Love That Lasts 5- Day Devotional Sample

One last thing: Not the things we bring into the marriage, or the things done against us, but the things we continually do in the current marriage.

It’s in those moments, especially early on in the marriage, you realize the first year of marriage is very much a crucible. Two lives completely thrown together in all areas (financial, creatively, job wise, sexuality, and more) there is bound to be friction. And in that friction we are tempted to think the other person is the problem. I’d be lying if I said this didn’t happen with Alyssa and me.

Why doesn’t she just act more like me?

Why doesn’t she do it this way?

It all comes down to framework: If you believe marriage is to make you happy, then you will be severely disappointed. (Now, does marriage make you happy? It sure does for us! But that’s not the point of marriage.) And when you believe that, you argue and fight differently. If your personal happiness is paramount, then anything that impedes that, like all of your spouse’s differences from you, then you’ll push back against that.

What if marriage isn’t meant to make you happy, but to make you holy?

And I don’t mean holy in the simplistic (actually false) definition of strict morality and whether or not you do this or don’t do that. Holiness by definition simply means “set apart, or sacred, or my favorite—different.” 

And so in some ways you can say, marriage is about making you different.

Or another way to put it is, marriage is about making you look more like Jesus.

When you realize that you no longer see disagreements or differences or your spouse’s peculiarities as annoying or maddening, but instead see them as opportunities to actually grow into your true self—the image of God reflected to be more and more like Jesus.