What is it about old-fashioned love stories that captivate us so much? We all swoon whenever we come across a story of a couple that have withstood the storms of life and marriage and are still together today. We want to soak up their love story, get the details, and find out what made it successful. We may take note of their advice (with hopes of applying it one day to our own love stories) but we’re still left wondering how on earth they lasted that long, and if they really do inhabit the same planet that we do.
First, let me just start off by saying that I am not an expert on marriage-far from it, but I have been married to my husband now for 24 years, 14 (so far) of which we have spent raising kids together. We were married young- met at 18 and got married at 20. I am exactly one week older than my husband.
To say that neither of us had good marital role models growing up is an understatement- we both came from very broken homes. My husband grew up in foster care and was on his own by the age of 16, and my parents “divorced” when I was 8 years old. I put divorce in quotes because my mom was a second wife in an polygamous marriage, so she didn’t need an legal divorce from the state. Either way, she considered the marriage over.
One thing I will never forget was asking my mom “Why?” I just couldn’t wrap my 8 year old mind around how people could just fall out of love with each other. I don’t remember her response at all, but I do remember saying this rather defiantly, “When I grow up, I will NEVER get divorced!”
I am not writing this post to give marriage advice (I still need a lot myself) or because I have it all figured out, and I am not writing it to judge or condemn anyone. I am writing it because (over the past 10 years) I have watched SO many relationships and marriages fall apart, and have also watched so many single people go through hell in the dating world! It really had me thinking hard about what on earth is going on? Why it is that some couples can stay married for 50 years or longer, while others don’t even last two?! Furthermore, why is it so difficult nowadays, to even find anyone worth spending the rest of our lives with? I know without a doubt, it’s not due to the lack of people meeting (thanks to online dating sites). I also know that it’s not because people don’t want to find that special person to spend their lives with. EVERYONE does! They’ve deceived themselves if they’re believing otherwise! No one wants to end up alone for the rest of their lives. We are created to be in relationships. It’s absolutely ingrained into us as human beings. From the time God created Adam, he knew right away that it was not good for man to be alone.
Genesis 2:18 The Lord God said, “It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper suitable for him.”
We are relational beings and created to share life with others. Yes there are people who choose to stay single for higher reasons or beliefs, and some who want to live the “free” life of never being tied down, but even if they have chosen that life, I can’t imagine that there are not times when they are extremely lonely and longing for companionship. Not just sex or one night stands, but true, deep, intimate companionship-someone to care and share their life with!
So, why is love, companionship and marriage so difficult in the 21st Century? Because most are doing it the worlds way, and it usually goes something like this:
Romance and “Love” (the worlds way) in the 21st Century
Until at least the age of 26, it’s time to sow some wild oats! What that means today is: you go wild, which for most includes lots of partying, sex, “experimenting”, falling in “love”, breaking up…maybe some traveling if you’re lucky (which also should include lots of partying and sex with strangers btw). Don’t worry about these years- they really don’t count anyway, and what’s most important is that you “find yourself” here. Sounds fun right? Oh, any by the way, you’re usually considered the odd one out if you are still a virgin even by the time you graduate High School.
Suddenly (if you haven’t wound up a druggie, alcoholic or with any fatal STD’s) you find yourself getting closer to the age of 30, and a little bit of panic starts to set in. That entire life-style starts to loose its appeal, is getting tiresome, and offers no real fulfillment like you thought it would, so now it’s time to get a little more serious and maybe consider settling down with someone.
Next, comes putting up some serious dating profiles on more then just hook up sites. You decide to meet for drinks (or dinner)…it’s usually assumed that that will come with sex at the end of the night (if all goes well)…have sex… if there’s interest to see each other again, more dating. This could go on for quite some time before, and if someone dares admit they feel love for the other (remember, never let your heart be vulnerable) then: dun dun dun, “We should move in together!!” This gets celebrated by most, almost like a marriage proposal used to. It’s the next “big step of commitment” and you get to play house! Try it all out without really having to fully commit. Test drive the car before purchasing! No marriage, just pretending, which comes with the added baggage (usually from both partners) of all of the wild oat years.
The average time for living together with all of the butterfly feelings still floating around, is about two years. Right around then, the newness starts to wear off, and so do all the feelings that came along with it. One (or both) start to doubt that it was ever love to begin with, because it just doesn’t “feel” like it used to, and thanks to the world teaching us that everything is about us and our feelings, this part is really confusing. Nothing here was built on truth, just feelings…so…. since we’re not married anyway, why pro-long the inevitable right?
