I've been spending some time at home during the day a lot lately. Other than doing my fabulously fascinating motherly/wifely duties of cooking, cleaning, and etcetera, I am not ashamed to say that I have become engrossed in daytime television. I can catch up on all of the foolishness that is now called entertainment that I don't watch at night for fear of polluting the innocence of my children. I multitask. Clean while listening, cook while watching.
Anyway, while watching a talk show, there was an actress that has been on one soap opera or another that is celebrating its 50th anniversary of being on air. She is also celebrating her 20 something year wedding anniversary. When one of the hosts of the show asked her what secret she and her husband contribute the longevity of their marriage to, she responded:
"Be prepared to have a few bad years."
Not to many things stop me in my tracks, but this statement I was not expecting.
My issue with those who have been married for decades is that, when encountered with the question, what is the key to having a long and healthy marriage is, communication and unconditional love. No one ever talks about what to do when love isn't paying the bills or when sex isn't helping keep the house clean. This actress kept it real. Marriage isn't like the perfume commercials seem; My husband and I running through the lily-covered fields in slow motion barefoot and holding hands. There have been times when I have to make myself smile at my husband when he comes through the door after work. In the same token, I'm sure there have been times when my husband would rather run screaming than enter the circus we call home every night after work. But because we dedicated ourselves to each other for the rest of our lives, we keep moving through the bad. We know that even though there will be bad, the bad can't possibly last forever.
Ecclesiastes 3:1
"To everything there is a season,
A time for every purpose under heaven..." (NKJV)
God's timing is perfect. No matter how much I would like to love my husband at all times, not have to be concerned about keeping our relationship on track and spend every night making love (...Well maybe not every night), we cannot. We have finances and jobs and children and ministry. We have lives. We have things to talk about and compromise on. Some things we may agree wholeheartedly on. Some things we will not. Sometimes we may get angry and have to leave the subject alone for a while. Some things we have to argue out. There will be times when we go to bed simmering because no conclusion to the issue was drawn. It happens! That doesn't mean that, in the morning, I'm Google Searching divorce lawyers. That means that I have something else to take to God when I roll out of the bed and on my knees in prayer before I begin my day. The point is, there will be bad moments. But that doesn't mean the marriage turned bad. That means there will be bad moments.
Don't live life expecting bad, in your marriage or any other aspect of your life.
Know that the bad will happen, and when it does, pray about it, tackle it and move on. You and your hubby will get stronger. Marriage is a muscle; you will have to exercise it. And when you do, you get stronger. Some exercises will come and be so hard you may want to drop the whole thing. But when those come up, look back at how hard the other ones were. And you got through them together.
This one will be no different....
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