Friday, April 13, 2007

The beauty of marriage

Monday will be my 30th wedding anniversary with Shirley.  How is it that we could ever have had the notion in our early twenties that our marriage would last?  There are very few things I have had a relationship with for 30 years.  One of the few is my auto insurance company (they've been great to work with).  When I married Shirley I was in the Navy.  We had probably seen each other a total of less than three weeks since meeting, because of school and service separation.  It took 7 months of overseas deployment to forge my determination to marry.  But, just as there was no doubt that I loved her and needed her there was also a confidence that our marriage was something from the Lord.  Ultimately it is a great and wonderful mystery how two who are so different by gender, by background, by interest (really all who come together in marriage are this way) not only "make it", but thrive.  Is it not obvious that marriage must be God's design!  With that assurance that we are carrying out God's plan through the complete merging of our lives, we understand where to go when we are overwhelmed and where to go in our gratitude.  We learn the vital lesson that we are not complete in ourselves.  Just as our spouse completes us for this life,  so our Lord will complete us for all life to come.  I believe marriage makes the most sense in the context of a God who longs to know us!
 
Ephesians 5:31 For this cause shall a man leave his father and mother, and shall be joined unto his wife, and they two shall be one flesh.  32 This is a great mystery: but I speak concerning Christ and the church.  33 Nevertheless let every one of you in particular so love his wife even as himself; and the wife see that she reverence her husband.
 
blessings,
 
Rob Smith

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