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FINDING SOMEONE
TO FILL YOUR GAPS
"God, what were you thinking?"
exclaims a wife as she considers the odd behavior of her husband.
What could the Creator have possibly had in mind to have made
two such different creatures, then joined them in wedlock "until
death do you part".
I think I have stumbled onto the
answer.
In his book "About Town,"
Ben Yagoda quotes a letter describing the two most different people
on the planet. E. B. White was writing about Harold Ross and Katharine
Angell, his bosses at "The New Yorker" magazine:
"Ross, though something of
a genius, had serious gaps. In Katharine, he found someone who
filled them in. No two people were ever more different than Mr.
Ross and Mrs. Angell; what he lacked, she had; what she lacked,
he had. She complemented him in a way that, in retrospect, seems
to me to have been indispensable to the survival of the magazine.
She was a product of Miss Winsor's and Bryn Mawr. Ross was a high
school dropout. She had a natural refinement of manner and speech;
Ross mumbled and bellowed and swore…."
Granted, these two were not husband
and wife, but colleagues on the editorial staff. Nevertheless,
they seem like spouses. Especially as God first envisioned the
matchup.
In the Garden of Eden, God saw
that in spite of the incredible plant and animal life around him,
Adam was unfulfilled. "It is not good for the man to be alone,"
the Lord said. "I will make a helper suitable for him."
(That's the New American Standard Bible version of Genesis 2:18)
A helper suitable is what the venerable King James Version called
"a help meet," sometimes corrupted to "helpmate."
But it's the Hebrew that informs us here.
The Hebrew has kenegdo, usually
translated "suitable" or "meet" or "fitting",
and meaning "corresponding to" or "in front of
him." This is a compound form found in Genesis 2:18 and 20
and nowhere else in the Bible. The Word Biblical Commentary says
this hybrid word literally means "like opposite him."
Eve was created to be like Adam in some ways (they were both human
and in the image of God) and completely unlike him in others---the
list could fill a book.
It turns out that Man really is
from Mars and Women from Venus in many respects. But not in all.
Sometimes they are One. And that is the beauty of the Original
Plan: God made man and woman to fill each other's gaps and to
become Whole as they cannot in any other way.
In her book on Genesis titled
"God's Story," Anne Graham Lotz writes: "Eve was
as different from Adam as Adam was different from Eve. But the
differences were complementary. Because of the emotional and physical
differences, Eve would supply what Adam lacked, and Adam would
supply what Eve lacked. Eve would complete Adam as a "a helper
suitable for him" (Genesis 2:18)."
On a personal note, she adds,
"The differences between my husband and myself have been
the basis for many fights." He wants every item in its place
while she never notices when the house is a mess. He is outgoing,
she introverted. He is athletic; she loves her books. Then, one
day Anne and husband Dan Lotz made a study of spiritual gifts
and came to the earthshaking discovery that they were created
as opposites.
That discovery, she writes, "led
us to recognize other differences, acknowledge those differences
by name, learn to accept them in each other, and then grow to
appreciate them for the balance they give to our marriage relationship."
It turns out that "incompatibility,"
far from being grounds for divorce, was what the Creator had in
mind from the beginning. The idea is to fill each other's gaps.
Now, this principle can be taken only so far, like all good rules
for living. For example, a Christian should not marry outside
the faith. Nothing could be more disparate than a follower of
Jesus joined with an atheist or a Muslim or a wiccan. But, it's
not a good idea. "Be not unequally yoked," says the
Scripture on this subject (II Corinthians 6:14).
In premarital counseling, I ask
the man and woman to identify areas in which they are alike. Often,
they name backgrounds, life goals, education, family heritage,
faith, and enjoyments. Then I ask, "How are you different?"
For most, this is the first time they have been asked to analyze
the ways in which they are opposite. In almost every case, one
is orderly and the other messier, one spontaneous and the other
addicted to schedules, one serious and the other quick to see
the fun in life. It's at the point of the opposites that we spend
some time preparing them for what's ahead.
The differences in a husband and
wife can destroy a marriage. However, properly understood and
appreciated, each one's distinctive gifts and ways can reinforce
the other.
Ask any carpenter. Two 2 x 4 boards
nailed together are stronger than one 4 x 4. They are the same
size, but the varying grains in the two pieces give an added strength
to each other.
It turns out the Creator knew
what He was doing.
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