Marriage: a labor of love

No doubt, you’ve heard it said many times, “Marriage is hard work!” Some say it without thinking, while others say it with the full belief that maintaining a great married relationship is a chore. With something like that put into the atmosphere, there is no wonder that few people want to get married nowadays! If a person is happy with their existence as a single individual, why would they knowingly enter into something that they are constantly told will be a burdensome task? In today’s society, we have a way of making the thought of marriage sound downright disgusting. We already have jobs and careers that we have to give much of our time to. Why on earth would we—by choice—take on something additional that’s going to be toilsome and tedious work?

We’re not for a moment trying to sell anyone on the unrealistic idea that maintaining a healthy and fulfilling marriage doesn’t take effort. It does! But every single day, each of us should make it our goal to never make our spouse be one of the ones to say that marriage is hard work.

When it comes to what we do in corporate America or in our entrepreneurship ventures, we describe some endeavors as our “job or career” and others as our “passion or purpose.” There is a distinct difference in our categorizing them as such. Quite often, jobs and careers are professions we carry out because we have to. Many times, we don’t necessarily like what we do, but we do it anyway because it has to be done in order to maintain our standard of living—or sometimes just to barely make ends meet.

On the other hand, those things we call a passion or purpose are connected to our heart. They require that we make an effort and that we apply energy and determination, but because we have, not only a heart, but a soul connection to those things, what we do to make them successful is called “a labor of love.”

This is what keeping the harmony and satisfaction in our marriages should be for all of us—a labor of love, not a laborious task.

This past weekend, we had an amazing fellowship of Christian couples at our home. As a part of Royalty Relationship Coaching, it is our mandate to enrich other married and engaged adults. This gathering had been in the making for a couple of months, and on Saturday, it finally became a reality. We can’t recall the last time our home has been filled with so much laughter and enjoyment shared just among couples.

Our guests ranged between those who are just a few months away from tying the knot, to those who have been married for over 30 years. Ages varied from 20-something-year-olds with small children to 50-something-year-olds with empty nests. The age difference didn’t build a bridge between us. It wasn’t a case of having a group of baby boomers and Generation X members in one area of the house while those considered Generation Y or Millennials were in another area. We remained all together throughout the afternoon and into the evening.

We played games of individual skill like Jenga and matches of competition like Taboo. All of us dined on a feast containing chicken and burgers (both beef and turkey) that had been cooked to perfection on the grill in our backyard and sides of homemade macaroni and cheese and baked beans that were prepared in our kitchen. We even planned properly for the vegans that would be among us! For them, we were sure to add fresh salmon on our grill and tossed salad with a mix of fresh veggies to our side choices. We ended the evening with talking about the goodness of God and pouring non-alcoholic strawberry daiquiri in flutes and toasting the beauty of marriage. It was a wonderful gathering that was a real-life display of what the bonds between husbands and wives can and should look like when God is at the head of it.

In the Berean Study Bible, Ecclesiastes 9:9 says, “Enjoy life with your beloved wife all the days of the fleeting life that God has given you under the sun—all of your fleeting days.”

Notice that this passage of Scripture does not tell a man to enjoy his wife during the honeymoon phase. It doesn’t say to enjoy her for any limited amount of time. It instructs him to enjoy her ALL THE DAYS of his fleeting life.

Life, in general, is just too short to waste it on mediocre living—that includes a mediocre marriage. Husbands and wives should labor in love together to establish and maintain an extraordinary union. Marriage is to be savored. It is to be beautiful. Why not enjoy the one who knows you and loves you intimately? There is a quote that says, “If you want to have a healthy marriage, surround yourself with other couples who have a healthy marriage.” At Royalty Relationship Coaching, we encourage engaged and married people to encircle themselves with other couples that love God and love one another—those who strive to keep holiness and happiness in their bond. Have married companions who will encourage you and pray for you and cheer-on your success!

That’s what Saturday at our home was about. Many of those who came did not know each other, they just all knew us. Our endeavor was to bring like-minded couples together to establish relationships that will grow and continue even after our hours of fellowship ended. It was done so that Christ-believing husbands and wives could experience how fun-filled a faith-filled marriage is—especially when it is put in a room with others just like it.

Listen, married people. One of the worst things that we can do is have close friends among those who don’t believe there is such a thing as an authentically happy marriage. People with that mindset generally have it because they’ve never come across or witnessed a marriage that has maintained genuine happiness. Their entire thought process and belief system have been corrupted by their limited life experiences. In essence, they have allowed their limited encounters to be the measuring stick by which they size-up every single relationship in the world. Because they haven’t experienced it, they refuse to believe it exists. How narrow-minded is that? Those are not people that need to be allowed in our inner circle. They will be constant feeders of negativity and won’t be satisfied until your marriage is broken, because in their mind, it will prove their misguided theory to be true.

The decision to enjoy your life as a couple under covenant is a CHOICE. You’re not forced or brow-beaten into doing it. You don’t do it grudgingly. It’s not a cross that you must bear. You do it because you want to. You desire to. It is an intentional and deliberate endeavor. Keeping joy, harmony and fulfillment in your marriage should be your purpose and your passion. It’s not hard work—it’s a labor of love.

Drs. Michael & Kendra Holmes are the senior pastors of Deliverance Revival Church in Byron, Ga., the founders of Royalty Relationship Coaching, LLC, the authors of the 31-day devotional, “Cross-Fire: Igniting Passionate, Purposeful, and Powerful Relationships” and guest hosts of the television talk show, “The Marriage Circle Connection.” W.A.R. is an acronym for “We Are Royalty,” ™ the official slogan of Royalty Relationship Coaching, LLC. Visit the website at www.RoyaltyRelationshipCoaching.com.

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