Week 39: Nine months married (week 8 of pregnancy)

This week marked our nine month anniversary! Time goes by so quickly! I can´t believe we have been married for almost a year!

I read this quote recently and I like it a lot:

¨In every marriage more than a week old, there are grounds for divorce. The trick is to find, and continue to find, grounds for marriage.¨

I think every married couple could easily find a million reasons not to stay together. It´s not hard. What´s hard is waking up each day and remembering exactly why you want to be married! Some days it´s easy...like on your anniversary when you feel all warm and fuzzy. But some days it´s difficult, like when you run into some kind of crisis. On good days it´s easy to remember why you fell in love with that person, and why you still love them. It was their laugh, maybe, or their romantic side. Maybe it was their sense of humor or maybe some quality in them that you admired. But what about when your prince charming turns into a regular man, and those marriage-worthy qualities seem far away?

As a Christian woman, my last resort is always a simple reminder of what the Bible says. God hates divorce. He hates it! Why? Because when two people get married, it isn´t the pastor or the government who marries them, it´s God! The bond of marriage is supernatural. Who am I to even consider breaking that bond?

But here´s another thought, something I´ve learned in these nine months. When he seems the least attractive to you, when all those charming qualities you love about him are nowhere to be found, and you are wondering what happened to that guy you dated, look in the mirror. Are you the girl he dated? Do you still try to look your best? Do you still try to be on your best behavior with him? I´ve found that my husband´s behavior is often (although not always) a direct reflection of my behavior towards him, and if I change my behavior, his is sure to follow suit. In marriage we are like sponges of our partners, and whatever mood we set they are sure to soak up. So my thought is this, that I, as a godly wife, should be setting the tone in my home before my husband even gets here. I need to spend time with God, and spend time getting my heart right so that my husband comes home to a calm, peaceful home instead of coming home to find me annoyed, aggravated, stressed, etc. It´s easier said than done I suppose, but not nearly as difficult as our selfishness wants us to believe!