What God Has Joined Together

I was reading a story today that was commenting on how marriage is dying as an institution in our society. The story talked about cohabitation and homosexuality, socioeconomic differences, etc. It also pointed out that among Christians, the divorce rate is just as high as among non-Christians, and we as Christians have not held up our end in promoting marriage as a good place to be.

So many times, when I hear Christians talk about marriage, the emphasis put on the promises that we make to each other "For better for worse, for richer for poorer, in sickness and in health."

When a couple comes to the altar and says those vows to each other, usually the joy of the day and being in love mask the depth of what those vows mean. Everything is simply beautiful and dreamy. We're promising our lives, our love to each other forever. Sigh...Image via Wikipedia.

But it is not those promises that join us together. It is God.

When the couple later hits difficult times, and Satan, the World, and our sinful flesh attack , often they are reminded of those promises that they made. And at that time, those promises weigh heavy -- Those vows come back and scream "you haven't done this ....your spouse certainly hasn't done this." "I didn't mean this." "This is going to go on for the rest of my life." "I have NO idea how to fix this. It can't be fixed." And the final conclusion -- "I can't save this. I made a mistake. Fixing this means stopping it."

And often couples get battered over the head and heart by those promises they made that were really too big for them, if keeping them relied solely on them. As Christians, we are not alone in the sustaining of our marriage. The Lord who created marriage is there.

It strikes me that in our baptismal and confirmation rites, when we make promises regarding steadfastness, our oath is "I do, by the grace of God." In the wedding rite, instead of an "I do" or an "I will" the vow really should be "I do, by the grace of God."

Because the strength of the Christian marriage is not the husband's strength or the wife's strength. It is the strength of God. The strength of the very God who sent His Son to die on the cross and rise again. And after the promises that the bride and the groom make to each other, we hear God's promise to us.

"What God has joined together..."

I'm convinced where we are falling down with marriage is that we are marriage pietists. In almost every other aspect of life, when we Lutherans talk about sanctification, we talk about how the Holy Spirit sustains, strengthens, guides us through all things. In teaching and counseling on marriage, the emphasis still tends to be on the promise WE make. Not the promise God makes.

In those words "What God has joined together," He has promised to bless the union that takes place. He promises to sustain it. He promises to guide it and strengthen it. And He promises that He is the one supporting it when it seems like there is absolutely no way that it can last one more day. That marriage didn't rely on the judgment or the feelings that were there when the engagement happened or on the day the vows were made. It wasn't the husband and wife that made that marriage. It is God that made that marriage. He made two people become one. And once he's done that, He's not going to leave it to those two people to keep it together by their own strength. It wasn't a mistake. No matter what the difficulties were, God allowed that marriage to happen and He PROMISES to bless you through your husband or wife.

And just like when we lose our jobs, when we've lost a loved one, when we are called to war, or when we face bankruptcy -- we trust that God will provide and get us through. Its the same with marriage. The answer is not "to suck it up and fly right," the answer is to trust that God will fix it, even when we can't individually find a way, and be patient and wait in that promise.

Social science bears that out -- in study after study, couples who have reported significant marital dissatisfaction, five years later, if they remained together, a vast majority report a great amount of satisfaction with their marriage and happiness. Those who divorced on average report much lower levels of happiness.

The Bible promises that we will have hard times, and that these times of suffering shape us and strengthen us, and that God will not give us more than we can handle. Those bad times happen in marriage, too. I don't know why we don't expect it to. It's the most intimate relationship we will ever have. It is a reflection of Christ's bond with His bride, the Church. Of course, Satan is going to use that to attack us. It is our most vulnerable point. God will sustain us through these times. And these times strengthen us, strengthen our faith, strengthen our bond with each other, and they bless us, just as surely as the romantic dates and the great sex do.

Rather than focusing on the law, we need to focus on the gospel, because it is surely there. God created the marriage that happened between the handsome guy in the tux and the pretty girl in the white gown, not the vows that they repeated or wrote. He will sustain it.

The gospel is that there were no mistakes made on your wedding day, because God sanctioned the marriage. God made the two one. And God was there between you, promising to sustain that marriage. If we base our marriage teaching on this promise and when we counsel those who are in trouble, maybe Christians will be able to stay married simply by doing what we are supposed to do -- lean not on our own understanding, but instead trust in God to provide all that is needed in our marriages, as in everything else. Because He will.

