A Good Marriage

This post idea has been rolling around in my head for some time now but I haven't had an opportunity to sit down and write (type) it. With my daughter getting married in a week, the topic of marriage is at hand often. People are constantly telling her how it is hard work and that seems to be what people are always saying. Preachers preach about it, married couples often say it and media tells young people to wait until they are older to commit and delve into marriage. Call me strange but I have never felt as though marriage was work. Even when Bob and I had marriage struggles (prior to church days), I didn't feel like it was a chore to be married. I did question my motivations of love and what love was and who I was but I didn't think "this is work or too much work".

I think what a marriage (and all relationships of any kind) takes is three things...Investment, Forgiveness, and Acceptance.

Time is the most important investment to be made. Attention, care, physical relations, thoughtfulness, etc. If you have invested in these ways, you build up a love bank between the two people.

Forgiveness is letting go of the transgressions, the faults, the mistakes of the other person. Forgetting those faults is also important. God doesn't remind us of the last time we messed up when we go to Him and ask forgiveness. No, those mess ups are as far as the east is from the west and buried in the depths of the sea! (Satan DOES remind us however) Now, when the love bank is full, it is much easier to be forgiving. It is easier to not become bitter and angry when the love bank has been padded and built up by the investing part so it is double-sided. Invest love and bitterness is less likely to build up countering the love so it is easy to let the transgressions and faults of the other person go into the depths of the sea.

Acceptance goes a long way to many things! Accepting a situation for what it is helps you to have peace in the situation and not waste time fighting against what cannot be changed. Accepting the person for ALL their little quirks and imperfections in physical looks and personality builds up the love bank too. Realizing that you have quirks and imperfections as well will help you in this area. Have you noticed that, whether in marriage or friendships, when you are frustrated with someone (because you haven't forgiven!) you are less accepting of their quirks?! Every little thing they do gets on your nerves!!! The things they do or the habits they have, the quirky things, just may as well be fingernails on a chalkboard. However, if the other person has invested enough time, care and attention to the love bank, you will be more forgiving and accepting. All of these three things work together or against in a circle. It takes all three to have a good relationship of any kind.
Now, I know some at this point in reading may be thinking "Well all this you are saying is work". But, if done in love it is not work or shouldn't feel like work. It makes me sad to see and hear people be so down on marriage and struggle to be happy in the relationship. I know that some people make things extremely difficult and one person may have to bend more or forgive more and feel they never get the investment made towards them (and they are often correct in this feeling) but this post is just to let people know that marriage shouldn't be work it is to be ruled by love.

Love is giving and expecting nothing in return. This is true love - sacrificial love. Jesus went to the cross for the sins WE committed not His own just to make a way to have access to God again after Adam and Eve fell to sin in the Garden. He did it even though many reject his sentiment and sacrifice. What a picture of giving and expecting nothing. The offer is just there whether we choose to accept the offer or not.