Week 04: Eternal Marriage

I had a good friend once ask me if I really believed in eternal marriage. My answer was a resounding, Yes!  She then looked at me and stated if her relationship with her husband was good than she could believe and want an eternal marriage. But her relationship was not, so why would she want to be with him eternally.

            I chocked… I didn’t quite know what to say. I knew they had struggled to find what worked for them, just like every couple does. I knew they had great moments that filled their life with joy, just like every couple does.  I couldn’t imagine why she would not what to be eternally bond to her husband. I wasn’t very helpful, or prepared to answer her question then, so today I’d like to take a second shot at answering.

            Every marriage has its moments that I call “root moments”. Just like a tree’s roots they may not be very pretty, they many not be very fun, or enjoyable, but they are necessary. Roots of a tree carry water and nutrients from the soil to the rest of the tree. Without healthy roots a tree cannot survive.   Uniquely, without leaves a tree would also die.  Leaves are those beautiful moments in a marriage.  Those moments that feed our love and binds us together tightly. Those moments feed back to the roots and make the tree healthier, and stronger. In return we have a healthy, beautiful tree that is strong against the winds of the world. 

            So what do we do if our root to leaves system is broken in our marriage? Start again. Start from the beginning. F. Burton Howard taught, “If you want something to last forever you treat it differently. It becomes special because you have made it so.”  Beautiful marriages that radiate joy, light and happiness do not happen because of fate, or luck. Beautiful marriages happen because of hard work, and dedication.  F. Burton Howard taught about eternal marriage. “First, an eternal marriage is eternal. Eternal implies continuing growth and improvement. It means that man and wife will honestly try to perfect themselves. It means that the marriage relationship is not to be frivolously discarded at the first sign of disagreement or when times get hard. It signifies that love will grow stronger with time and that it extends beyond the grave. It means that each partner will be blessed with the company of the other partner forever and that problems and differences might as well be resolved because they are not going to go away. Eternal signifies repentance, forgiveness, long-suffering, patience, hope, charity, love, and humility. All of these things are involved in anything that is eternal, and surely we must learn and practice them if we intend to claim an eternal marriage.”