(note: this does not necessarily apply to situations that the Bible addresses -- such as where Christ says that divorce is permissible in cases where the spouse has abandoned the marriage or broken it through adultery. Eventually it becomes impossible to save a marriage when the other person has determined to destroy it)

Rejecting Industrialized Sex

This is an amazing post on sex from the First Things Blog. And of course, the comparison to industrialized eating is great, too.

What Kind of Woman Does a Pastor Fall In Love With???

Sometimes, I just love finding how people find my blog. Someone was listed because they Googled the question "What kind of woman does a pastor fall in love with?" I don't know if this person stopped to look around, it was one of those hits that says "0:00" and I still haven't figured out why I get so many of those (really, I don't bite...well, not hard and only when I have PMS).

Mr. Rebellious Pastor's Wife isn't here right now to ask but I have heard a few criteria over the past 15 or so years....For those of you who know Concordia Theological Seminary, I've been told (by my husband) that my husband (who was merely my new boyfriend at the time) had an idea to change a luxury retirement apartment building that is to the south (Towne House) of the lake into a residence for promising pastor's wife candidates (actually, the term he used was"ortho-babes." Obviously, I would've lived there).

I heard a grumpy seminarian one time say that a Lutheran pastor's wife should be "a good Baptist girl with childbearing hips."

And of course, he should keep the congregation's needs in mind. She should be able to bake like there is no tomorrow and not put on weight, she should be able to whip a church office into shape in the blink of an eye, not to mention put together a ladies retreat with style and grace, have been able to play the entire liturgy on the organ from the tender age of eight, and manage her house of five plus angelic children with a smile and a perfectly coiffed modest hair-do and perfectly tailored dress and modest heels.

Honestly, I don't know how many pastors out there think so much about what kind of woman they'd fall in love with because they are a pastor, as much as what kind of woman they'd fall in love with because they are a man who wants to spend the rest of his life with someone who has qualities they enjoy. Common interests, common values, common faith all serve to create some kind of chemistry.

That's all I can account for in my situation at least. I completely lack domestic skills (well, I can cook...now), my figure is less than hourglass (or more than hourglass), I don't play an instrument, I live in jeans and t-shirts, have one of those volcanic "Sgt. Schultz" type Germanic tempers, and my potluck dishes often have a price tag on them, when I actually have it together enough to remember to bring one.

However, I LOVE to read, laugh, cuddle, and I was much more impressed that the skinny-guy-with-glasses-who-won-my-heart could tie a cherry stem in a knot with his tongue than I was that he was a seminarian.

So, basically, I got myself in this mess by just being me...and if you happen to get yourself in the same sort of mess by just being you, then it is a very good thing. If you are trying to snare yourself a man of the cloth, my question is..... "why on God's green earth would you be LOOKING for this kind of trouble???"

But I'd love to hear from others...pastors and pastor's wives. What was on the list for qualifications for a life-long parsonage mate? (and, of course, answers could be serious, or tongue in cheek. I'm not sure what my attempt at this question is.) (and why does this dumb thing switch from double-spaced to single-spaced all the time???)

A Good Father Addendum

I think it should be noted that the previous list was made while I did not consider myself a Lutheran. I was. I was just in denial.

I was also in college in rural Utah. Before I went to college, I was attending a non-denominational "fellowship" and working at a Christian bookstore. I also don't know that I had come to see dating and relationships as being the road to marriage. I still only viewed them as ends in themselves. I probably would've been spared a lot of heartache if I'd had a healthier perspective. But I still bought into the world's perspective of "school, career, adventure, and then marriage" but who wouldn't enjoy the company along the way?

I'd at least had the common sense to establish beforehand that when I moved to Utah, I would not date a Mormon. I could not imagine him serving my purposes, and I knew that I could not serve his. I would never become LDS and therefore never marry in the temple. But that was the limits of the criteria that I went in with.

Many people don't realize how completely the LDS church pervades the culture in Utah. It has a tight rein on the state and local governments, can determine whether or not you get a job, and is also the main force in most people's social lives there. I had a professor who quipped that if you weren't 3rd generation Utah Mormon, you were an outsider. It is truly a different culture, even non-Utah Mormons experience culture shock upon moving there, and I can vouch for the fact that reverse culture shock is experienced, also. The pastors that are there are truly missionaries in a spiritually unfriendly land. Just seeing a passing stranger in Kmart who was wearing a cross was a comforting reminder that "I am not alone." Those of us at Southern Utah University (a public university) who were not Mormon (forget even Christian) felt a bond with each other based solely on that fact. So, that became the definition of my dating criteria as well.

