What Do You Know About Love, Marriage and Family?
I feel compelled to write about love, marriage and family… just a few light topics before bedtime. So: “What Do You Know About Love, Marriage and Family?”
I guess the short answer to the title question for any of us in 2010 America is: “Not enough”.
I worked with a gentleman who raised not only his own children, but also his grandchild because the actual parents didn’t want the responsibility. Now, he’s in the process of repeating this cycle with his GREAT-grandchild! Why are adults refusing to grow up? While responsibility may have become a synonym for burden in our society, one thing I know is that family, marriage and love are some of the nicest inconveniences in life.
I saw a movie, “In Good Company” (2004), where a young man is asking an older man how he managed a happy marriage. The older man responds with “First you find someone that’s going to stay in the foxhole with you, and then you keep [yourself faithful].” (Umm… had to clean up the language a bit.) There’s a lot of truth in this line. Prior to meeting my own bride, I had dated a young lady who thought love was just a feeling. This prior girlfriend would get so irritated with me when I told her my understanding:
Love is a commitment, a willful action, to stay in love… and marriage? Marriage is a responsibility to stay committed when life gets hard. It’s staying in the foxhole when the pressures of life try to pull you away.
When I was dating the lady that eventually became my wife, we were up late in the evening, talking about the nature of love. That night, she said the unbelievable: love is more of a decision than a feeling. I couldn’t believe it: I had found that person who could stay in the foxhole with me! Now, I’m not saying that either one of us has it all together or that it’s beyond either of us to stumble, but we decided long ago that the word divorce was not in our vocabulary. And with God’s help, it never will be.
Now this message isn’t condemnation to anyone who has gone through a divorce. I’ve seen one spouse work oh-so-very-hard on the marriage only to see their partner walk away. And I admit that divorce sounds like a good option when the only other option is a life of misery with someone who just can’t meet your needs. In other words: option (A) stay married and have a miserable life, or option (B) cut your losses and make the best out of the remainder of your life. But there is an option (C): make a happy marriage. If people really believed that option (C) was worth it and achievable, we would see divorce rates plummet in this country.
Is a happy marriage achievable? I think if you can find the person that will stay in foxhole with you… absolutely. It takes mutual commitment to work on it. It takes a man choosing to relinquish his selfish desires, and deciding to cherish the woman he has committed to love, courting her heart and striving to live a life worthy of respect. It takes a woman who will demonstrate respect for her husband when the chinks are seen in his not-so-shining armor. It takes a resolution to love someone when they’re not lovable, helping someone who maybe doesn’t want your help, and being available at the most inconvenient times. It takes intentional acts to re-kindle the fire and just have fun together. I believe it’s very hard, but it’s also worth the effort. Everyone around the winners in the fight for a happy marriage is strengthened by the outcome. And waves of encouragement can extend to unborn generations. It’s hard, but it’s worth it… and it takes pressing past the emotions that scream at you to “run away!”.
I believe emotions are like engine indicator lights in a car: an error indication tells you something is wrong, but it doesn’t necessarily say “what” is wrong. I had a car that gave me an error every time it rained heavily. The first couple times it happened, I was anxious about what was wrong. Eventually, though, I discovered that heavy rain gave me a faulty reading. Emotions are that way. Sometimes they indicate something is wrong with you or your marriage, but sometimes they just give you a false reading because something is wrong in the environment. Is an alarm going off? Listen to it and investigate what’s triggering the alarm.
We live in a fast-paced, task-oriented culture, but we were made to be relational beings. As a result of our culture, we can often disregard the alarm until something major has happened, and just as it took time to get into the mess, it can take time to resolve the issues. Issues can cause other issues, which of course can cause even more issues. But a responsible adult takes ownership of the issues and cleans up the mess, modeling responsibility to the next generation.
How can children learn to be responsible adults unless they have been parented? We desperately need to learn, apply and pass on to our children the lost art of life-long, loving, marriages. What heritage do we leave our children when our happiness is dependent upon our circumstances? How much better to show them that with God’s help we can make our own happiness? I don’t have this mastered, but I’m committed to learning and applying whatever I can grasp, knowing that I’ll be better for it and that I will leave my own kids with more than I started with.
