Mini-Thought: Finding a Good Thing
Hey everyone! Happy Sabbath! There have been quite a few weeks lately where a busy week or being out of town has meant I’ve been unable to put together a full-fledged Sabbath Thought, so I’m going to start trying to post Sabbath Mini-Thoughts on weeks like those. Here’s the first one!
It seems to me that as our society moves farther and farther from the idea of marriage as a sacred, God-ordained institution, the more the idea seeps into the Church that the vows between a husband and a wife can be discarded when times get tough or they become inconvenient. God gives very specific instances where He condones the termination of a marriage, the chief of these being infidelity, but none of them come remotely close to today’s half-baked excuses of, “We just don’t work together,” or, “I just don’t love him anymore.”
The Bible tells us, “He who finds a wife finds a good thing, and obtains favor from the Lord” (Proverbs 18:22, emphasis mine). The union of a husband and a wife, treated correctly, is a blessing from God—not the “ol’ ball and chain” that so many disgruntled spouses see it as. In fact, marriage is the one big metaphor God gives us to understand the relationship of the Church with Christ (Ephesians 5:22-33). The love and respect that God intended to be shared between a husband a wife ought to mirror the love and respect shared between Christ and His people.
That’s not to say that the ideal marriage is devoid of disagreement or rough patches. The point is that when those times come, converted spouses ought to be working through together them with the love and respect commanded by God instead of throwing in the towel and walking away from the most important human relationship in their lives. It won’t always be easy, but there is no reason that a God-fearing husband and wife should not be able to reconcile their differences. Marriages don’t fall apart because of tough times or difficult circumstances—they fall apart when one or more parties stop caring enough to try.
With the exception of God’s calling and Holy Spirit, my wife is the greatest blessing in my life. And while I am no veteran of marriage or life in general, I understand that the vows I made to God and Mary on my wedding day are lifelong, and until there is no breath left in me to keep them, I am bound by them. And I’m happy about that, because she’s worth keeping. There will be difficulties. There will be times we don’t see eye-to-eye. There will be disagreements and hurt feelings. But we will work through them together, because when God brought my wife and me together, I found a good thing. And that good thing—like the relationship between all of us and our Savior—is worth working through every difficulty. The love, respect, insight, strength, and companionship Mary and I have shared in our short time together makes me excited for what we will find as we continue to perfect this relationship together.
Marriage is blessing. Finding a wife means finding a good thing. And as much as it depends on you…make it work.
Until next time,
Jeremy
