Treasuring Marriage

Maybe you’ve heard about the empty-nest couple, as the husband took off his glasses and lay his head on his wife’s lap she said “You know, without your glasses on you look just like the young handsome man I married.” He replied, “Without my glasses, you still look pretty good, too.”

It’s a good thing that marriages survive on more than good looks!

To all who are married and have stuck it out through good times and bad, for richer or poorer, in sickness and health, and plan to keep doing so until death parts your ways, I offer you my most sincere commendation and appreciation. I’d give you a medal if I had one!

Marriage is a wonderful gift from God. It’s His divine design for the good of mankind, for companionship, friendship, intimacy, help, encouragement, strength, security, and joy. God knew what He was doing when He created a woman for Adam from his rib, “bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh,” as Adam described this exciting new creature in the garden.

The Bible says, “Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh” (Genesis 2:24). In affirming this truth, Jesus went on to say, “So they are no longer two, but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, let not man separate” (Matthew 19:6).

Contrary to popular opinion, marriage is not a man-made institution subject to change with the cultural tide. It’s God’s original blueprint for the flourishing of the human race. His design for marriage is for one man to be united with one woman in a lifetime covenant of faithfulness and love. It’s a perfect plan. And it’s the height of arrogance and foolishness for anyone to dismiss or attempt to redefine what God has perfectly created for good.

“Let marriage be held in honor by all, and let the marriage bed be undefiled, for God will judge the sexually immoral and adulterous” (Hebrews 13:4).

I want to encourage you to honor marriage! Treasure your marriage by thanking God for the gift of your spouse, by praying with and for your spouse, by asking God to make you a better husband or wife, by learning to praise and encourage rather than critique and put down, by listening well, by loving sacrificially and respecting one another graciously, by resolving to work things out, by asking for forgiveness when needed and freely granting forgiveness, by choosing to overlook some faults and maintaining realistic expectations.

And if you’re not married, will you seek to be a champion for God’s way of doing marriage? For the blessing of every area of community life – economically, socially, mentally, emotionally, morally, spiritually?

My in-laws are celebrating 58 years of marriage this week. My parents’ 50^th wedding anniversary is in September. Amy and I will celebrate 27 years in a couple of weeks. Good, strong, thriving marriages aren’t based on good looks and they aren’t built on sand. It takes hard work, commitment, faithfulness, and love. But firm on the foundation of God’s grace, a marriage covenant can indeed last a lifetime.