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What I learned the last 55 years

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This past February, Gaspar and I celebrated our 55th wedding anniversary. That’s quite a few years! It even amazes me… and I lived it! In my mind, I’m still that 19-year-old blushing bride, but I’ve learned a lot in those years. It seems like we always learn the most from the difficult times. And like most couples, we’ve had our share.

So what nuggets of wisdom have I gleaned over five decades? Here are my top 10 ingredients for a successful marriage. They’re not in any particular order because I believe they all play an equally important role in a strong marriage.

Top 10 ingredients to a successful marriage

  1. Demonstrate Unconditional Love and Forgiveness.
    I know that’s two things, but a big part of unconditional love is forgiving each other. Not one of us is perfect. We all sin and make mistakes. We all cause each other hurt and pain, from the smallest slights to the deepest wounds. Could we really eliminate either of these ingredients and still call ourselves a Christian couple? Both are commands from God for all believers.

  2. Be Honest and Truthful.
    I can’t separate these two either. They’re a solid couple. Honesty involves a few key practices like never lying, never hiding the truth—or even purposely omitting it. Honesty in marriage means always telling your spouse the truth, even if they won’t like it. It builds a strong foundation for trust and, eventhough there are many ways besides dishonesty to break trust, honesty is key. Once trust has been broken, it’s a long hard road back to rebuilding it.

  3. Never Use the “D” Word.
    When we were young, foolish and unsaved, I would threaten divorce often. It was so destructive to our marriage and brought us to the brink of breaking up several times. I didn’t realize that was a word of death I was confessing over our marriage. After we came to the Lord, we promised—no matter how angry we got—we’d never use the “D” word again…and we haven’t. Marriage is a commitment between you, your mate and God. When you’re going through a rough time turn to the Lord, listen to Him, and do what He says. I promise He’ll see you through every time.

  4. Keep Intimacy Alive.
    Keep love alive with romance and physical intimacy. Both are so important to a healthy marriage. You’d be surprised how far a little romance will go toward strengthening your relationship. Tender touches, hugs, kisses and saying “I love you” every day will lead to even deeper, more gratifying intimacy.

  5. Communicate Well.
    Communication is probably one of the biggest struggles in marriages. But it’s worth working through because it affects every other area. A big part of communication is being a good listener and taking time to understand what your spouse needs. Of course, there will be disagreements. You and your mate have different personalities and see things differently. But successful couples respect each other’s opinions and learn the art of compromise.

  6. Get on the Same Team.
    You and your spouse have a common enemy—and it isn’t each other. His name is satan. Spiritual warfare in marriage is real. Satan wants to steal your joy and destroy your marriage. Even in the middle of a disagreement, it’s important to remember that your spouse is not your enemy. Remind each other that you’re on the same side. And unity—more than who’s right or wrong—is crucial.

  7. Accept Each Other.
    Lack of acceptance is a major relationship killer. We marry our spouse because we love who they are, not who we can change them into. It’s not our responsibility to play Holy Spirit for them. If we’re not careful, we can slip into thinking “I know best” in every matter. To build a strong marriage, we must focus on how we can become more Christlike and entrust our spouse to the Lord.

  8. Prioritize Couple’s Time.
    With work and family responsibilities, it’s easy to put your relationship on the back burner and take each other for granted. DON’T!!! We’ve said over and over how important it is to make time for just the two of you. Have a date night as often as you can, even if you can’t go out. Put the children to bed and plan a special evening for just the two of you. The most successful couples vouch for this and agree it’s been a life-saver for their marriage.

  9. Encourage and Inspire.
    One of the most effective ways to help your spouse is to offer encouraging words. The word encourage means to “inspire courage.” We all have areas and times in which we feel insecure. Your words can be a powerful tool to lift each other up and inspire the best in each other. Make this a practice: Look for one way to encourage the best in each other everyday.

  10. Put God at the Center.
    In everything you do, put God at the center of your marriage. Invite His Presence into everything. Make time to pray together each day. It only takes a few minutes to ask God to bless and protect each other. Consistently attend church. Share what you received from the message. Sharing your insights helps the message to become a part of you and draws you closer spiritually. What an awesome role model and legacy to leave your children and grandchildren!
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Whether you’re a newlywed or an oldie-wed like us, every marriage has its share of ups and downs: stress, poor communication, financial difficulties…. As we always say, marriage is hard work and, for Christian couples, the work is all about growing up and becoming more like Jesus. I pray the things I’ve shared with you today will help make your marriage even stronger.


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Help for the struggling & ecstatically happy

A couple in our marriage group asked me to recommend a book they could read together. Without a second thought I said “Sacred Marriage” by Gary Thomas. Yes, this is the book we named our couples mentorship class after. It’s an all-time favorite of both Gaspar and I. This book truly impacted our marriage when we were going through a rough time. Sacred Marriage is a must read for every couple—dating, engaged, married, struggling, ecstatically happy…. It’s for everyone.

You can find Sacred Marriage at Lifeway, Faith Gateway, Christianbook, Amazon and others. Even Audible if you’re more of a listener.

Sacred Marriage is very different from most marriage books. For one thing, it puts forth the idea that the challenges in marriage are meant to draw us closer to God and mature us spiritually. But for marriage to grow us spiritually, we must be brutally honest with ourselves and each other. We need to do some soul-searching and fess-up to bad attitudes, selfishness, and unrealistic expectations. We also must rid ourselves of the notion that if we could just change our spouse to be more like us and maybe learn a few marriage principles, everything would be just fine. Been there… done that… It doesn’t work.

When our relationship with Christ is strong, we won’t put unrealistic demands on each other to compensate for our spiritual emptiness.

Why romance is not enough

Romance is not enough. Why? Because God created marriage for a much deeper purpose than romance. He designed marriage, as Thomas says, “to make us holy more than to make us happy.” God is using our earthly marriage to prepare us to be the Bride of Christ. Unfortunately, we’ve all been influenced by the Hollywood version of love, romance, and marriage. Yes, love and romance are important to a healthy marriage, but romantic love alone doesn’t have what it takes to get you through the challenges marriage brings.

When the honeymoon phase fades as it always does, some couples think their marriage is over, they divorce and try to find that exhilarating passion with someone new. Only to find that, in time, it fades again. 

Other couples fall into an adversarial relationship—arguing, blaming each other for their unhappiness…. Instead of working together, they treat each other like enemies. Some couples become married singles, living a peaceful coexistence of separate lives. Determined couples that refuse to give up buy a copy of Sacred Marriage, read it together, get real, and get to work. 

Why this mutual pursuit of Christ

This work has as much to do with your relationship with Christ as it does with each other. Only as we grow in Christ do we develop what it takes to grow deeper in our marriages. Marriage calls us to an extremely selfless way of life, impossible without Christ living big in us.

Just as Adam and Eve walked with God in the garden each day, we can find even more meaning in our marriage by pursuing Him together. Recognize that He alone can fill the emptiness in our souls. We can try to make our marriages as happy and fulfilling as possible, but what we both crave more than anything, only God can give us. When our relationship with Christ is strong, we won’t put unrealistic demands on each other to compensate for our spiritual emptiness. 

This might sound strange for a marriage book, but the ultimate purpose of Sacred Marriage is not to make you love your spouse more. But that will happen. Its purpose is to equip you to love your God more. And thankfully that will happen too.


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