I’m not sure anyone has the credentials to teach and/or write about love and marriage. I might. I’ve been married longer than most of you reading this have been living. I married the woman who is still my mate before you were born. This week, March 15, Jerry and I will celebrate our sixty-fifth wedding anniversary. That should be enough to get your attention.
I begin by insisting that love is something you do. That’s not the way most folks think. Some high school sophomores offered these definitions of love.
Life is one thing after another! Love is two things after each other.
Love is the feeling in your stomach of butterflies wearing roller skates.
Love is that feeling you feel when you feel you are going to have a feeling you have never felt before.
We chuckle at that, but as one who has spent hours and hours counseling couples on the verge of “throwing in the towel” on their troubled marriage, I can assure you those definitions are not far from typical. All too common in the understanding of persons in troubled marriages, is that love is made up of feelings and emotions generated by physical attraction, sexual desire, emotional and security needs.
But love is more. It is decision, something you do. It is an act of the will that gives unselfishly for the good and enrichment of another.
And it is dangerous! Yes, C.S. Lewis is right: “To love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything and your heart will certainly be wrung and possibly broken.”
Before you say no too quickly, be sure you know I’m not talking about “love” reduced in common language. We love everything from cheesecake to fried green tomatoes. But love is a relational word…personal and interpersonal. It involves risk and willingness to be vulnerable.
In relationships there is usually a price to pay. When we love, what hurts another hurts us; what brings them sorrow brings us tears. What causes them anxiety causes our hearts to beat faster.
Sixty-five years is a “life time,” and that’s the way we are to see marriage. There is nothing tentative about it. So we enter as learners, and we keep on learning. Putting all my years of learning into a few words, if I were preparing you for marriage I would say,
Don’t be selfish with your time. Give your spouse and children the time they need. Schedule “together” time.
Pay attention. You can’t be aware of what’s going on that needs you unless you pay attention.
Listen. Nothing affirms your loved ones more than your listening to them.
Speak. Talk matters, but “guard your tongue.” Angry words spoken are difficult to forget, but love unspoken has no affirming power.