Split…freedom…rebound…emptiness…lonely again…still longing to meet someone worth spending life with…hoping that somewhere out there is THE ONE… and…it starts all over- only this time, we are more jaded, less trusting and have all of the emotional, physical and even spiritual baggage of the previous relationship(s) that we get to bring with us into the next one! (Yay!) Yes, there are few who may get married, and few who may even make the marriages last, but it’s few and not the majority.
Our ideals of the perfect partner continue to get higher and more unrealistic and soon, no one is good enough for us, no one meets our checklist, and we are just NOT going to settle for anything less! Been there, done that right? We have locked up our hearts in an iron steel container at this point to avoid any more pain, and we pretty much doubt that there is even a key that exists that can unlock it.
Hallmark movies are loved by so many women because they portray something we all long for, but is never in our reach. We cry because we know deep down (or maybe not so deep) that the world’s way of dating and romance is not right, but we have fallen prey to it. We love to escape into the old fashioned love stories of the past (if only for a couple hours) in hopes to get a little feel of that deep, till-death-do-us-part love that the world has lied to us exists. Some people choose to escape into a lot worse like online fantasy, pornography, etc.
It was not supposed to go this way, and we all know it! It wasn’t this way “back then”. It wasn’t so complicated. “It was a lot simpler time,” we tell ourselves. The sweet love stories of how they met as kids or High School sweethearts, got married and survived life’s storms together, start to haunt us. Or the couple we hear that died only hours apart, simply because they couldn’t go on living without the other one. They all speak to a desire deep in our hearts that God himself put there when He created us.
So what’s the answer? Is there any hope for romance, love and marriage in the 21st century, or do we need to settle and accept that old-fashioned love is a thing of the past-it is what it is?
There is hope. We don’t have to settle. And it is still possible. But it’s not the world’s way.
One of common-denominators I have found in the married for 50+ years couples, is that when they met and fell in love, they were usually young. That means, they didn’t carry with them into the relationship loads of past partners, hurt, shame, cynicism, etc. They were fresh to love and wanted to get married young because they didn’t want to live apart. Some would argue here- that back then (because sex was typically saved for marriage) they were only wanting to get married so they could have sex. Well, I’m sure that played a part in wanting to get married, but isn’t that why we do have such strong physical desires in the first place? To draw people together to commit? Not just to satisfy and move on? Today, if a couple wants to get married young, people look at them like they’re crazy, pregnant or it must be a religious thing.
My husband is the only man I have ever been with sexually. I am thankful for that to this day. A lot of it has to do with the fact that we met and got married so young. I was not a promiscuous teenager and had always planned to save myself for marriage. But I remember going into adulthood being so confused about this. I was taught that it was God’s plan for sex to be for marriage, and I believed that, yet the world was saying the complete opposite everywhere I turned- from movies, to magazines and even close friends who were sexually active. It all left me so confused. If God did intend for it to only be for marriage, than why was the world so completely opposite all around me?
I did, however, always know I wanted to get married and have a family, that part was clear. Today, even the value of family is sadly becoming a thing of the past. It’s all about living for yourself and creating the best life for yourself. Self, self, self is what the world teaches us. It’s all about us.
But the world lies.
My husband and I were both from the last generation that grew up without the World Wide Web, and all of the desensitizing exposure that came along with it. We both still believed that marriage was a normal thing to do if we were in love, so we chose to get married. I wasn’t pregnant. We didn’t have to. We just wanted to. Young love. I’m assuming that a lot of the 50+year couples were along those same lines. Many were probably virgins when they met, so there wasn’t all of that extra baggage, and (because it was a simpler time) they weren’t judged for valuing love, marriage and family. It was just what you did back then.
Like us, I’m sure they had to go through a lot of learning and growing up together. There were times when we thought divorce was the only option, and almost took it. I could write an entire post (or book) just about what I’ve learned while being married, but that is not what this post is about.
If you want an old-fashioned love story of your own (whether you’re young, middle age, or old) you need to stop doing it the world’s way and start doing it God’s way!
You see, God designed marriage to be between one man and one woman, and God never changes. God designed sex (an intimate, beautiful thing) to be shared within the holy covenant of marriage. When it’s in that context, it leads to life! When it’s outside of God’s context, it can lead to spiritual death. Why? Because repeated sin can separate us from fellowship and intimacy with God. Any unconfessed sin in the life of a follower of Jesus can create a sense of separation from God. And sex outside of the covenant of marriage, is sin.
Hebrews 13:4 Marriage should be honored by all, and the marriage bed kept pure, for God will judge the adulterer and all the sexually immoral
I know that people don’t want to hear this, especially in the 21st Century, but it’s the truth, and people are desperate for the truth.
