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July 7 - August 29, 2025
Every marriage is an ongoing story with highs and lows, joys and disasters. And it is shaping each of us, for better or worse.
Every marriage is an ongoing story with highs and lows, joys and disasters. And it is shaping each of us, for better or worse.
The hard moments and the suffering are an inescapable part of our journey toward connection and closeness.
The hard moments and the suffering are an inescapable part of our journey toward connection and closeness.
Every marriage is a story of two people formed by different worlds joining together to create a universe that has never existed before. Your marriage is unique in all its goodness and in all that needs redemption.
Every marriage is a story of two people formed by different worlds joining together to create a universe that has never existed before. Your marriage is unique in all its goodness and in all that needs redemption.
Understanding the past allows us to make sense of what’s not working in the present. If we don’t explore our earlier stories, we won’t grasp how our histories of brokenness and beauty are playing out now. And we’ll be bound to repeat them in one form or another.
Understanding the past allows us to make sense of what’s not working in the present. If we don’t explore our earlier stories, we won’t grasp how our histories of brokenness and beauty are playing out now. And we’ll be bound to repeat them in one form or another.
Your marriage is where redemption is meant to grow. God intends for it to be not merely good or happy, but transformative. You will become who your marriage exposes and invites you to be. This is a far richer and more compelling vision of marriage than only getting along or resolving conflict through compromise. You are either becoming more like Jesus together and because of each other, or you are not.
Whatever your relational dynamic is today, whether it is on the rocks, soaring above the clouds, or living somewhere in the middle orbit of reality, I want you to know: you and your partner are meant for more. No matter how difficult or sweet your marriage is, God created you for more than whatever you are experiencing today.
Whatever your relational dynamic is today, whether it is on the rocks, soaring above the clouds, or living somewhere in the middle orbit of reality, I want you to know: you and your partner are meant for more. No matter how difficult or sweet your marriage is, God created you for more than whatever you are experiencing today.
Every marriage is meant to be a taste of heaven, a glimpse back into Eden, and an anticipation of what will one day be true. We are the face of God to each other.
Of course, we often fail to do this. Many times, sadly, I have been for Becky a taste of hell, and, likewise, she has been an acrid presence for me. This is not because we don’t love each other or belong together; it is because we possess frailties no human can escape. But it is by design that these rise to the surface in marriage, so we can sense how God treats our hurts and needs, and so he can grab hold of broken parts of us and make us new.
Of course, we often fail to do this. Many times, sadly, I have been for Becky a taste of hell, and, likewise, she has been an acrid presence for me. This is not because we don’t love each other or belong together; it is because we possess frailties no human can escape. But it is by design that these rise to the surface in marriage, so we can sense how God treats our hurts and needs, and so he can grab hold of broken parts of us and make us new.
No matter the ups and downs, we are meant to be the presence of God that brings transformation, doing so in a way no one else possibly could. To put it bluntly, we are meant to drive each other crazy, and welcome each other to sanity, wholeness, and joy.
No matter the ups and downs, we are meant to be the presence of God that brings transformation, doing so in a way no one else possibly could. To put it bluntly, we are meant to drive each other crazy, and welcome each other to sanity, wholeness, and joy.
She quietly and tenderly shook her head. No. I glided closer, now inches away, and said coldly and quietly, “Move.” What she did next, to this day, decades later, makes my head spin. She put her hand on my heart and said, “I know the men who have brought you heartache and humiliated you. I know what it has cost you. And I know that is not what you want to do to your son.” I don’t know why my heart softened then and not during a hundred times of other failures, but I began to cry. What I expected was my wife’s defensive anger to protect our son from his angry father. Instead, I experienced the
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She quietly and tenderly shook her head. No. I glided closer, now inches away, and said coldly and quietly, “Move.” What she did next, to this day, decades later, makes my head spin. She put her hand on my heart and said, “I know the men who have brought you heartache and humiliated you. I know what it has cost you. And I know that is not what you want to do to your son.” I don’t know why my heart softened then and not during a hundred times of other failures, but I began to cry. What I expected was my wife’s defensive anger to protect our son from his angry father. Instead, I experienced the
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Then she addressed my wounds from the past, my struggle in the present, and my yearning for a healthy, joyful future. It was, altogether, a reassurance to me that I was seen—and that I could become more. It was a taste of heaven, loving me and pulling me toward goodness, and precisely what my soul needed.
Then she addressed my wounds from the past, my struggle in the present, and my yearning for a healthy, joyful future. It was, altogether, a reassurance to me that I was seen—and that I could become more. It was a taste of heaven, loving me and pulling me toward goodness, and precisely what my soul needed.
Becky and I have become more aware of tender areas to treat with care and of broken tendencies to redirect.
Becky and I have become more aware of tender areas to treat with care and of broken tendencies to redirect.
