The marriage relationship is not an easy one. If the classic rose colored glasses were ever worn, by either party, they have usually been shoved askew before the nuptials even take place.
The bonds of marriage are legal as well as spiritual and at times (for all people) it can feel like a life sentence.
The marriage of two people, is often the language used of God and the church.
“‘Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.’ This mystery is profound, and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the church” (Ephesians 5:31-32).
Sometimes I look at my own marriage and cannot, for the life of me, see any comparison to how God loves his church.
I am selfish … He is unselfish
I seek my own well being … He seeks our well being.
I give up easily … He is committed eternally.
Perhaps if our focus is on how he loves the church, rather than on how our spouse loves us … perhaps then we would see his plan for us in our marriages. Perhaps that is the true mystery.
First we need to understand His purpose for the church, as well as for our marriages.
The purpose of the church is to glorify and worship God … such is the purpose of marriage.
Now that is a mystery! For few of us can say that others would see our marriages as examples of the glorification and worship of God. Yet, our marriages are to be the mirror through which others see the love, the sacrificial, selfless love of God. If we were to achieve this lofty goal, it is a mystery as to how profoundly our world might change.
Two flawed mortals tied together in marriage can make a great deal of knots, twisting and turning us inside and out. It can also be the binding that can make you feel more freedom than anything else … I think the later is how it was intended. Loving our ‘other’ as an outpouring of our love for God … that he, God, be glorified … and in fulfilling this we are more freed than bound.
“The covenant that binds can be what sets you free to be.
The covenant that binds can be what holds
when everything’s blowing up.
The covenant that binds
can bond your heart to your one place of belonging,
when everything else lets go.”
Ann Voskamp
itsawonderfilledlife 