Marriage - A New Perspective

In reading an article recently given to me by a friend and mentor entitled The Case for Early Marriage, exactly one sentence stood out to me in a way that the rest of the article failed to do: "What most young adults fail to realize is that marriage is a formative institution not an institution to be entered into once one is fully formed." Hold on here a second. Why have I never thought of marriage in this way before? I mean, it really never crossed my mind that it may actually work this way.

Ever since I was little, marriage was what you got to do when you were all grown up, when you had it all together, when you "arrived" and became the person you would be for the rest of your life. And even as an adult, I continued to think this way. I blamed others in a relationship for not having all together (as if I ever did), and dumped many a nice man just for that.

But what I have come to learn is that I don't have it all together yet. And what's more, I'll never be able to get to the point where I have "arrived." Ta da! I'm all grown up! Life is all about growing, changing, a continual path of formation and transformation, growing ever closer to and gaining knowledge of God, others, and self (in that order). And marriage is choosing to do all of that with another person. And just like growth and change for one person is messy and unpredictable and confusing and hard work, I know that marriage will be all of this as well, and that's how it was designed.

Although I am tempted to look back on every relationship that I ended because they didn't have it all together, and in truth, neither did I, I mustn't. God would have steered my heart back to the one planned for me, or maybe He will still. The call will be unignorable. Something tells me I will not miss it. So, with this new found knowledge, I can only look ahead to future relationships. Dating and marriage is in itself formative. It's a choice to grow and change with someone else. I've been praying for my husband as long as I've known I could, and I know that God will bless me as He sees fit, married or not. And I need to be content in that.