Living in the Reality of Marriage

Can two flawed people be truly happy?

Listen in: Living in the Reality of Marriage

Weddings are usually joyful occasions. That’s because the hope of marriage is that it offers a way to be fully known, deeply understood, and unconditionally loved. We rejoice in the idea of two people making each other blissfully happy. And yet the reality of marriage is often brings pain, disillusionment, and frustration as the ideal becomes an ordeal.

One way of thinking about marriage is like flies on a screen door: those that are out want in, and those that are in want out! You may be struggling in your marriage and you’d like to get out. Or you may be single and really want to get in. People on both sides of the door are unhappy, and that’s a part of life that people may be reluctant to talk about.

In the second episode of our new series, Making Marriage Work, John and Lynn sit down to talk about the way that God designed marriage to function, how sin breaks the bond of unity and intimacy in marital relationships, and the challenge of building a healthy marriage in the face of life’s harsh realities. It turns out that living in an imperfect relationship requires humility and divine grace – that’s the real deal!

God’s Design – The Ideal

God designed marriage for our fulfillment, our pleasure, companionship, intimacy, vulnerability, safety, and security. But it only worked really well in one place: the Garden of Eden. In the book of Genesis, God creates man and woman and places them in the garden to come together and feel known, safe, and connected. He creates them to have a ‘one flesh’ relationship.

Even though this happened thousands of years ago, we all have that same ideal in our hearts. When you walk down the aisle on your wedding day – or wait up front for your beautiful bride – all of your hopes and dreams are centered around this other person, and how they are going to love you, take care of you, admire you, meet your needs, and all the other things that are shown to us in our culture.

Sin – The Ordeal

The Garden of Eden was paradise until sin entered the picture. Sin brought shame, which fractured the closeness that Adam and Eve had with each other and with God. Then they withdrew, went into hiding, and blamed each other. In fact, Adam blamed Eve, God, and the serpent in one loaded sentence!

What happened in Eden explains what is also true today: when two sinners get married, they each expect that the other person will meet all their needs – when that doesn’t happen, they re-enact the same pattern of shame, hiding, and blaming over and over again.

You may shirk at taking responsibility for your own actions and quickly point the finger at your spouse – the person you’ve entrusted your heart with and are supposed to be closest to! Like sneezing, blaming is automatic; being defensive comes naturally.

One source of conflict counselors often notice is that someone goes into marriage seeking to be parented – or re-parented – by the other person to make up for lingering needs and longings from childhood. If you lacked safety and security when you were growing up, you may be hoping or expecting those needs to be met in marriage.

It’s important to understand that all children are asking these questions:

• “Can I be fully known and fully loved?”

• “Can I have my own way?”

• “Can I make a mistake and still be loved?”

• “Can I be my own authority and understand my impact on other people?”

Now consider what might happen if those questions were not adequately answered in your childhood. You may be expecting your spouse to answer them for you. In that case, you're bringing developmental needs into a relationship that is not meant to be a parent-child relationship.

If you’d like to know more about childhood needs, go back and listen to our series Becoming a Whole Person, where we cover them in detail.

Accepting Reality – The Real Deal

Not every couple makes the choice to face reality. It’s very common for couples to live in the ‘ordeal’ and get tossed back and forth. Facing reality is an active choice that you have to make. It starts by embracing the fact that you are not perfect, and the other person isn’t perfect. You are starting to come to grips with the fact that the ‘ideal’ ship has sailed – and in fact, it never even existed.

You are not perfect, and the other person isn’t perfect. The ‘ideal’ ship has sailed – in fact, it never even existed.

You need to accept that you can’t control or change the other person. There’s some relief in that! It’s a lot of pressure to feel like you’re responsible for changing another human.

Instead, you have to be in charge of YOU and start working on yourself. Can you become the kind of person who can love their spouse and understand where they have been hurt, and what they need? Can you be a positive influence on them?

Facing reality means embracing your spouse from a position of love and grace, the way God relates to us. He moves towards in spite of our imperfections. He doesn’t abandon us, shame us, reject us, criticize us, or stonewall us. He displays compassion, patience, and lovingkindness towards us.

Part of the notion of living in the ‘real deal’ is grieving the loss of the marriage that you wanted. You may need to have a funeral in your head for the marriage you thought you were going to have. This is very hard to do and it’s extremely painful. This is a form of grieving and letting go of something that you can never get back. You may associate ‘grieving’ with the loss of a loved one, but there are many losses in life that will require you to grieve. And some of those losses are in marriage.

When the Marriage Covenant is Broken

While many marriages are able to improve through this idea of facing reality, we need to make it clear that abuse of any kind is unacceptable in marriage. An abusive marriage cannot be fixed by accepting that you and your spouse are not perfect and then tolerating destructive behavior.

Abuse is intolerable in a marriage because it works against the vulnerability and trust that makes a marriage work. If that is a situation that you find yourself in, it’s important to acknowledge what is happening, seek support and help to ensure safety, assess the damage in your marriage, and figure out what steps are needed for trust to be re-established.

Many times people want a clear answer to the question, “Do I have grounds for divorce?” We always say that every situation is different. We recommend seeking wise counsel and having trusted people in your life that love you and care about you that can help you navigate that decision.

As believers, we see marriage as a covenant where we’re making a vow with the other person and with God to be faithful and sacrifice for the good of the marriage. But a person can break that covenant, and God recognizes that, including abuse, abandonment, and adultery. There are many kinds of abuse, including physical, emotional, verbal, psychological, and financial, all of which destroy trust and mock the sanctity of the marriage covenant.

Because of the deceitfulness of sin, the hardness of the heart, and hurtful behaviors that can destroy trust over time, sometimes a marriage is not sustainable and it doesn’t work. At times, the outcome is divorce, which is very painful, distressing and creates upheaval in the family. Although no one ever gets married with the intention of getting a divorce, this is part of reality. If this happens, by God’s grace, there can be personal growth, forgiveness, and healing.

Marriage as Ministry

We want to propose a new framework for understanding marriage. Instead of a ‘consumer model’, which leads to buyer’s remorse - and a desire to trade in your spouse for a newer version! - we’re pushing a ‘ministry model’ of marriage where we learn to grow and love and serve each other with grace.

This ministry model of marriage should be happening in community. If your spouse is your only oxygen tank, you’re going to run out of air pretty quickly. We need other people around us to help make our marriage work. You will need multiple places where you’re being fed and where you’re receiving life and love from other sources than your spouse.

As you give yourself and your spouse to God, relying on him to work in you things that you could not accomplish on your own, you will move from the ideal through the ordeal to the real deal - and build a marriage that can go the distance.