Communication is a key ingredient to a growing, happy, and healthy marriage. Married couples need to learn how to communicate in ways that foster growth, encourage openness, and cultivate love. When husbands and wives communicate the right way, great things happen.

Many married couples today, however, fail to do what is right when communicating with each other. Instead of bringing up, they tear each other down; instead of encouraging one another to love, they discourage one another and cause the other to resent marrying them; and instead of becoming a "safe space" for the spouse to openly share, they become the first to criticize and condemn.

Friends, this shouldn't be!

What it means to love with our mouths

Every Christian husband and wife needs to realize that love is not just a four-letter word that brings a warm, fuzzy feeling whenever it is present. Love, or the lack of it, fuels our actions, behaviors, and words towards our spouses.

Ephesians 5:22-33 tells us that we should love our spouses: husbands should love their wives as Christ loved the church, and wives should submit to their husbands as the church submits to Christ. Verse 21 tells us that we should be "submitting to one another in the fear of God."

As we follow this instruction, we ought to remember one way to do it. Ephesians 4:15 tells us that we should be "speaking the truth in love."

Reflecting upon these, let's talk about wrong ways of communication that we should avoid in our marriages.

1) Lying

Married couples need to be honest, even if it hurts. Honest communication will build trust between couples. Communicating deceitfully will simply break down whatever amount of trust is left.

Couples should be honest when they talk to each other. Hiding secrets will breed distrust, and will be a fertile ground for secret sins. Couples are encouraged not to hide anything from one another.

2) Reminding one another of past sins

Married couples should avoid reminding one another of past sins. When a spouse repeatedly brings some offense to remembrance, the spouse will feel condemned and unforgiven. More than that, they will feel unloved.

Proverbs 17:9 tells us that "he who covers a transgression seeks love, but he who repeats a matter separates friends." Reminding our spouses of their faults will not bring anything good from it - especially if we repeat it for the 'nth' time after years have passed.

The solution? 1 Corinthians 13:5 says love "thinks no evil." We must not meditate on our spouse's faults.

3) Talking down to each other

When we talk down to our spouses, we will never be able to bring them up. Life and death is in the power of the tongue; why expect good things when all we ever tell our spouses are negative, condescending and insulting remarks?

We must avoid being a negative talker. This doesn't mean we shouldn't talk about problems and other important matters anymore. What it means is that we must choose to rephrase our words to become uplifting, rather than demeaning.

This is very applicable when our spouses try to admit a fault or open some private matter up to us. When they're vulnerable, we must not risking breaking them apart with our words.

In closing

We must always choose to build our spouses up. When we speak the right way and cultivate honest, loving communication, we allow for growth and greater intimacy with them.