There is nothing which so certifies the genuineness of a man’s faith as his patience and his patient endurance, his keeping on steadily in spite of everything.
~Martyn Lloyd-Jones from Spiritual Depression – Its Causes and Cure

You, my brothers and sisters, were called to be free.
But do not use your freedom to indulge the flesh;
rather, serve one another humbly in love.
Galatians 5:13-14

Staying married, therefore, is not mainly about staying in love.
It is about keeping covenant.
“Till death do us part” or
“As long as we both shall live”
is a sacred covenant promise –
the same kind Jesus made with His bride when He died for her.
~John Piper from This Momentary Marriage: A Parable of Permanence

My husband and I attended a wedding in an outdoor park years ago where the officiating pastor asked the couple to vow to each other to stay together “as long as we both shall will.”

I remember thinking that was the most useless vow I’d ever heard because it was no vow at all. It was a poetic and tempting string of words, like a strand of colored lights buried in the snow, pretty but pointless in purpose.

There was no promise to keep covenant with one another despite everything that can happen in life.

There was no commitment to see things through, to be steadfast in the face of trouble, to not wander from the path set before us simply because we have the freedom and desire to do so.

Keeping covenant is particularly significant when a couple ages, and memory and body fade and fail. A spouse continues to love and support as they vowed to do when they married, by keeping faith through this toughest battle of all by serving needs with strength and endurance.

As we enter Holy Week this coming weekend, we are reminded about keeping covenant–with each other, with the body of Christ, with God Himself. The complication is that we have been created with the freedom to choose not to do so or only do so as long we shall “will.”

How genuine is our commitment? It is so fragile compared to God’s commitment to us.

His Son on the cross was God’s most tangible keeping of covenant with His children. He came to us, stayed with us, died for us, and remains committed to saving us as we await His return.

We are kept whole, through our greatest earthly battles and in our dying, by His love.

This year’s Lenten theme:

…where you go I will go…
Ruth 1:16