Can I be honest with you?
I need some marriage advice. No, not for any of my relationships, but for the life that I said "I do" to, last year.
The honeymoon stage has officially ended. One year in, and it's time for the rocky stuff to start. No deep dark scandals or hidden agendas. Just hard stuff being hard. Humans being humans. Sin being sin. Imperfect people being imperfect. Don't go get all up in arms, I expected disillusion. I knew it was coming.
Like a new marriage, the time of testing has come. Will I still love you now that you have hurt me? Now that I know a different side of you? Now that I know that we are both selfish?
Don't we all experience disillusion in our lives? Disillusioned with a spouse, a job, a child, a church or a friend, we all carry the past wounds of unmet, or worse, completely shattered expectations. I can literally hear the sound of all of you married folks' heads nodding with understanding. You know what I'm talking about.
So how do we handle it? What do we do? How do we respond when we feel hurt, or lied to, or betrayed?
Give up? Get angry? Get bitter? Whine? Mope? Wallow? Run? Hide? Add fuel to the fire with our own self-righteousness?
Let me tell you what I think I know. I know that ALL things in this life aside from Christ are bound to disappoint us. We need to get used to it. Christ is the only reality that can meet my expectations.
So it's time for me to fall back in love again. Time for a re-up. Time to remember my one true love, Christ. Time to fall in love with the life that I really married, and not the life that I thought I got myself into. Time to remember that I too, am broken and selfish, and sinful beyond measure. Time to take the plank out of my own eye and own up to the fuel that I added to the flames. Time for a new kind of love. The kind of love that follows commitment, and not the romantic idealistic love that precedes commitment.
So I pour out my heart like water before the Lord. I repeat His promises to myself over and over again. I wait patiently. I do not give up on doing good. I will trust His call. I will listen for His voice. I will not abandon the work of His hands. I will not call my mother or my girlfriends and complain about my proverbial "husband." I will love. I will build. I will respect. I will pray. I will believe. I will trust the One who sent me. I put my whole life into this place, I am committed to it, and I love it.
And in the mean time? I will REJOICE. I never understood that passage until now. "Consider it pure joy, whenever you face trials of many kinds." What? How can I rejoice? My heart is broken! I'm not going to "put on a happy face" if my heart isn't in it anymore!
I can rejoice because I know that while my heart may be temporarily injured, my character is not. I've been told that hard times produce perseverance, and that perseverance builds more character, and that character produces hope: hope that the reward waiting on the other side is worth the pain. Welcome to maturity. Doing the hard thing that you know will ultimately bring about good results, even when you don't feel like doing it. It's that simple.
So when you see me smiling through the tears or clasping hands with the one I chose despite the tension, try not to judge me. I'm not faking it, I'm building character. I'm holding out to prove that Hope is true.
I can rejoice because I know that while my heart may be temporarily injured, my character is not. I've been told that hard times produce perseverance, and that perseverance builds more character, and that character produces hope: hope that the reward waiting on the other side is worth the pain. Welcome to maturity. Doing the hard thing that you know will ultimately bring about good results, even when you don't feel like doing it. It's that simple.
So when you see me smiling through the tears or clasping hands with the one I chose despite the tension, try not to judge me. I'm not faking it, I'm building character. I'm holding out to prove that Hope is true.
