My wife and I recently celebrated our ten year anniversary as a married couple, although we’ve been together for over thirteen. It’s been an adventure—almost like a road trip across the country.
Figuratively speaking, we’ve had moments that felt like being in Florida at the Magic Kingdom. We’ve traveled through the beautiful rolling hills of Tennessee and through colorful fall forests in Vermont. We’ve been in the self-serving capitol of DC, the craziness of New York City, and also caught in some horribly cold ice storms of Minnesota and Illinois. And then there were the very, very boring times through Kansas, Iowa and Nebraska. We’ve stayed in nice resorts, cheap motels, slept in the car, and even in separate cars on a time or two. And, on a few trying occasions, we even took our own separate road trips, which weren’t easy nor were they much fun.
Our marriage hasn’t always been rosy. I challenge anyone to find one that is. Gratefully I can say that I have never loved my wife more than I do today. She’s my best friend. She’s my greatest ally. She’s my cheerleader, my hope, my compass. She is the iron that sharpens my iron. My wife is, to me, an irreplaceable gift. Yet there were times when I didn’t quite feel this way—neither of us did. We were like strangers living in separate rooms in our own home. Instead of a happy house, it was a place of isolation, frustration, despair and regret. And it was hell.
For the longest time I fervently prayed for God to change her, to reshape and reform her to fit MY mold. It was she that was the problem; she was stubborn, she was angry, she was unbudging…she was wrong. Whenever an argument would arise (which became more and more frequent), I’d filter everything through a Timmy-centric bias, managing to remove any wrong-doing on my part or sense of why we were arguing in the first place. Quickly put, I was selfish. I was miserable and I was inconsiderately self-serving.
One day, while pouring my heart out to God and bombarding him with mass amounts of frustration, I heard a small voice of brilliant reason that came like a punch in the gut. “Maybe you should stop trying to make her change. You change.”
Shut up. This is not something that you want to hear when you’re proudly riding atop Ego, your high horse. Yet, after a few days of these words echoing in my spirit, I realized that it was true. Instead of expecting her to be a better wife to me, and instead of spending overwhelming amounts of energy that I did not have to make her change, what if I changed? What if I was a better husband? A better friend? What would that look like?
Thankfully, I had a map.
“Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.” — 1 Corinthians 13:4-7
So, I put Ego back in his stable, took off my top hat and tails, put on servant’s clothes, and began to humbly love her in a completely different way. It was clumsy and awkward at first and I didn’t always get it right, but whenever possible, I tried my best to be humble—to be kind and patient, to be loving and most importantly, to empty myself of pride. Whenever I began to see those destructive self-important attitudes creeping in, I did my best to shoo them away and instead take a posture of love. And, even though there wasn’t an overnight change (in either of us), over time there certainly was a measurable difference. I began to change (for the better), and in a surprisingly unexpected way, she too began to change.
My faith was a great encouragement to me. If God is Love as He says He is, and if Love is patient, kind, etc., then as His creation (He also says that we were created in His image), shouldn’t I also demonstrate and embody these virtues? Inviting Him into our marriage to be the glue that holds us together was the best thing we could ever have done. I could write volumes on the difference we’ve seen by simply embracing and living each point of wisdom in the above verse. Living out love point-by-point as it is described will change you in radical ways; so much to the point that it can’t help but overflow into others’ lives.
I am so grateful for my best friend. And I am unbelievably appreciative for where we have been on our road trip through life together and where we are heading. Through our transformation in our posture of heart toward one another, we’ve been able to roll down the windows, turn up the music, and take the more scenic routes. Although there will most certainly be flat tires and stretches of desert or bad weather from time to time, we will never again be stuck in Kansas with tornadoes raging all about.
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