12
Better Together
Chains do not hold a marriage together. It is threads, hundreds of tiny threads which sew people together through the years.
Simone Signoret
You and your mate have a shared story. How you met, what first attracted you to each other, the adjustments of married life, the birth of children, adventures you’ve enjoyed, hardships you’ve weathered together—all combine to make up your mutual history, threads that hold you together through the years.
What are your threads? Think back to your early days of courtship. What drew you to one another? What did you see in your mate that began to connect your heart to theirs? What did you do that began to bring you together? Was it going out to dinner, hiking, listening to music, playing a sport, taking a class? What shared memories did you create? What made you laugh? What were your inside jokes? What was your first trip together? What were your terms of affection?
Many simple things form the strength of the bond you share—laughing, crying, long conversations, enjoying a sunset. Each of these is a thread that connects you together through the years. There are also major threads such as the birth of your children, buying a home, or the joys and heartaches you’ve experienced as a couple. Even your most serious conflicts and negative experiences can serve as threads as you endure and overcome.
Your shared history is a sustaining force for lasting love. These experiences are a treasure that can serve as collateral as you face difficult times in your married life.
If you have been married less than ten years, it is likely you are still building that collateral. You have put in a great deal of effort but may not yet be reaping the full reward. Mark Twain once observed, “Love seems the swiftest, but it is the slowest of all growths. No man or woman really knows what perfect love is until they have been married a quarter of a century.”1 It takes time to build that shared history and enjoy the benefits of your investment. Unfortunately, some young couples choose to bail out of their marriages before they have had a chance to enjoy the fruit of their perseverance.
Looking Forward
When you began reading this book, you may have felt hopeless or at least seriously discouraged about your marriage, with no belief that things could possibly change between you and your spouse. You are not alone. Most marriages experience times, or even prolonged seasons, that are painful and seem impassable.
It is helpful at these times to both rehearse your shared history and think ahead to what you hope for in your relationship. It may be hard to picture today what the two of you can make of your marriage, but I would encourage you to begin to cast a vision for what can be.
You both have longings and desires for life ahead. You have personal goals as well as marital and family goals. You have ideas about how you would like to treat each other, what you want to do for recreation, and how you’d like to shape the character and competencies of your children.
It can help to create a new, shared vision with your mate, a “marriage vision”2 that will help you define your intentions for the future and inspire you toward experiencing a thriving relationship. To do this, set aside unpressured time when the two of you can do some brainstorming. Choose a time when you are fresh and free of cell phones, kids, and so forth.
Begin by each making a list of goals you want to see happen in your marriage. State each one positively, as if it were already happening. Here is a sample list:
We are affectionate.
We respect each other.
We have a weekly date night.
We take time to notice our protectors during or after a conflict.
We are compassionate toward young parts in ourselves and each other.
We enjoy sex.
We laugh together.
We express appreciation at least once per day.
We have daily couple time.
When one of us is away, we stay in daily contact.
We make collaborative decisions.
We prioritize each other over parents, extended family, and friends.
We nurture our spiritual lives.
Once you make your list, share it with your mate. Put a plus symbol next to any goals you both agree are important. Make a new, combined list including all goals you both think are important. Then review the list and be more specific. Identify two to three strategies or behaviors that will accomplish each item. For instance:
1. We make collaborative decisions.
a. When determining where we will spend the holidays, we talk together and agree on our schedule. We do not commit to our families in any way until we have fully agreed as a couple.
b. When making a purchase over $200, we consult each other first.
2. We have daily couple time.
a. After the kids are down, we take thirty minutes to unwind together and share about our day or concerns.
b. During couple time, we shut off our phones, television, and so forth, and give each other our undivided attention.
This combined list of goals and strategies becomes your marriage vision. Post the goals of your vision someplace where you will see them daily. Review your complete list of strategies weekly until it becomes part of your DNA as a couple. Remember, this is a living document you can change or add to as time goes on.
Creating a shared marriage vision will help you know where you’re headed and help you stay on course when life starts to pull you off course. The vision will empower you to change by keeping you mindful of your goals as a couple. If there are one or more items that one of you felt were very important but the other didn’t, make a note of those items and, at another time, use the skills provided in chapter 6 to address them together.
