Until Death Parts Us

When we see
marriage as a covenant, not a contract, it’s confirmation that we are
meant to stay together until death parts us. In A Model for Marriage, Jack and Judy Balswick point out that “the
core characteristic of a covenant marriage is commitment, a factor that
is profoundly important to marital stability, according to research
findings.”

The very nature of wedding vows implies a
covenant, but for most brides and grooms, the common attitude is to see
marriage as a contract that can be broken. Typically, a couple—despite
vowing to endure better or worse until death—live by the principle that
they’ll stay together only as long as their spouse fulfills their end of
the bargain. That’s an attitude that feeds into the “short haul”
approach.

The first 10 years of our marriage were
terrible—what we call the “Great Tribulation.” Yes, we had some good
times; but, overall, we didn’t have a good marriage. Yet we never
considered divorce as an option. Though we were both young when we
married, one thing was clear: We were determined to make it work. We
didn’t think of our marriage as a covenant in those days, but we lived
as if we had made a covenant. We understood our vows. We were there for
the long haul—for better or for worse.

How different our lives
would have been if we had given up because we were miserable.
Eventually, we grew past our misery and started to build something
special together.

A number of marriage studies have been based
on interviews with couples on the verge of divorce who, of course,
reported that they were miserable. Many of these studies are designed so
the researchers can go back and reinterview the same couples years
later. Invariably, the couples who divorced report that they still are
unhappy; but most of the couples who stayed together report that they
are now happy.

I’ve worked with couples who were miserable
but came to counseling because divorce just wasn’t an option for them.
One of these couples came back recently to deal with some
extended-family issues. I hadn’t seen them in years. My last memory of
them was their telling me they believed they’d turned the corner in
their marriage and had the tools to keep their relationship on-track. It
turns out they did, and they thanked me for helping them turn things
around. What had been misery to them—and the cause of divorce with many
other couples—was long past. They were in the process of becoming
everything they had hoped to be as a couple.

Marriages go
through seasons. When a couple can genuinely make an unconditional
commitment to stay the course during the cold, dark season of a
marriage, then spring and even summer seasons follow.

There is a
saying that goes something like: “Don’t doubt in the darkness what you
know to be true in the light.” You can apply this warning to the seasons
of a marriage. When you hit the dark , cold winter season together,
don’t question the vows and commitments you made to each other in the
light of the summer season. Stay the course. Love unconditionally and
know that spring will come.

Click here to read two other principles to help fix your marriage before it’s too late.

David Stoop, Ph.D., and Jan Stoop, Ph.D.,
lead seminars and marriage retreats nationally and internationally.
More tips to keeping the love fires burning in marriage are available in
their book Better Than Ever: Seven Secrets to a Great Marriage. Or visit them online at drstoop.com.