I Still Do By Dave HarveySample

DAY 5

Thorns Change Our Boast

I have a confession. In my first few years of marriage, I saw myself as God’s gift to the institution. I imagined the ways God might use our marriage to exalt the wisdom of biblical gender roles, establish a potent specimen of marital godliness, or spotlight my leadership savvy. It would be my starring role!

But getting married didn’t make me sparkle. It exposed my weakness. In regretful ways, I trusted in my own strength and what that strength could produce. So God gave me a thorn that brought my self-assessment back to earth. The thorn was a job for which I was equal parts underqualified and overconfident. It revealed the shabby foundations in my life, which came into full view the day my wife said, “You missed our anniversary.”

My eyes filled with tears. I had been working so hard that I completely missed the arrival and departure of that momentous day. Never, never in a million years did I see myself as an anniversary-skipping kind of husband. Not when I tried so hard to cover all of my bases. Not when I was throwing my best leadership at life. But it happened. In my ambition to excel, I failed to prioritize our marriage. I failed to honor my wife. 

“I’m so ashamed,” I whispered. “Please forgive me.”

“Of course I forgive you,” she responded. “You’ve been working like a lunatic. Let’s celebrate it tonight!” 

My wife’s gracious forgiveness flipped a switch in my mind. My illusion of myself as a consistently strong and attentive husband had to be downgraded. I’m not omnicompetent. I’m really a weak man who needs a strong Savior, so “I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me” (2 Corinthians 12:9).

Humility is essential to a marriage that endures. A humble acceptance of our own responsibility and an ongoing awareness of our culpability as sinners helps us to daily depend on God’s amazing grace and sufficiency instead of our own. It reminds us that we are not the Creator but creatures. We have not arrived; we’re just pilgrims journeying toward our eternal home.

How have you experienced God’s help through mistakes you’ve made in your marriage?