The Making of Marriage

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Marriage is full of seasons. Some seasons are so smooth. You’re on the mountain top– everything feels so right, love feels effortless, and you’re clicking with your spouse at every turn. It’s like you’re sharing the same brain and you just can’t imagine spending time apart at all. You simply can’t imagine not always feeling this way with your spouse. But life doesn’t stay easy breezy. What happens when life gets hard? When stress, loss, disconnection, or disappointment enter the chat? That’s when we scramble, right? How did it get like this? Why aren’t we connecting? Where did my best friend go?

Too often, couples wait until that season of difficulty arises to start working on their relationship, but by then, they’re already running on empty. We’ve been there. Believe me. We made it out, clawing and scratching, but it wasn’t easy. 

Galatians 6:9 reminds us,

“Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time, we will reap a harvest if we do not give up.”

Paul is reminding us to keep up the hard work as believers– growing closer to God, loving others, serving others. Not only is this a powerful encouragement as a believer in general, but for your marriage as well. 

I know I just used a planting metaphor in my last post, but I’m going to do it again (like I know anything about planting). Just as a farmer doesn’t wait until winter to plant seeds, couples shouldn’t wait until difficult seasons to start investing in their relationship. The rhythms we create in the springtime of our marriage– prayer, communication, quality time, acts of service– become the foundation that will carry us through the winters. 

Difficulties are inevitable, but preparation for the winter can help your marriage thrive. To create a strong marriage that will weather the storms, we need to be intentional about cultivating good habits now, trusting that we will reap the benefits of our faithfulness and be able to thrive off of what we have built up in the storehouse. (Ok, enough about plants… maybe.) 

Prayer & Spiritual Growth

Whether you do this together or separately, establishing a habit of praying, studying Scripture, and seeking God’s guidance can only benefit your marriage. Michael and I have gone through a few studies together on The Bible App. Some of them have been good, leading to meaningful conversation and connection. Others have had us struggling to get through them. But! Going through these studies together, regardless of the material, still allowed us to connect intentionally on a spiritual, intellectual, and emotional level. Occasionally we’ll pray together as a couple, but that’s a work in progress. The importance here is seeking God first in our marriage in order to grow closer to each other. If you’re not praying with each other, at least pray for each other. I’ve told so many people about Praying for Your Husband from Head to Toe by Sharon Jaynes– it’s a great place to start! I can’t speak for the other side out of experience, but The Power of a Praying Husband by Stormie Omartian could be good for the husbands (I’ve seen it recommended a few times). 

Which leads me to my next point–

Communication & Vulnerability 

Making time for deep conversations, actively listening, and practicing emotional honesty is a surefire way to keep your connection strong. Does this take time and effort? Absolutely. But if you’re not talking, laughing, and connecting in the good times, why would you suddenly have the effort to do that in the difficult times? Use the good seasons to talk and connect, so that when the difficult times arise you feel safe enough to speak to your spouse about it because that foundation of trust and vulnerability is already there.  

Quality Time & Connection: 

I’ve talked about this a lot and will continue to harp on the importance of prioritizing quality time with each other. Date nights, shared hobbies, and daily check-ins can strengthen the bond that help you ride out the winter. Sure, you might not feel like having a weekly date night because of the stress or grief or hurt, but you have already created these routines and need to keep them going. Support each other, use the time to check in with one another. We post conversation starters (almost) weekly on Instagram and I know I’ve written at least 3 separate blog posts just focusing on date nights. Don’t let this routine fall off when the weather gets rough. 

Acts of Service & Sacrifice 

Like the importance of date night, this is a topic I can (and will) spend more time on on another day. If I’m being super transparent, this is one of the first things I try to drop when Michael and I are in a rough patch. I don’t want to serve him. I don’t want to put him before me. Why would I want to show love to the guy who I’m trying not to touch when we pass in the hallway?! But that’s exactly why this routine needs to stay in place. In Timothy Keller’s book, The Meaning of Marriage, he spends time talking about the emotion of love and the action of love. He emphasizes the importance of choosing to love our spouse even when we’re not feeling it. He says,

“Of the two, emotion and action, it is the latter that we have the most control over. It is the action of love that we can promise to maintain every day.”

Every day we can wake up and choose love. Choose to serve. Choose sacrifice. Why? Because in the model of the perfect marriage, Jesus and the church, He chose to love, serve, and sacrifice, even when He wasn’t feeling it. Building a mindset of serving each other joyfully and meeting each other’s needs is a choice. And just like with The Love Dare, if you choose to love and serve your spouse daily, even when you’re not feeling it and they’re not making it easy, your marriage will benefit. 

Conflict Resolution & Grace

This may be the most difficult for me, and probably a lot of you reading this. But learning to navigate disagreements with patience and forgiveness before challenges intensify can help you through those difficult times. You can use the tools you have already learned and practiced to make work through struggles with your spouse. It won’t be all rainbows and unicorns, but at least you will have a foundation to fall back on. Michael recently finished reading The Seven Principles for Making Marriage Work by John Gottman and said this is a great resource for tools that help with conflict resolution. 

The Harvest

Just like Galations 6:9 says, don’t become weary. Don’t throw in the towel when you hit these winter storms. Instead, let the work that you have put in sustain you. For when you climb out of the valley back to the mountain top, you will look down into the valley and see what is there. You will have reaped the harvest of all of the efforts you put in and the flowers will bloom. 

There’s this song I came across during the most difficult season of my life, and our marriage. The song, Flowers by Samatha Ebert, was a song that  made me both sob and gave me such hope. The song says, 

The rain won’t stop pouring down my window pane
And I haven’t left my bedroom in 76 days
I wish something would change
‘Cause I’m losing faith
So I brought it up in a desperate prayer
Lord, why are you keeping me here?
Then He said to me, “Child, I’m planting seeds
So trust that I’m holding a watering can
And someday you’ll see that flowers grow in the valley”

I remember pleading with God, wondering why I couldn’t just speed through this season, get to the healing portion since He’s all powerful. But there is purpose in the winter storms. We cannot see the flowers that those seeds of routine will become if we don’t get through the storm. The verse before the final chorus says, 

When I’m on the mountain and looking down below
I’ll see a valley of flowers that needed time to grow
And I’ll thank you for the rain, the hurt and days of pain 

And while we would rather not go through the storms of life, God will use them for good. For a purpose. For His kingdom (see Romans 8:28 and Jerimiah 29:11). That can be seen in the fact that I’m sitting here writing this blog post, still married and very much in love with my husband. Just keep going, sowing those good seeds, even when you are facing the dark clouds of a big storm. The sun will shine again. 

Just like weathering a harsh winter doesn’t happen overnight, neither does building strong rhythms. But it also doesn’t require drastic changes. Building these rhythms require small consistent choices– simple acts of love and commitment to build a foundation for the future. How can you start today?

Choose one rhythm from above to focus on this week. Don’t try to completely overhaul your marriage in the next week– that will just lead to burn out and no one will benefit. Instead, pick one habit to intentionally nurture your marriage. Just one– small consistent efforts can lead to lasting change. If you have a good support system, surround yourselves with people who will encourage and support your marriage, whether that’s a mentor couple, a small group, or even a good friend who is always Team Marriage. Having accountability can help you stay committed to building these rhythms. 

Don’t wait until your marriage is struggling to start cultivating strong rhythms. Start today. Choose one rhythm, one intentional step, and trust that God will bless the seeds you plant.

Enjoy the adventure,

Amanda