Advice From Friends

It’s amazing to me how much advice that you receive when the topic of marriage comes up. Don’t get me wrong, I know so little about marriage that I find it instrumental to gain advice from those who have lived in it for years. But not every marriage is the same, or is it? Just the other day I had a dear friend ask me, “Have you guys thought about getting married later and living in the same town together for a while?” My response was less than polite. Have we thought about this decision? Have we prayed for this decision? Only about a million times! Are you kidding me!?!

I think the question that I have is, “Does anyone ever really know enough about the other person before getting married?” There are always new things that we learn about others and will continue to learn about our partners for the rest of our life, no matter how long you try to work out all the details.

I do, however, value the advice that folks have given me over the years, and Leslie and I over these past few months. One of my favorite conversations about marriage was about the things that you need to discuss before getting married. We have been encouraged to clean out the closet, so to speak. The questions were something like this…

Make sure you talk about…
1) Finances- who, what, how much, if any debt, how do you spend?
2) Child rearing- talk about everything from discipline to college funds
3) How do you spell love?
4) How do you fight?

The list goes on (feel free to add to that list if you would like), but the fact remains that none of us really knows what to expect in any partnership until you are in it. The most important thing about our marriage is that we have both agreed that we are committed till death parts us. Everything else, through communication, hard work, and a lot of laughing, will be figured out and I can’t wait! It is such a gift to know that I GET to partner with my best friend. Through thick and thin, up’s and down’s, I will always have the earthly love of my life at my side.

Advice is an amazing thing to me though. No matter what the advice is, it always encourages us to put a mirror up to our face and search things out for ourselves. Do we agree with the advice? Do we not? Why?

What a gift we have from God…the gift of free will. We get to decide, with the direction of His amazing love story for us, how we are going to live out our own personal lives. The journey is long and winding. I could think of no better person that I would want to partner with than the one God has pointed me to in Leslie Ruth. I hope that in your own lives that you feel the same, and if not, move back towards your partner and find joy again!