Anyway, as I described below, when I moved there, I attended a Baptist church and was relatively happy there, except for the fact that I couldn't seem to find a comfortable place regarding the sacraments. While I still struggled with the idea of baptism as a proclamation of faith - I still didn't have a problem with the validity of my infant baptism and the fact that I did really receive the Holy Spirit there. I also could not bring myself to take Communion where they did not believe that Christ's Body and Blood were indeed present with the bread and the wine.

I had a flirtation (and nothing more) with an Episcopalian, but as our friendship progressed, I realized we were on two different pages morally and Biblically. I also dated a Catholic for two months and that became very clear that would not work. (No one prays to St. Thomas of the Roads to protect him in MY car - even if that u-turn wasn't particularly legal!)

I was probably married to my Lutheran seminarian for two years and close to giving birth when I realized that I couldn't imagine what it would be like to marry someone who wasn't Lutheran. So many people don't think it matters - but what about when the birth of your child comes up and all of a sudden you realize that your spouse thinks that it is abominable that you would want your baby baptized?

Or even before that. I can't imagine what it would be like to not be able to worship with my husband or commune with him. That would break my heart. (even though I have generally spent the first three years of each of my children's lives griping that I don't worship WITH my husband...he's in the pulpit while I'm wrestling my escape artist toddlers to the ground in the narthex).

As Lutherans, we are in a very unique place in the Christian world, theologically. We reject the teachings of the Catholics that are non-Biblical, yet we hold to inerrancy of Scripture and we also reject that the waters of baptism and the bread and wine are merely symbols of Christ's forgiveness. There really is no other denomination that truly holds to that. We really can't yoke ourselves to believers in either Catholic or Protestant realms and find true unity and peace. That is something that I didn't quite comprehend when I made my list below and simply put "Christian."

Yet I also mourn that I can't simply tell my children "make sure they're good Lutherans" without a full checklist of what Lutheran is, thanks to the false teachings of the Evangelical "Lutheran" Church in America, who claim the name but not the theology, or even in the strongly varied teachings in our own Missouri Synod. But as parents, it is our job to teach them what their faith means, and to pray that God protects them and keeps them in that faith. And we do teach them, even now--especially now, before those hormones kick in and make it a little harder to listen.

Still, I have visions in my head of the Cheers episode where Woody (LCMS) and Kelly(ELCA) realized how different they really were--after their wedding. When I first saw it, my friend Pete and I were rolling on the floor laughing (with a bunch of our Mormon dormmates wondering what was THAT funny). Now that I have children, I don't think it is as funny as I did then.

(though I can't believe that I can't find that clip on YouTube!! Some technologically savvy Lutheran fan of 1980's and 90's sitcoms has got to put that up!!).

A Good Father

In the Spring of 1991, I was driving back to school from Las Vegas. To the left of me was probably one of the most beautiful sunsets I have ever seen. There really is nothing like a sunset over the desert. Oh my, sometimes I miss the desert.....

Oh, yeah, back to the Spring of 1991. I barely noticed the sunset. I was crying. My boyfriend, Frank, and I had just broken up. Frank was kind of structured (very unlike me) and his weekends were laid out just so: Saturday night, he usually spent that evening with his friends Ray and I don't even remember the other one...he was more Ray's friend anyway. Sunday was spent with his half-brothers. Neither one of those things could bring any complaint, really. It is good to spend time with your friends and your brothers. I just happened to live 175 miles away, and I worked on Fridays, and only sometimes on Saturdays if I was needed, and I usually didn't know if I was needed until Saturday. Frank didn't cancel plans without notice. I'd driven down to see him, hoping that he would be able to make time for me, and he didn't. (I did get to do some great four-wheeling with my friend Todd, though). In the midst of those obligations, there was no time for me, the person he willingly entered into a relationship with, and said he loved. On top of it all, Frank and I had been dating off and on through high school (mostly off) and this was the longest we'd gone, and I had really started to hope we could make it work this time. I realized there was something wrong with that, and we had the first fight we'd had in our six year friendship and relationship. Usually, we'd just distance ourselves for a while. It was good to have that fight.

Somewhere along that drive though, I had an epiphany. I realized that I dealt with those same issues with my father. My father is a good man who keeps his word....but he's not very flexible, and sometimes it seemed like the obligations he made to other people came before the ones to his family...in the name of taking care of his family.

At that point, the tears dried up, and the realization came to me that I had been saved from a very trying relationship, one in which I could not win. It also occurred to me that if I didn't want to end up in this situation again, I'd better really figure out what I wanted in a guy and be on the lookout for it. So, I put together this list.

