Bounce Back In Style 2nd Edition Edition | Page 22

INTERVIEW WITH PASTORS

AITY & DENNIS INYANG
Q. Congratulations! You both have just recently celebrated 24 wonderful
years of marriage!
A. Thank you. We give God all the glory
Q a: Aity, what does it mean to be married to Dennis?
A: It's very interesting. It is an experience of having to share my life with
someone who deeply loves and cares for me. In my husband I find a friend
who understands me and shares my high and low moments. Relating with
him has given me knowledge and wisdom in relating with my professional
colleagues who are male.
Q b: Dennis, what does it mean to be married to Aity?
A: It's great and exciting and I treasure the years we have shared our lives
together. She is my friend and confidant, my most committed ministry partner. Besides being the simple, warm and homely girl who stole my heart in
my youth, it feels good to be married to a star. I imagine that many guys envy
me.
Q: To many, 24 years is a long time, and there seems to be "short-wave
band" marriages today. To some couples an exit route is pre-determined
before they start the marriage. What do you think of this?
A. Aity: If you go into marriage with a mindset to ship out at the slightest challenge, I can assure you that you will
pack your bags and call it quits in no time. Nothing you want to build is easy; destroying is much easier. It takes
time to build anything worthwhile. People go through tough and thin to build their business or career but they
may not demonstrate the same patience and resilience when it comes to their marriage. Many people have dumped
their spouses and gotten married to someone else only to find out that human beings are basically almost the same;
so you see them working harder to keep the second marriage than they did the first one. When you realise that you
are not married to an angel and neither are you one yourself, you will take it easy with your spouse and forgive their
mistakes just like you expect them to forgive yours. Some one rightly said that for a good marriage you need a short
memory and a big waste paper basket.
A. Dennis: It doesn't seem such a long time to me. The truth is that
when your marriage is not good and every day seems like some hell
on earth, even one year is like eternity. When your marriage is fun,
you are oblivious of the passage of time. But for marriage to be fun
and last a lifetime, it is a matter of choice. Love is more than a feeling; it is a decision. The challenge, however, is when that decision is
one-sided. It takes two for marriage to be good and enduring. I think
we have been fortunate on this score.
Q: I know you had humble beginnings, but many high profile
couples tend to go the route of having a pre-nuptial agreement.
What do you say about this?
A: That is a rather strange practice. It is like setting yourself up for
divorce or signing the divorce papers before your marriage. Happily,
we don't hear of that in Nigeria or, maybe, we are too far from the
circles where such is practiced. It is also not biblical. The scripture
enjoins us to live by faith and that includes marriage. You must believe that your marriage will work and, in the words of Apostle Paul,
make no provision for the flesh. The pre-nuptial agreement we had
was that our marriage is for life. We recommend that to every intending couple.
Q: .We live in the 21st century, with facebook,twitter, instagram, whatsapp and a host of social media and communication
22