How to Marry Your Husband All Over Again

“But at the beginning of creation God ‘made them male and female. . . For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh.’ So they are no longer two, but one flesh. Therefore what God has joined together, let no one separate,” (Mark 10:6–9).

There’s nothing like a wedding to make a girl fall crazy in love—again.

Last Saturday, my brother-in-law got married. He’s 15 years younger than my husband, which makes us the wise older couple. After 11 years of marriage, two children and a minivan, hubby and I have this marriage thing down.

Or so I thought. Until a moment during the ceremony when the minister spoke these words.

“Marriage isn’t a vow you make once and for all on your wedding day. It’s a daily recommitment.”

Huh. A daily recommitment—to love, honor and cherish this person, in sickness and in health—every single stinking day, whether you feel like it or not.

I turned to look at my husband, the tallest groomsman on the altar, standing regal and proud among a line of young men. He’s still my groom, I thought. He’s still the one I love.

This man, whom I know beyond the tuxedo.

The one who mows the lawn in hole-torn jeans and a sweaty three-day beard.

The one who clutched my hand through childbirth and whispers bedtime stories to our girls.

The one who harbors dreams still not reached, and cheers me on toward mine.

I know his virtues. I know his faults. Do I still wake up every day vowing “I do”? When his hair peppers gray and he gains a few pounds. When we go to bed in silence the night before, angry and hurt. When other people or places start to look more interesting than this life we share. Will I lay it all on the altar again each morning and promise to love my husband most?

If there’s anything I’ve learned since my own wedding day, it’s that the exhilaration of new love fades. But it can grow to something deeper, something even stronger.

Commitment.

And commitment isn’t a feeling. It’s a choice.

Later that night, I watched with my heart stuck in my throat as my husband held our six-year-old daughter’s hands and spun her on the dance floor. Someday—in a blur of years like a single breath—I’ll look on this same scene at my daughter in shimmering white, and her daddy blinking back tears as he gives her away to her own husband, her own lifelong choice. And I pray it’ll be a good one.

Because marriage still matters. It’s the love of God growing through generations in good times and bad. And I’m going to choose it again and again, day after day, ‘til death do us part.

Will you?

Blessings,
Becky