Why Did I Get Married?

I never had a doubt in my mind that I would get married.  I was born into a large Jamaican family where my grandparents were married for almost 70 years.  In fact when my grandmother became ill, my grandfather made a vow that he would not leave this earth until she left first.  When she finally passed away, he told his 11 children he would give them a few more months and then he would join her.  This was the example of marriage I knew. Not only did I see this in my grandparents relationship, my parents have been married for over 50 years.  I have seen them weather every storm.  Needless to say divorce was never a consideration of my future reality.

I got married at the age of 23.  To me this was not unusual; in-fact I thought I was behind as my mother married at the age of 19! So when I thought I met my prince charming in college, who checked every box, felt like my best friend,  I couldn’t come up with one reason why we should wait.  We knew each other for four years. Now reflecting back I would use the word “knew” loosely even after spending two of those years in a summer program together.  We dated for one year during which time we discussed getting married.  I decided there were more reasons not to wait.  We were both Christians wanting to honor the Lord with our lives and bodies, we were just about to enter the long journey of becoming medical doctors, why not journey this long difficult road and not put off joining our lives together?

My mother questioned “the rush.”

The filter of my Christian lenses said  “this is “no rush-this is the right thing to do.  We LOVE each other, we are ‘honoring God’ and I can’t imagine meeting anyone MORE PERFECT.

Looking back I see so many red flags. Can you see them?  Can you name them?  There are many.  For the sake of this introduction I’ll focus on one.

I Rushed

If you are a follower of Jesus Christ and you choose to get married, you understand marriage is a covenant between husband, wife and God.  It has also been drilled into our heads as teenagers over and over before we even read it in the Bible for ourselves- “sex before marriage is a sin.” It is placed at the top of the list even though God is no respecter of sins. This is further backed up by recited partial scripture over and over that “it is better to marry than to burn.” Does this sound familiar?

In a letter to the people of Corinth- a place at that time which made Las Vegas look like  “candy land,” Paul in 1 Corinthians 7:9 said “But if they cannot control themselves, they should marry, for it is better to marry than burn with passion. Although Paul was providing wisdom to a group of people who were new to the faith, and abusing the gift of sexual intimacy, this scripture as been used to guilt couples into marrying when they were not the right partners for each other.

As Christians, if we are honest, it is our sexual desires that lead us down the aisle- not our desire to be a wife or a husband. It is not our desire to be a life-partner. If we are again- honest- we are chasing a fairytale. We are marrying because if we are not married at age 30… the world is going to fall apart.

We may or may not complete pre-marital counseling.  This counseling may be completed in a group or individual session by a licensed or unlicensed person.  If you are not a member of a church or following Jesus Christ, counseling may not even be a part of the discussion or a part of your process on the path down the aisle. Even Paul said in verse 8 of the above scripture in 1 Corinthians- ‘Now to the unmarried and the widows I say (his opinion): is is good for them to stay unmarried as I do.’ Paul was all about doing God’s work and did not want the distractions of marriage.

Yes we want to the fairytale marriage!  In this great desire to fulfill this dream, we rush past the most important thing: getting to know the person we are about to commit the rest of our lives to.

Do we truly know who we are marrying?  Do we know past the superficials?  Do we know what they bring to the table?  We are not talking about income or credit score. We are talking about what family history, life events, positive experiences, or culture shaped their character.

What traumas are our “til death do us part” carrying?  

What happened to them- that may affect you?

What happened to you- that may affect them?

What are you getting and what are you going to give?

We neglect the most important part of the process of getting married with the false reassurance that in the end “love conquers all.”

What led you down the aisle?