Some reflections on marriage

It struck me as sort of coincidence when Paul walked through the door today and informed me that he’d heard through the grapevine about this couple who has decided to get a divorce. They have literally been married for 14 months, maybe. It really made me sad. I thought it was coincidence because the whole subject of marriage has been on my mind lately.

At church on Sunday we sat several rows back from an elderly couple. It was absolutely precious the display of their affection. I could not help but to stare at them. I’m a people watcher anyway, but this couple in particular kept drawing me in. She whispered something to him and I’m guessing she asked for her jacket because he so tenderly pulled it up over her shoulders, wrapped his one arm around her to straighten the front of the jacket, while using his other arm to pull at it from the bottom and loosen wrinkles. I thought about all of the years they had been together and how the husband helped his wife put a jacket on with all of his heart. It was like I could see the love as a visible substance floating over them. Weird, I know. I watched as she needed to get up and walk out of the service, how he held the small of her back and held her hand to lift her to her feet.

Then I let my eyes wander to a couple that I know. I love thinking about marriage, I’ve had the dream written on my heart since I was a young child. This couple is middle-aged, and as near as I can tell have been married for more than 20 years. They leaned into each other to share a whisper, their shoulders brushed, her head lay against his side for a minute. It was all so natural. And this lady that I know, she’s usually a busy, hardworking woman. But this Sunday she was dressed up with her hair pulled back in a sparkle clip. I couldn’t help but to think how beautiful she looked, how beautiful her husband probably thought she looked. Not just because of how she looked, or because of the rarity that she wears something overly feminine (and I know her..), but because they’ve been married for so long and there is just an underlying adoration there that lingers over them and around them. And I like to think about how it all works.

Most of the couples I know at my church have this way about them with their spouses and I often find myself thinking about what a beautiful thing it is. And trust me, it’s not because they are at church and they are supposed to be in love. It’s very real because you cannot fake the natural tendencies of affection. A glow is not something you can command your complexion, but I see it all of the time. I can only hope to have the same show, although I love my husband and you’ve probably gathered this about me, I love being married. But I still feel the process of oneness taking place. We aren’t there yet, in fact, many of the young couples I know lack the same intense display I gather from the older couples. And that’s ok. For me, it’s a worthy pursuit.

And this unique oneness, the beautiful mystery of the unity that takes place between a couple who has been married for awhile makes me think about sex, and that’s the truth. I almost didn’t say it. But it does, it makes me think about the way sex was designed, to be something mystical and majestic, and something that God intended from the beginning of time for a man and a woman to experience, to become one. I think about what a precious, matchless, intimate experience sex must be between a couple that is truly walking in that oneness. I pray that one day I’ll understand a half of what that means if my heart will ever heal from all of the years that I didn’t have a clue.

Marriage at it’s finest is under attack. Most never make it to see the things I described above because they give up. They can’t take it. No one ever told us it wasn‘t going to be easy. I’d lived through enough breakup, divorce, and attempted divorce to know it wouldn’t be but I thought love would fix everything. I know I‘m not the only woman to believe love conquers all. Yet I’ve learned that God’s love in us and through us conquers all, our love by itself is a mess of emotions.

So you get a mix out there. Couples that actually make it, 1 out of 2. Couples that make it several years and call it quits. Couples that can‘t forgive after a year of marriage. A Something Corporate song comes to mind here, “You marry a role and you give up your soul until you breakdown.” A common mindset.

Then there is the latter, the couple that is terrified of marriage. I know enough of these guys from the pregnancy center. You can read them all of the statistics in the world, tell them heartwarming stories of real love but they don’t believe you because they’ve seen too many times what marriage is really like. The way their parents modeled it.

Drunk dad beating the crap out of the mom. Detached mom cheating repeatedly on dad. Mom and dad living completely separate lives. Mom and dad happily married, and then separate out of the blue. These kids rarely recover. Especially if they never know the restoration of Christ. They meet a partner, move in together, get jobs, have babies, but they’ll never for a day trust each other. And their kids may look at them one day and see the resonance of devotion hover over their heads (if they stay together that long, odds are highly unlikely) but they’ll miss out on the unmistakable, unconditional love that I see in these couples who are completely committed to one another, for better or worse.

What a mess our culture has made of marriage. Divorcing after 14 months of marriage, that’s ridiculous.

And yes, it’s easy for me to say that. I married a fantastic man who is my soul mate and above all else loves God. I come second. That is perfectly fine with me.

But I made a choice too. I knew what I wanted, and I knew what I didn’t want. And I knew what God wanted for me and I went with that, nothing else mattered. It didn’t matter to me how long we dated, or what other people thought, or how much I could have made it work with others that I had loved. No, I went with the deepest longings of my soul, not the insane whims of my overly emotional heart. That’s the initial secret, I think. And then for the rest of it, Jesus, Jesus, Jesus. What else is there?