Marriage - Read with Caution (and there WILL be a part two)

I say "Read With Caution" because I am probably really about to step on some toes here with this one. I am probably also going to say some things that you may think are completely out of left field and may get me labeled in some circles.

Oh well...

I have some thoughts on marriage that I really want to say. Make that - some things I feel called to say. Because just as I am passionate about YOU and your knowing how relentlessly God pursues you and loves you, I am also passionate about marriage. "Why?" you ask? That's a fair question since I am staring down the backroad of my own failed one. I am passionate about it because, as many of you know all too well, Satan is passionate about killing marriage. One by one. Like soldiers on a battlefield, we are picked off. One by one. We barely have time to wrap our minds around the comrade across the field who has fallen when we look over to see that the one right next to us is down. And it makes us fearful. And questioning. And we wonder, "Who's next?" And before we know it, it's us.

So, indulge me a moment and let me share my thoughts with you husbands and wives out there. Do you know what, in my opinion, is the number one killer of marriage? I have not done the research, but my honest and humble opinion is this: Selfishness. It is not finances. It is not adultery. It is not time. It is pure and simple selfishness.

That, and a failed ideal of what marriage is all about to begin with. Do you realize that marriage is the only - let me reiterate ONLY - relationship compared with the relationship of Christ and His followers? Do you get that? Because I certainly did not. In any way. I did not grasp, realize, respect, nor honor that connection. And we as disciples read those words in THE Word, and you know what we do? We sit and look at our spouses and think to ourselves, "If only he/she would act right, then I could act the way God calls me to."

Selfishness.

I was looking online for a book when I stumbled across another book. I have not read it, so do not take this as an endorsement, but the title intrigued me and I have not been able to get it off my mind for quite a while.

"What If Marriage Was Designed to Make Us Holy, Not Happy?"

I do not even remember the name of the author. But the title was enough to challenge me. (And yes, I do intend to read it one day). What if we really do not 'get it'?

Marriage was not designed to be one giant love story like we see in the movies. We have such a distorted, demented view of male/female relationships because we are looking to romance novels and movies instead of to the CREATOR of the relationship Himself. No offense to Nicholas Sparks and his colleagues in the romance department, but I do not believe marriage, or relationships, were designed to make us happy and fulfill us. No person on this planet can do that. And we are putting entirely too much pressure on another person to do what God and God alone can do in our hearts.

I believe that marriage was created to draw us nearer to God Himself. To know Him in a deeper way by living, on earth, in a relationship that should challenge us to know Him in a more intimate, real, selfless-love kind of way.

So, my words to the married are this: (and I apologize in advance)

Get. Over. Yourselves.

Quit pointing fingers and blaming and feeling sorry for yourselves and get on your knees and ask God to use you to bless your spouse. Read "Love and Respect" and "The Love Dare." These two books completely changed and challenged my perspective of marriage.

Although it was too late for me, DON'T let it be too late for you.