I had a guideline. I decided that it would all fall under this category: He must be a good father. I didn't even know if I wanted kids, but I figured the traits that I wanted for my kids, if I had them, would be a good guideline. And I loaded that definition with A LOT more than just - he must like playing with kids and will be willing to change diapers.

1. He must be a good Christian (Frank was not..he was a good guy in many ways, and he was curious and respectful, but he was not a believer. I don't think any guy I ever dated had been a Christian, not a committed one, anyway, and this part scared me. I did like a guy who was exciting and who got my blood pumping. I didn't know if the two were really compatible. They are).

2. He must be respectful and have manners. If he cares enough to pull out my chair, open my door, or get me flowers - then that is a good sign that he will be respectful when things get more serious. Convincing myself that I deserved these things was another story. But I did. I told myself that I wanted a man who would show my son that it was important, and just as importantly, his daughter should expect this from any man who was interested in her, as well. And if they don't take time to do this at the beginning of a relationship, they won't be any better at it (in fact, they'll be worse) when they are comfortable with you. They have to believe you are a gift from God (and you have to believe they are, too).

3. I need to be able to respect him. This is so important. More important than I could've ever imagined. Today I would put that in terms of "He loves God more than he loves me." Because there have been times I wanted him to conform to my will, and that was against God's will - or at least there was some wisdom that I was missing. And when my husband loves God more than me, he takes even more seriously the command to love me as Christ loves the church. And still the quantity of the love that my husband has for me is more than I can ever fathom.

4. I want him to want to spend time with me. I want that to be a strong priority. I want to enjoy being with him. I want him to believe that building and maintaining his relationship with me is what the foundation for the family should be built upon (only second to our foundation being built on Christ). When we have a happy marriage, we have a happy family. And the problems....when we emphasize this, we work through those problems.

5.He has to have a great sense of humor and like to play....with me as well as with our children.

6. He can't make his decisions in life based on the risk of getting hurt. He has to want to risk loving and know that getting hurt is part of the process of loving a sinner and being a sinner. He also can't be the kind that wears his heart on his sleeve either -showing off his hurts or expecting them. He simply knows that God is going to take care of him in this.

Not long after this list was made , I met Jeff. I don't know if he knows what kind of scrutiny he was under (but he had his own list, too). Having guidelines helped me to keep my head on my shoulders while I was falling in love and until the very day I said "I do." It was amazing the difference that there was. I also think the fact that he possessed all of these traits and then some led me to fall in love with someone I may not have normally considered my type. It took me out of "my type" and drew me to someone who was truly good for me. Sometimes the fact that he did seem to fit these so well kept me there even when I really thought it might be better to go my merry way, just to see what would happen next. It was a completely different process.

I don't believe that we are victims of our emotions or our pheremones. I do believe we can fall in love with whom we choose. And when all the stars and such seem to fall from the sky and we are back on earth again and calling attention to each other's faults in spades, the fact that the person who now seems very very human is still a very good man and inspires me to be as good as I possibly can be in the face of this new adversity ends up being the strength that the relationship stands on. (because in the end, that was based on finding someone who truly put their trust in Christ in the first place) --and what rescues it from our sad and sometimes evil flaws (Okay, this sentence is such a grammatical nightmare that I can't believe I published it. I am still wrestling through a more concise way to say it. At least it poetically expresses the tumult that is felt when this situation finally comes, right??? Repeat after me "Rationalization is my friend.")

To a great extent, this is why I think arranged marriage or courtship can work so well. Other people recognize a good man, too. My parents certainly did recognize that Jeff was "the one" from the very moment they met him. And so did my friends - even the ones who hadn't met him - like Frank. Often, they've seen things I wasn't willing to see.

And when you have a person who trusts in God and has good character and integrity - you will have a good relationship - because at some point in time, that is what you are left with.....and love and passion continually flow through these and are fed by these traits.

I have friends who let their kids become everything when they have them. Their lives become centered around their kids and all of a sudden the husband is a means of supporting this lifestyle they have with their kids. They don't understand when their husband is working longer hours or going out with his friends more, and they fear for the day that their kids will grow up and leave them. I don't have that. I love and respect my husband, and above all, he is my best friend. I love the time that God has given me with my kids, but I actually look forward to when they will be gone, and it will be just us again, and we can just lay about and talk and do other things without interruption, and enjoy life together again at our pace.

And - as far as all those people who say "sexual compatibility is so important." I agree....but beyond physical attraction, beyond intelligence, beyond money -- NOTHING is as sexy as a truly good, loving man.