom), they both realize that they don’t feel any better now than when the whole thing started. Justin’s not supposed to feel better…he was proven wrong. But Paula won the fight…the joy of vindication and accomplishment is quickly fading and she’s feeling unsettled again…as usual.

Why does Paula still feel hollow and Justin still feel defeated?

Might I suggest an answer? Could it be they’re competing for the wrong prize and, to their own detriment, actually winning it?

You see, Justin and Paula, in their recent history of combat, have been fighting to determine who is right and who is wrong. And the winner is the one with the high ground of the facts being on their side…the right one. But the prize never makes good on the promises it makes.

Determining who is right and who is wrong will never resolve marital conflict. Let me repeat that. Determining who is right and who is wrong will never resolve marital conflict. You see, in order to “win” the chronic fight that they are engaged in, they must turn away from each other and then turn on each other. They have to set themselves up against each other and then attack each other. Someone must “win” and someone must “lose,” and that is no “win” at all.

Think of it another way. We were once embattled against God. Who had the moral high ground? Who had the facts on their side? Well, that would be God. But that didn’t resolve the problem…it WAS the problem. The enmity between us was resolved only by a cross. It was resolved by love and by mercy. It was resolved out of grace. This is what Justin and Paula need.

They need motivations that are for the betterment of the other. They need to be willing to be wronged and love anyway. They need to be willing to be right, but not make that the main issue. If there is enmity between them, resolving the enmity is the goal…not proving who is right or wrong.

It’s not that the facts don’t matter, but they only matter in the greater context of the right prize…the prize of holy oneness. When oneness is the goal of a marriage, suddenly turning on each other is folly…not a strategy. It is destructive…not victorious.

When Justin and Paula understand the need for the cross to have its effect on their marriage, their warfare will be transformed. They will no longer be fighting against each other, but alongside each other after the proper goal of oneness.

And, by the way, the cross will have the same effect in your marriage, too. That’s what the cross does…it destroys enmity and replaces it with grace.