Reflections on Twenty-Five Years of Marriage

How does one celebrate twenty-five years of marriage? It’s not as if that particular milestone on one’s marital journey is innately distinct from the year before or the one hopefully to follow. Yet our culture nods sternly toward the expectation that any couple who has made it this far, and is not in the midst of divorce proceedings, ought to do something special to mark the achievement.

Anticipating that my wife, Beth, and I would attain said landmark, we planned to do it right and travel for a week to Hawaii this summer. As the day approached and time constraints were more carefully considered, we modified the plan to five days in the Canadian Rockies. Later, fiscal realities were assessed (we live on one salary and bankroll four teenagers) and our anniversary week was recast as jetting away for four days on the east coast. In the end, we took off in our minivan for three days on the North Shore.

We could not have been happier in a penthouse suit overlooking the French Riviera. The point was that we were alone, celebrating a quarter-century of life together. We enjoyed every minute, recognizing with grateful hearts that many marriages never survive to see this day. Here we were, best friends, still in love, playing together, praying together, enjoying long talks until speech gave way to silence that had long ago ceased to prove awkward.

In one of our more serious talks I asked Beth what we got right. God only knows how many things we’ve gotten wrong. Marriage is a tough slog between two sinners who have to figure a lot out in order to survive. But here we were after twenty-five years and still very much in love. What did we get right? After a long pause, Beth’s answered: “Everything!”

Even after dinner out and the prospect of a couple of days away from the kids I was blindsided by such a glowing assessment. But her one word response spoke volumes, having little to do with reality and much to do with attitude. Beth could concentrate for three minutes on my faults and failings as a husband and have enough material to remain bitter right through our fiftieth anniversary. But she has consistently chosen to view her husband in the best possible light. She is no pushover, let me tell you. Nor is she anything close to a Pollyanna. But as analytical, tough-minded, and unrelenting as she can sometimes be, Beth persistently chooses to see what is best in me. That is pure grace. It is also high quality lubricant for the gears of marriage.

Believing as we do that marriage is not only a gift from God but a tool he uses to deepen and change His people, we talked at length about the purifying crucible of marriage. Beth shared that one of the critical moments of growth for her came early in our relationship. She realized that I loved God more than I loved her and that reality troubled her. She explained the innate yearning as a young woman to be all important to her man—to suffer no rival for my affection, not even God. But in an epiphany she came to understand that the right ordering of affections is crucial to the health of a marriage. As creatures made in God’s image we must learn to love only what we ought, and to the degree that we should, such that God is glorified as the giver of every good gift. Since God is the creator and source of all goodness, to love Him supremely is to love everything else rightly. Beth realized that if I loved her more than I loved God, my love for her would prove disordered and small. If I loved God first, I would love her optimally. She now rests in the satisfaction of that truth.

One of my epiphanies came when I realized that marriage was not about getting your way or attaining a woman who would meet every need and desire. Rather marriage was a calling to love and value one woman as an exclusive gift from God. It was a calling to pour my life into a creature of distinct design so that she would grow closer to God through my nurture, finding refuge in my devotion and fidelity to her. In those early days I realized that love was fundamentally a matter of giving, not getting. After twenty-five years, I’ve discovered that the exercise of love is itself a receiving, never dutiful sacrifice.

Twenty-five years of joyful marriage does not make us experts. We won’t be writing any books. But perhaps it earns a couple the privilege to point to the wisdom of God’s counsel and the wonder of his grace. He is the ultimate gift from whom all blessings flow. Thank you, Father, for Beth.