Becoming Your Best Together
We are all in the process of becoming. The spouse you see today is not the spouse you will see in the future. My husband and I have been married for forty years. We had no idea how much we would both change through the ups and downs of life together. The selfishness that characterized our early years of marriage has given way to a willingness to give and compromise. The tendency to seek to satisfy our own needs first has given way to a mutually supportive concern with meeting the needs of both of us. We still have our selfish moments, but we each recognize them and are able to apologize and change course more quickly.
Are you feeling discouraged about your marriage and the prospects for change? God’s got this. He is in the business of transformation. He wants you to experience the joys of marriage even more than you do. After all, it was his idea.
As I look back on the seasons of our married life, there were times when the only thing holding our marriage together was the commitment we’d made to stick it out. One such season was when my husband was questioning his love for me. I was devastated and hurt. Knowing I was loved by God was an anchor for me during that time. I was able to find peace in the midst of my husband’s confusion and not react out of fear or hurt.
Although I was tempted to push him away and protect myself from further pain, I was able to stay centered in my relationship with God as my husband sorted through his emotions. Then, when he did express his desire to restore our relationship, I was tempted to punish him. But after I reflected on how much my loving God had forgiven me, it was hard to justify holding out on forgiveness for my husband.
God’s love softens hearts and makes restoration possible. Having an intimate relationship with God changes the way you see yourself (as fully known and fully loved) and your mate (as a work in progress in the hands of a loving God). When loving God is your priority, knowing how to love the other becomes clear. It becomes easier to allow the space and time for God to work in their life and in yours.
We are all in the process of becoming who we were made to be. If you can see your mate as someone in process instead of a static set of negative traits, you will open up a space for them to grow. When you yourself have been given this space by God, who sees your “warts” and loves you still, you are more able to offer the space to others. You can help your spouse become all God desires them to be.
Tim Keller says:
Within this Christian vision of marriage, here’s what it means to fall in love. It is to look at another person and get a glimpse of what God is creating, and to say, “I see who God is making you, and it excites me! I want to be part of that. I want to partner with you and God in the journey you are taking to his throne. And when we get there, I will look at your magnificence and say, ‘I always knew you could be like this. I got glimpses of it on earth, but now look at you!’”3
What a tremendous opportunity we have to witness our mate becoming all they were meant to be. Your marriage is a work in progress. Together, you and your mate share a venture that is unique in all the world. No two people are like you. No two have more potential to shape each other into their best selves than do you.
When you said “I do,” you likely had no idea that the journey that lay ahead would involve as many roadblocks and potholes as you have discovered. Your picture then did not include the detours and road construction that would be necessary. You couldn’t have anticipated the personal makeovers that would need to occur as self-centered ways of thinking and being are exposed and molted to allow love to grow.
Marriage was designed by God to meet our deepest needs for companionship and intimacy. It was also designed to be our place of most profound transformation. We cannot enjoy the heights of the first without experiencing the metamorphosis of the latter. I hope you embrace the adventure. There are vistas ahead you cannot imagine.
Discussion Questions: Chapter 12
Group and Couple Questions
- Share with your group the highlights of your shared history. You might include how you met, how you became engaged, funny moments, difficult seasons, and so forth. What are your significant “threads”?
- Create your “Marriage Vision” by following the directions in the chapter. Share with the group two of your goals and two or three strategies that you intend to implement to meet those goals. If you are comfortable, invite them to hold you accountable to working toward those goals by checking in on your progress occasionally.
- Read the quote by Tim Keller aloud. Share with your mate the “glimpses of magnificence” you have been able to see in them, evidences of God’s work in their life. Discuss together how you can hinder God’s activity in each other (stir up protectors) and how you can support his work in each other’s lives.
- Read 2 Thessalonians 3:5. If your heart was filled with God’s love and Christ’s perseverance, how would that impact your marriage? Your tenacity during hard times? What is the relationship between love and perseverance?
- How does it help to think of your mate as being “a work in progress” rather than defining them by their negative traits? How might such a gracious attitude align with how God sees you? Read Romans 5:8. Does God wait till we are perfect to love us? What implications does your answer have for loving your mate?
- What are the “glimpses of magnificence” you can see in your partner today? If you can’t see them, look harder. God sees them and he wants you to share his vision. If you do see them, savor them and know there are more to come!