We’ve become quicker to speak compassion and grace when we stumble.
We’ve become quicker to speak compassion and grace when we stumble.
If we want a redeemed future and a more beautiful marriage, we must excavate and sift through what shaped us in the past.
If we want a redeemed future and a more beautiful marriage, we must excavate and sift through what shaped us in the past.
We can see the answer in a picture of gardening. If you want a flourishing garden, you need to tend to the soil, even bring in manure. You must tend to the dirt and get nutrients to the roots. If you are dealing with weeds, it is not enough to cut them off at the top and hope they go away. You have to dig down deep into the soil to extract the roots and kill what will diminish your crop. It is messy, dirty work, but the result of good care and wisdom is delicious, nourishing fruit.
We can see the answer in a picture of gardening. If you want a flourishing garden, you need to tend to the soil, even bring in manure. You must tend to the dirt and get nutrients to the roots. If you are dealing with weeds, it is not enough to cut them off at the top and hope they go away. You have to dig down deep into the soil to extract the roots and kill what will diminish your crop. It is messy, dirty work, but the result of good care and wisdom is delicious, nourishing fruit.
While no one is perfect and no marriage is without flaws, every marriage can defy the past, redeem the present, and thrive in the future.
While no one is perfect and no marriage is without flaws, every marriage can defy the past, redeem the present, and thrive in the future.
Marriage is a wild, at times terrifying, journey into the fullness of what love, with honesty and humility, can bring to this earth. Your marriage is meant to transform, redeem, and free you to be fully alive.
Marriage is a wild, at times terrifying, journey into the fullness of what love, with honesty and humility, can bring to this earth. Your marriage is meant to transform, redeem, and free you to be fully alive.
Wherever your imagination wanders, dare to ask, What do I dream for my partner and me? How would I love to see our story unfold in the years to come? How might we step into transformation, freedom, and vibrancy?
Wherever your imagination wanders, dare to ask, What do I dream for my partner and me? How would I love to see our story unfold in the years to come? How might we step into transformation, freedom, and vibrancy?
Also explore: Who do I want to become? Who would I like to be in moments of tension with my partner? What would a more curious, honest, compassionate, and patient version of me look like?
Also explore: Who do I want to become? Who would I like to be in moments of tension with my partner? What would a more curious, honest, compassionate, and patient version of me look like?
We begin by reflecting because it is nearly impossible to go forward until we go back—until we understand why we married each other. It holds the key to our beauty as couples and gives a window into our brokenness.
We begin by reflecting because it is nearly impossible to go forward until we go back—until we understand why we married each other. It holds the key to our beauty as couples and gives a window into our brokenness.
deus ex machina,
Every marriage is built on the unconscious intention to find redemption. We look at the extraordinary person we’re dating and, somehow, in our bones we sense, You will give me what I never had before. You will give my body and heart what I know I need. We typically are unaware of this impulse. And of our unmet needs. And of how the other might rescue us.
After spending hours or days on separate continents (emotionally speaking), we would find our way back to each other and slowly return to touch. The debris from our collision was swept away, never truly addressed, and a demilitarized zone (DMZ) was formed—meaning, we learned to avoid talking about her family or mine.
We didn’t know it, but we were in a war of trauma built on the foundation of false loyalty to our parents, and leaving it felt like a form of death.
We did not see that we had married each other to escape our trauma, or that marrying each other did not, necessarily, enable us to break free from our families and past trauma.
We married each other to redeem what we had lost and suffered without naming what had driven us into the arms of the other—which meant our deep hurts kept hurting. And ruling us. And dividing us. We married each other to find God and, in turn, at times, we tasted hell.
what draws couples together eventually can divide them. What brings them together is a hunger for redemption of harm they barely can see, let alone name—and that failure to name creates a framework for untold present and future suffering to play out.
To go forward, we must first go back. We must enter the fray of past heartache to have the capacity to dream and live out a radical new future.
I want you to celebrate the odd, lovely, and, at times, crazy ways God brought you into the sphere of your spouse. It wasn’t an accident. But it is far more than merely God’s will. Our movement toward each other includes our felt need for restoring, our longing for the other to replenish what we sense we lack.
Lisa was what my own mother was not, which I found deeply attractive.
So I went into marriage feeling like I’d hit the jackpot—here was a gorgeous woman I loved who didn’t demand attention or reassurance. I had the illusion that marriage offered a “need-free” zone, a liberating arrangement that offered emotional connection without demands. Little did I know that Lisa’s and my pattern of denying our needs would lead us away from true joy and deep intimacy.
No one experiences near-constant joy in their marriage, but sadly, some of us go long stretches with little to no delight. While even in a strong relationship, it may be relatively infrequent, joy is never meant to be rare. We have learned to deny the desire to be delighted in, but it exists in every heart.