I guess the short answer to the title question for any of us in 2010 America is: “Not enough”.
I worked with a gentleman who raised not only his own children, but also his grandchild because the actual parents didn’t want the responsibility. Now, he’s in the process of repeating this cycle with his GREAT-grandchild! Why are adults refusing to grow up? While responsibility may have become a synonym for burden in our society, one thing I know is that family, marriage and love are some of the nicest inconveniences in life.
I saw a movie, “In Good Company” (2004), where a young man is asking an older man how he managed a happy marriage. The older man responds with “First you find someone that’s going to stay in the foxhole with you, and then you keep [yourself faithful].” (Umm… had to clean up the language a bit.) There’s a lot of truth in this line. Prior to meeting my own bride, I had dated a young lady who thought love was just a feeling. This prior girlfriend would get so irritated with me when I told her my understanding:
Love is a powerful feeling, but more than that… it’s a decision.
Love is a commitment, a willful action, to stay in love… and marriage? Marriage is a responsibility to stay committed when life gets hard. It’s staying in the foxhole when the pressures of life try to pull you away.
When I was dating the lady that eventually became my wife, we were up late in the evening, talking about the nature of love. That night, she said the unbelievable: love is more of a decision than a feeling. I couldn’t believe it: I had found that person who could stay in the foxhole with me! Now, I’m not saying that either one of us has it all together or that it’s beyond either of us to stumble, but we decided long ago that the word divorce was not in our vocabulary. And with God’s help, it never will be.
Now this message isn’t condemnation to anyone who has gone through a divorce. I’ve seen one spouse work oh-so-very-hard on the marriage only to see their partner walk away. And I admit that divorce sounds like a good option when the only other option is a life of misery with someone who just can’t meet your needs. In other words: option (A) stay married and have a miserable life, or option (B) cut your losses and make the best out of the remainder of your life. But there is an option (C): make a happy marriage. If people really believed that option (C) was worth it and achievable, we would see divorce rates plummet in this country.
Is a happy marriage achievable? I think if you can find the person that will stay in foxhole with you… absolutely. It takes mutual commitment to work on it. It takes a man choosing to relinquish his selfish desires, and deciding to cherish the woman he has committed to love, courting her heart and striving to live a life worthy of respect. It takes a woman who will demonstrate respect for her husband when the chinks are seen in his not-so-shining armor. It takes a resolution to love someone when they’re not lovable, helping someone who maybe doesn’t want your help, and being available at the most inconvenient times. It takes intentional acts to re-kindle the fire and just have fun together. I believe it’s very hard, but it’s also worth the effort. Everyone around the winners in the fight for a happy marriage is strengthened by the outcome. And waves of encouragement can extend to unborn generations. It’s hard, but it’s worth it… and it takes pressing past the emotions that scream at you to “run away!”.
I believe emotions are like engine indicator lights in a car: an error indication tells you something is wrong, but it doesn’t necessarily say “what” is wrong. I had a car that gave me an error every time it rained heavily. The first couple times it happened, I was anxious about what was wrong. Eventually, though, I discovered that heavy rain gave me a faulty reading. Emotions are that way. Sometimes they indicate something is wrong with you or your marriage, but sometimes they just give you a false reading because something is wrong in the environment. Is an alarm going off? Listen to it and investigate what’s triggering the alarm.
We live in a fast-paced, task-oriented culture, but we were made to be relational beings. As a result of our culture, we can often disregard the alarm until something major has happened, and just as it took time to get into the mess, it can take time to resolve the issues. Issues can cause other issues, which of course can cause even more issues. But a responsible adult takes ownership of the issues and cleans up the mess, modeling responsibility to the next generation.
How can children learn to be responsible adults unless they have been parented? We desperately need to learn, apply and pass on to our children the lost art of life-long, loving, marriages. What heritage do we leave our children when our happiness is dependent upon our circumstances? How much better to show them that with God’s help we can make our own happiness? I don’t have this mastered, but I’m committed to learning and applying whatever I can grasp, knowing that I’ll be better for it and that I will leave my own kids with more than I started with.
