The Primary Purpose for Marriage

I recently performed a wedding in our church for a young couple. Though I have officiated many more funerals than weddings during my years of pastoral ministry, I always count it a privilege to participate in the ceremony of couple joining together in marriage. It’s wonderful to experience the love, joy and hope of the occasion.

It’s sad, therefore, to think that statistics tell us the divorce rate in our country for first-time marriages is around 50 percent. This causes me to question what happens to half the marriages that begin with so much optimism.

While there are many reasons for divorce, I wonder if one underlying cause is that most people have a misunderstanding about the primary purpose of marriage. Most people go into marriage thinking the primary purpose is happiness. While we all desire a happy marriage, the truth is the primary reason for marriage is not to make us happy, but to make us holy.

God uses the marriage relationship to help us learn about him and to grow in the likeness of his Son Jesus Christ. How does that work? Well, how can we love our neighbor as ourselves if we cannot love our spouse? How can we show patience to a stranger if we cannot show it to the one who is closest to us? How can we stop to listen to those who are in need if we cannot do it to the one we live with daily?

This leads to what I believe is another misunderstanding concerning marriage: that it is a 50-50 relationship. A 50-50 view means if one is not able to hold up their half of the relationship, there is a lack, and the marriage suffers. Marriage, rather, should not be 50-50, but 100-100. When one spouse is struggling in life for some reason (whether physically, emotionally or spiritually), the other spouse is willing to give beyond themselves to love and to help.

If through a season one is only able to give 30 percent, the other spouse, for the reason of love, devotes 70 percent. There may even be times when one spouse is not able to invest anything into the relationship. This will then require the other to be giving all 100 percent. Though this type of situation can be very difficult on a marriage, love enables us to do amazing and beautiful things.

That is why the Apostle Paul writes in the well-known 13th chapter of 1 Corinthians in the New Testament: “Love is patient; love is kind . . . It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs . . . It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails.”

My prayer for you is that as you learn to show this type of love in your marriage, you will not only grow in your holiness, but you will also find your marriage growing in its happiness!