Once upon a time there lived two couples.
You may have heard of Jim and Elisabeth Elliot. The often quoted phrase “He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain that which he cannot lose” is attributed to Jim and the work he and Elisabeth committed their lives toward. They spent their short marriage taking the gospel to unreached tribes in South America. Jim and five others eventually died by the spears of members of the Auca tribe somewhere in a jungle of Ecuador. Elisabeth’s books document their story and her redemptive reconnection as a widow with the Auca people.
Chances are you have never heard of Frank and Millie Sparks. Frank spent his life on his land, a small plot somewhere north of Orlando, Florida. He gardened and worked as a tree surgeon. Millie was a homemaker, as many here in the South would like to confidently describe the occupation. Their tiny house had a revolving door. Anyone who knew Frank and Millie knew they had a standing invitation to breakfast, lunch, dinner, and the guest room for the night. My wife remembers her grandparents’ home constantly filled with friends and strangers alike. To my wife and countless others, Frank and Millie’s home was the safest and most grace-full place on Earth.
Both the Elliots and Sparks told drastically different stories with their marriages. Both heroically sacrificed in ways that altered the trajectory of my wife’s life.
What story do you want told one day about your marriage?
Your marriage will tell a story. This is not optional. The great thing about writing a story with your marriage is that you get to be around for the beginning. It wasn’t so with your life. Or at least that wasn’t the case for mine. I have no recollection of my birth. I cried, I think. If not for pictures, you would have a hard time convincing me that I was there. Actually, I really have little recall of the first five or six years of my life.
I do remember this: I used to stand in the shower as a kid imagining that my life was a movie. I envisioned an audience eating their popcorn and sipping their drinks. I could hear the straws sucking up air and what was left of the Coke at the bottom of the ice. No one would move toward the door for a refill, though, because my life was so riveting. People would see through my eyes, agonize with me every time an episode of Full House ended. The audience would go wild each time I turned in my homework. This is a good movie, they would say, definitely worth the price of admission into Luke’s head, they would say. Then the shower water would get cold, and my movie would end. It was not until a few years later that I awoke to this deeper truth: By very nature of existence, our lives are telling a story. We have characters. There is a setting. And even if we don’t understand it all, the plot of this narrative seems to be moving somewhere.
Because you get to be cognizant and aware when you start the story of your marriage, you get to answer some questions that will determine the characters, setting, and plot of your marital story.
You are invited to co-write the storyline. Life is not a passive experience. Yes God is sovereign, but too often I hear people take a backseat to their life by abdicating their role in the determination of their future. “I don’t know what God wants for me; I will just have to wait and see.” “What is your will for me, God?” While these may be godly statements in some contexts, they can also mask our fear of failure and contempt for desire.
Author and speaker Dan Allender says, “We are the sum of every yes that we utter.” That truth dares us to examine our role in writing the story of our lives alongside God. “What do you want?” becomes a life-altering question. It can also be a godly question. In his self-titled gospel, John documents Jesus response to him on the day that they met. When John identifies Jesus to his disciples, Jesus responds, “What do you want?” While Jesus elicits a practical answer, He also probes the depths of their desire. John and his disciples chose to spend that day with Jesus. In doing so they uttered a yes that rewrote the previously penned epic of three heroic fishermen who would day after day valiantly conquer the Sea of Galilee. They chose a better story.
Every compelling literary character knows what they want. Their motivations determine the story. If you watch TV and sleep on your couch for eighteen hours and play Call of Duty with the other six hours of the day, you are telling a story, albeit not a very good one (note: unless you are a female playing Call of Duty–that would intrigue me). A story without a great cause puts an audience to sleep. Why? Because great characters are defined by desire. Story writing and purposeful living begin with desire. With motivation. Both individually and as a couple, you must answer this question: What do you want? Your life story and the story that your marriage tells will be heavily influenced by the answer to that question. Donald Miller writes, “A story is based on what people think is important, so when we live a story, we are telling people around us what we think is important.”
As a couple, your desires and motivation will co-write the story of your marriage.
You can only live so many stories. How many times have you heard someone tell a child, “You can do anything you want (i.e. accomplish everything you want) if you just work hard enough,”? I am all about inspiring a soul to dream, but let’s be honest: Every yes is a million no’s. You can only do so many things. When Frank and Millie chose to create a people-centered home in Orlando, they indirectly chose not to do mission work in Ecuador. When Jim and Elisabeth decided to pursue international ministry, they simultaneously chose not to be Millie and Frank. When you make a decision to move in one direction, you are also making the decision not to move in another.
You and your spouse can live a great story together, but to do so you must dream first and then refine and whittle down your desires. Simply your purpose. Don’t try to live too many stories. Steven Pressfiled says, “The Principle of Priority states (a) you must know the difference between what is urgent and what is important, and (b) you must do what’s important first.” Aspiring to live too many stories results in living an undefined and uninspiring one. Imagine a movie where the main character wants to harbor refugees during the Rwandan genocide, destroy the Death Star before a decrepit old man in a hood conquers the galaxy, and save Los Angeles and CTU from peril at the hands of terrorists, all the while making sure his fiancée loves him while the Titanic is sinking. Talk about a nightmare for a script writer. Great characters know what they want and risk everything to find it. People who know what they want also know what they do not want. They also know what they want more than the other things that they also want. How is that for a tongue twister?
As you begin to dream together as a couple about the kind of story you want to live, you will face your own limitations. Find the things that you must do together.
Practical Questions for You and Your Spouse/Fiance:
1. Imagine you are in the audience watching the movie of your marriage and/or life now. How good of a story is it? Are you captivated? If not, you have some work to do.
2. What are the things that you want to do together? Dream without editing.
3. What are the things that you must do together?
