Secret Treasures

In the solemnity of the wedding day, the most powerfully binding and profound segment is that moment when the blissful wife and the nervous husband declare their vows one to another in front of a hundred witnesses or so, before the minister, before God.  The words echo quietly like this:

Some couples choose to reword it for a more personal effect.  My husband and I decided to maintain the traditional wording of our vows on our wedding day almost eight years ago.  Why? Simply because it cuts out all the other emotional trivialities and goes straight down to the bottom line --- this is it, I will have you, I will behold you, I will love you and cherish you, for better or for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health, until death do us part.

Pause. 

Do you care to realize what a huge risk you just signed yourself into?  Do you bother to think deeply about the vow you have just spoken aloud to the man you have bound yourself with for the rest of your life?   

First of all, you have no guarantees whatsoever as to what will become of your husband a year from that day, much more ten or twenty years forward.  You entered into a vow that speaks of a lifetime without the ability to know, not even predict what happens within that span of years.  You have no way of calculating any sort of "return of investment".  You have no form of measurement to use to appraise the appreciating or depreciating value of your spouse, no X number of years warranty (return if there is any factory default, or free repair, free exchange).  That, my friend, is the biggest risk that any one of us can ever take in all our life!

Oh you can invest your finances for a certain number of years, and if it's not gaining good profit, divest and invest in another venture.  Marriage, however is not an investment. It's more risky than any investments you make, and moreover involves not only your finances, but your emotions, your health, your mental capacity, your everything.

Yes, that is what you said your I Do to.  Let's take the line "for better or for worse".  Do you realize how long the range can go from better to worse?  It's interesting how the vow does not even say "for best or for worst".  Have you asked yourself why?  First of all, you should know it can never become best because until death do you part, you will remain imperfect, so it can either only keep going better, or worse.  But it can never get worst as well, because that adjective can only describe death.  By the time you hit the worst on the range, either you or your spouse has died.  Any circumstance that has nothing to do with death still goes under worse, NOT worst.  Wow, that's the long stretch that demands for love to manifest through patience.  Love is patient.  How patient?  That patient.

So you promise to love, to have, to cherish, and to behold your spouse through the better days, as well as through the worse days, until you either hit best or worst (both of these latter words indicate death).

Let's examine richer or poorer.  You can never go poorest.  The poorest one on earth is she who has nothing at all in that single moment, not even the breath of life.  So who is the poorest? The one lying six feet under ground. She has no money with her, no more opinion, no more voice, no ability to move, no capacity to help herself up.  As long as you are not in that state yet, you may be getting poorer, but never poorest.  Richer.  You can never go richest because the richest one is she who has no need nor want of anything at all, in a state of perfection for a stable long period of time --- eternal bliss, if you didn't get it.  You are the richest when you already find yourself in heaven with Jesus, relishing in His perfection, enjoying your glorified state.  So while you are married here on earth, you can really either go richer than yesterday, or poorer than last week.  But it can never reach either end of the pendulum for a long period of time, simply because you live in a fallen world, and you're married to a fallen spouse (though redeemed, I hope, he is still a long work in progress like you are).

So you promise to love, to have, to cherish, to behold your spouse whether the two of you are getting richer, or getting poorer.  If it means remaining in long suffering, then choosing that road is choosing the road of Love.  Love suffers long.

And all the same principle holds true for "in sickness and in health." 

Bottom line.  When you said your vows, you closed every possible open door of escape.  There are no fire exits in marriage.  You can be sure when you call on the Lord, He can save you more than the firefighters of this city can when your marriage house is "on fire".  Jesus paid for your marriage's fire insurance.  But the whole process of repairing the damaged parts of your relationship, including your burned hearts and minds can't be accomplished by a third party.  You and your spouse must actively undertake it, and shed some emotional and mental expenses while doing so.  It's called "working it out".

Our earthly marriage was designed to display the kind of relationship God wants to have with us.  Ultimately, He is the top Risktaker throughout eternity.  He gave His own Son for our redemption, with all the risks of mankind's rejection.  He opens His arms in complete forgiveness to us each time we repent, though He knows full well how we are prone to repeat the same sin.  Yet He continues to invite us to come closer to Him.  He persists on showing us His tender mercies.  His discipline is not that which comes from exasperation, but from constantly believing in us.  He does not tolerate our pretensions, but calls us to transparency and honesty.  In blatant exposure of our filthiest weaknesses, He chooses to embrace and cover us with His perfection.

That is the picture of the kind of risk you and I are called to take in our marriages, friend. You have to see yourself as the risk that God willingly took in order for you to be able to take the same risks daily with your spouse.

It is utterly wonderful.

And literally breathtaking.

I got acquainted with Dr. Gary Smalley's works when my Dad purchased for me a book from a Booksale branch entitled "Love Is A Decision".  I was completely engrossed with the wisdom found in that book, and was pleasantly surprised to find him in the list of teachers in our video-based premarital counseling series called "So You're Getting Married".  

This topic is a must-read for both husband and wife.  The principles found here in his points are as applicable with the wives as they are with the husbands.  I hope you will not only enjoy reading this, but you will do your best to APPLY what you glean from it.