06 September 2022
Genuine love and fulfillment from a spouse can build on your commitment to divine purpose and Covenant.
When I met my wife, it was not as if I fell madly in love. Hers was not the superficial beauty of the flesh. Her real beauty had barely begun to manifest at that point. Today she is the greatest treasure of my life.
I had been through the wringer with gorgeous babes. I won't tell you that they are all rotten, but I never met one who wasn't, until later in life when some of them had also been through the wringer. Maybe this is one of the unlamented tragedies of our modern western society, but truly lovely girls are conditioned very early in life to take advantage of how others react to them. They are granted every privilege possible for no other reason than that their physical form is pleasing to the eyes. Long before life has any hope of bestowing on them one iota of moral strength, they are already seduced into the corruption of what they get from the world around them.
It's not shameful to know what you like, men, but it's shameful when you allow the flesh to make your decisions. There are truly attractive women who were raised right, not taking their beauty too seriously, but those are so rare that they become legends. Don't count on running into one of them.
Thus, when I knew the Lord wanted me to select a wife, I avoided the cuties. All the ones I had ever encountered were wholly unsuited to my calling and mission in life. Instead, I spent a lot of time looking for that inner beauty of a woman who was ready to sacrifice for the Cross. This was a mission woman. I made the right choice. So far as I have been able to determine, no one else in my circle of acquaintances would have stood by me like this one. No regrets.
I had that long view from the start; somehow the Lord got through to me very early. An elder pastor once asked me a question to which the answer was: "It doesn't require blind passion to make a marriage. I know that genuine love and commitment will grow in due time." He noted how rare it was for a man of any age to know that. He asked me to come and serve as a volunteer in his church.
Men with an eye to the Covenant path can most certainly build a worthy love and commitment with a woman who may not set his pulse racing at first sight. The racing pulse most certainly can become a man's reaction to the kind of love that comes from trust and trustworthiness. We can certainly learn to be turned on by that. Trust and commitment builds a hotter fire than anything else.
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