Successful Marriage: Well yes, If The Lord is Lord of Them

I watched a brief video about Ben and Erin Napier of the HGTV show "Home Town" and discovered why Susan loved that show about her home town, Laurel, Mississippi, so much. I thought it was because of it being focused on her hometown. But after watching this short bio about Ben and Erin Napier I now know it was about the similarity she saw in their relationship to ours. The relationships are not the same but they were oh so similar.

That led to me remembering an interview I had a few weeks ago in which after the formal interview was done the young man doing the interview said to me. "I am getting married in February and since you were married for 54 years what would you say is he most important thing to having a marriage that lasts that long?" 

He seemed surprised at my answer and I guess anyone would. I said, "My wife and I believed that the only way to have a long and blessed marriage is to keep God in the marriage relationship." As he sort of stuttered I continued, "everything about marriage is better when the Lord is included . . . . and I mean everything from the romance to the heartbreaks . . . . everything is better."

He then told me that he had asked a lot of long term married Christian couples in the project for which he was interviewing me and I was the first to say putting God in the center of the marriage relationship is the key to a long successful marriage. 

He told me he had heard things like, "have a sense of humor," "Don't take yourself too serious," and give your spouse priority."  One person even said, "learn how to transition from hot sex to sweet caresses."  No one had said, "Put God in the middle of your marriage."

All of these are probably important ingredients but I don’t think they are crucial to having a long successful marriage. I have a notion that it takes a lot influence from the God who instituted marriage to do that. 

I went on to say, “You need to  spend a lot of time together. Trust me on this . . . there is no such thing as quality time without quantity of time. Anyone who thinks you can have quality time as a couple without quantity of time is sadly mistaken. 

Don't become co-dependent but it really helps to be interdependent. Without going into a long discussion about becoming “One Flesh” marriage is the context in which God brings together  two entities, a man and a women, and creates an entirely new entity identified as a married couple whose objective is to become one flesh. This cannot happen without God in the mix.

Michel W. Smith wrote a wonderful line in a song entitled "Friends." It was about the death of his daughter. 

And friends are friends forever 
If the Lord's the Lord of them
And a friend will not say never
'Cause the welcome will not end

This is true of genuine friendships and it is true of a marriage that has achieved or is approaching the goal of Oneness.  If the Lord is Lord of them every aspect of marriage gets better as the years pass. Then somewhere along the journey you realize you have arrived at what God calls "One Flesh" and now everything in your marriage becomes a spiritual experience . . . . yes I said everything. Everything in the relationship, including the physical aspect, have a spiritual component. How could it be otherwise. 

ADDENDUM

That may seem like a tall order but like everything that grows it starts small. Though there is much that can be done I will offer one suggestion that I believe is important in a Christian marriage. 

From the moment you enter marriage (I call it a covenant of companionship) begin including the Lord in all that you do. Yes I said from the beginning. If I had my way marriage ceremonies would include the Groom and the Bride praying a prayer of thanksgiving for their new spouse and asking God for wisdom in becoming the person their spouse needs to become the spouse they need them to be. This is the helpmate aspect of marriage. 

Commit to praying for each other. Preferably in each others presence always thanking God for the precious gift He has given to you in the person of your spouse. The sooner this becomes a life practice the better. However, it is never too late to start.