Usually I am a glass is half full guy. Sometimes it’s mostly full. For my wife, Karla, it’s half empty. Sometimes it’s mostly empty.

I like all vegetables. I think they are pretty. Karla says vegetables are for eating not for looking. Learning this news, I said, “In that case, I don’t like all vegetables very much.” She loves eating vegetables.

My favorite time of the year is fall. It means football is back. Baseball is still going. Basketball will soon be starting. Karla hates fall. It means football is back. Baseball is still going. Basketball will soon be starting.

I stand on a platform and speak to hundreds of people each week. Karla would rather stuff a wireless microphone up her nose than set foot on a platform, let alone speak publically.

I like adventure as long as it means staying on the ground and doing nothing dangerous. Karla has been known to skydive from 14,000 feet. Once she signed us up to zip line without thinking that I’d rather stuff a wireless microphone up my nose than go zip lining through the jungles of Mexico.

My point, frequently (but not always) opposites attract. Karla and I are opposites in some things, but we are likeminded in important matters (God, priorities, money, etc.). All marriages (whether the couple is as opposite as can be or peas in a pod) require work. Even when two people love Jesus, they still need to invest time and effort in their marriage; think of the other person’s interests above their own and genuinely strive for the other’s betterment.

One of the oldest observations in the Bible states, “That is why a man leaves his father and mother and is united to his wife, and they become one flesh” (Genesis 2:24). The successful marriages are the ones that figure out that two different people must become one. Oh, not in everything, try as I might, I’m fairly confident that Karla will never become a baseball fan, and I am equally confident I will not be eating zucchini any time soon. Still, the happily-ever-after couples put Jesus first, their spouse (not self) second, work to be of one mind in the important things of life and never have your spouse so frustrated that he/she wants to stick a wireless microphone up his/her nose.