The other day, a friend sent me a post by one of their friends. Here is that post.
I immediately fell in love with this post. I love it because it touches a lot of aspects of marriage that in today’s society is forgotten. It talks about personal responsibility in marriage. It talks about how as humans we are subjected to making mistakes and falling short of perfection. Whether you are Christian or not, Christ and His church is a good example of a good union.
Personal responsibility in marriage. The question she asked “how can I make it easier on (my spouse) to love me like Jesus?” isn’t about making your spouse happy or changing who you are. It is about making choices or saying something that makes it easier for your spouse to choose to love you. Love in marriage is a choice that needs to be made daily. So daily make sure that choice is easy for your spouse to make.
I got to put this advice into action Thursday night when we went to take family photos. Why? Because taking family pictures is my husbands least favorite thing in all the world to do he literally told me it was comparable to torture for him. But taking pictures is important to me and I wanted to do it. How could I make it EASIER on Seth to still love me even though he felt like I was “torturing him” taking family photos. I acknowledged his frustrations. I let him know that I appreciated his sacrifice in doing something he hates because he knew I love it. I let him know that I felt loved and supported by him and that I am grateful he did it. Expecting Seth to do these family photos without letting him know I knew it was a sacrifice for him would have made it hard for him to love me. I let him know that I didn’t expect blind obedience because I said so.
We are humans and we subject to screw ups, mistakes, and falling short of perfection. How often do we cut our spouse slack for making a mistake? How often do we slip up and admit to it? I know for me, there are many times I have to catch myself when Seth makes a mistake wanting to get angry. I have to remind myself that he’s human that he’s not perfect and never will be on this earth. But when I make a mistake, I often try to sweep it under the rug and seek to forget it happened. Seth and I recently had a slip up and we could’ve just each ignored it. After a time to calm down and reflect I knew that I needed to confront Seth about what happened and in doing so we both were able to move on and not allow it fester in our relationship.
Something that was small can always come back to bite you in the butt and be thrown out of proportion. Accept each other’s flaws, and when you accept their flaws they will find it EASIER to love you because they will know you accept them for every “perfect imperfection” (John Legend All of Me)(Love this song!!).
Christ and His Church as an example of a good union. “Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself up for her (Ephesians 5:25).” I love the scripture she quoted in her post because it truly shows love Christ had for his church. I’m gonna quote John Legend’s song again, “Cause all of me, Loves all of you”. Christ did not hold back anything when it came to His Love for the church. Just as I seek every day not to hold back anything from Seth. I love John Legend’s song because it is Seth’s and I wedding song and because it is one of the greatest loves songs because it doesn’t sugarcoat love, it talks about loving them with everything they have including all of their flaws. Because love is not about loving someone only through the good but the bad too. Christ gave his all even though the church was far from perfect and had their own flaws but Christ knew its potential and loved her anyway. Love your spouse with everything you have and as you do so it will make it EASIER for them to love you in return.
Not sure if you noticed, but I purposely wrote easier in all caps because love is not easy but neither is it hard. Love is an action and a choice to make daily. Because your spouse, children, friends, and whoever else is in your circle will say something that will either make it harder or easier to love them. So when thinking about your own actions and your own words, are you making it easier or harder for your spouse to choose to love you?