God will never bless sin because he loves us and wants the best life for us. God’s way is not the world’s way, and we can see clearly in this day and age what the results of the world’s way are. It wasn’t intended to be like this, and it’s affecting every relationship we have and every person on this earth. We are all feeling its weight!
Thank God that he sent his one and only son, Jesus to pay for those sins so you and I don’t have to! We can be completely set free from the weight and penalty of sin when we put our hope, faith and trust in Jesus Christ! But grace was never meant to be a free ticket to sin. Jesus told the woman caught in adultery in John 8, that he did not condemn her, but to go and sin no more.
John 8:10-11 Jesus straightened up and asked her, “Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?” “No one, sir,” she said. “Then neither do I condemn you,” Jesus declared. “Go now and leave you life of sin.”
We were never meant to carry into our relationships years of sleeping around . The most physically intimate thing we can do with another person is sex, and it is not meant to be shared with just anyone. When we do, we give up a spiritual piece of ourselves each time. We also take on a spiritual piece of another.
Genesis 2:24 Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh.
Notice, it doesn’t say he should leave his mother and father and go sow some wild oats before finding a wife. No, we were only meant to become “one flesh” with the one we marry.
Now I am not the Holy Spirit and I am not a judge. God is. And every one of us has sinned. I am far from perfect and need God’s forgiveness daily. I needed it before marrying, because even though I was a virgin when I met my husband, we did not wait until marriage to have sex. And I justified it all in my head, like most do; it had to be okay because we loved each other and because it “felt” so right. Thankfully, God forgave us, but the sin had repercussions in our marriage.
He forgives all of us if we ask. There is nothing we have ever done or will do, that He cannot forgive if we truly repent (thank you Jesus!), but in order to heal and be forgiven, we must also offer forgiveness and we must also be willing to turn from our sin. That includes forgiving all of the people we have given ourselves to (and then later blamed for our broken hearts). Healing starts with forgiveness.
Matthew 6:14-15 For if you forgive other people when they sin against you, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive others their sins, your Father will not forgive your sins.
1 John 1:9 If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.
So what if you’ve already had many failed sexual relationships outside of marriage? What if you’re divorced, does it still apply? Should you still wait to get married before having sex again? I think God’s Word is pretty clear on the matter when he said sex should be within the covenant of marriage.
Is that even possible? It seems like way too much to have to deny ourselves that pleasure right? God’s way is outdated, old fashion even.
Here’s the thing: marriage is a lot about denying ourselves, just as Jesus did. It’s about learning to put someone else’s needs above your own, learning to serve rather then be served, and learning to love unconditionally, even when we don’t feel like it. It’s about giving 100%, even when it’s not reciprocated. When we learn to love and serve like this, we are learning to be like Jesus; God is transforming us more into His image. When we submit to (and learn to joyfully serve) our spouse, we are submitting to and serving God, and our reward will come from Him.
Ephesians 5:21 Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ.
Romans 12:10 Be devoted to one another in love. Honor one another above yourselves.
Successful marriages are built on Truth, not on feelings. Feelings WILL change, and if we don’t build a foundation of truth, the relationship will crumble. It’s inevitable.
So what can you do at this point?
Matthew 6:33 But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all of these things will be added to you.
You can seek Jesus. He can heal you. He can restore you. He can make your broken heart whole again. But He is the only one that can. Instead of seeking the perfect partner, start seeking the Perfect Love that only comes from Jesus and the only love that can change you! Start seeking to be the perfect partner that is worth finding! Then, when and if you desire to find romance and love again, trust God to make it happen, and it will be like it was always intended to be: beautiful, pure, sacred.
Joel 2:25 I will repay you for the years the locust have eaten-
Jeremiah 29:11 For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.”
I believe God continues to bless my marriage, not because we deserve it or have earned it, but because we are trying to do it God’s way, not the world’s. Jesus has told me over and over again to trust Him when things didn’t make sense and I have had to surrender to His way time and again, not my own.
Proverbs 3:5-6 Trust in the Lord with all your heart, And lean not on your own understanding; In all your ways acknowledge Him, And He shall direct your paths.
I am trusting God with it. Jesus is the foundation of our lives together. The world’s way is broken and leads to death. God’s way leads to fullness and life! Neither way is easy- but one leads to a life of sweet fruit, while the other almost always leads to pain, heartache and emptiness.
As for me, I will continue to do things God’s way, because loving God means also obeying Him, and I have learned that His way is always the BEST way! I want to be an example for my kids. I want to be a light of hope for people who have given up on love, and I want to someday be the old couple holding hands with a sweet old-fashioned love story to share, and I will give God all the glory!