Things I Didn’t Know About Marriage
I’ve been married for 35 years as of yesterday. Our marriage is now as old as most of the people I pastor. We were born in a different day: one before social media, cell phones, or even the Internet. In some ways, it feels like forever ago. In other ways, it seems like just yesterday.
I still have a lot to learn about marriage, but here are some things I’ve learned along the way.
Marriage is Revealing
Nothing will reveal so much about yourself as marriage. (Parenting comes as a close second.) Before you get married, you can withhold part of yourself from others. All that changes when you walk down the aisle. Even if you try, your real self will be revealed, and there’s nowhere to hide. Marriage revealed sins I didn’t even know I had. It left me exposed in ways I hadn’t anticipated, and that turns out to be a very good thing.
The best part is, after being ruthlessly exposed, that you discover what it means to be loved when marriage works as it should.
Marriage is Hard
I knew this, but I didn’t really know it. I knew that every marriage would weather storms, but I think I believed that only bad marriages would be hard. Now I know that even the best marriages are hard.
When a bride and groom talks about for better and for worse, they’re really only expecting the better parts. The same goes for richer and poorer, and in sickness and in health. Mark my words: you will encounter plenty of both, and it will be harder than you think. Don’t ever think you’ll escape. Marriage is hard and it will cost you everything.
Things Get Better
When I say better, I’m not talking about a little better. I’m talking about a knock your socks off, I can’t believe how good it is kind of better. For most of us, we will pay the price early. We will have to sacrifice our selfishness, our expectations, and our dreams of what marriage will be. For a while, it will look like there’s little payoff. It’s at the moment that you stop looking for the payoff that you will experience it. When you stop expecting marriage to serve you and focus on serving your spouse, you will find that marriage starts to bring a joy and satisfaction that it never did when you were looking for it.
The way to a good marriage is persistence, selflessness, and sacrifice, and in general, the reward is much bigger than you can imagine.
Old Love Is Better Than Young Love
Young love is exciting. It’s like a fire that burns on kindling. It’s quick and powerful, but it can quickly burn out.
Old love is less exciting. It’s like a piece of hardwood that’s been on the fire for hours. You won’t see the same flashes of fire, but it burns with an intensity and heat that can’t compare. A fire built on kindling will quickly die; the embers of an old fire can burn for a surprisingly long time.
Marriage is like that. As someone once told me when we got married, I would only discover what real love is after being married for 20 or 30 years. I only knew young love then; now I’ve learned something even more powerful.
No wonder marriage is such a picture of the eternal romance revealed in the gospel. We’re exposed and yet somehow loved with a love we don’t deserve. We’re invited in to a relationship that cost Christ everything and that will also demand everything from us. We don’t do it for the payback, but the rewards are greater than we can imagine. And the love of God for us in Jesus turns out to be more powerful than any other kind of love.
Marriage is costly but worth it. 35 years is just enough to get started. I’m looking forward to learning new lessons in the coming years if God allows.
