The potential for misunderstanding within a marriage relationship is huge. When our lives are so intimately entwined it is so easy to say something in the wrong way or to misunderstand something our spouse said. For Lainey and I it is no different, sometimes it is really hard to ‘keep up’ with the direction a conversation is taking. Sometimes it feels like we are speaking a different language to one another. The potential to hurt each other through the words we speak should never be under-estimated!
On the other hand though, there is the power of covenant! Lainey and I both understand that through our marriage we are in a covenant, we are covenant partners! As a covenant partner I understand that her life is my life, my life is her life, and because of the strength of our covenant with each other it is unlikely that Lainey would do anything to willfully hurt me.
25 Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her 26 to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the word, 27 and to present her to himself as a radiant church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless. 28 In this same way, husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. 29 After all, no one ever hated their own body, but they feed and care for their body, just as Christ does the church? 30 for we are members of his body. 31 For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh. 32 This is a profound mystery but I am talking about Christ and the church. 33 However, each one of you also must love his wife as he loves himself, and the wife must respect her husband.
Ephesians 5
The potential for misunderstanding in a marriage is huge … but for those who understand covenant the opportunity for a misunderstanding to hurt us is incredibly small! If Lainey says something and I am hurt by it, I only have to remember our covenant and understand that Lainey is unlikely to have said something to wilfully bring me down. I then know that either I have misunderstood what Lainey said, or that Lainey has miscommunicated whatever she had meant to say. Questions follow to bring understanding and healing.
Of course, I could choose to be offended anyway, regardless of my understanding of covenant. I could allow myself to be hurt when hurt was never intended. But that would just be stupid wouldn’t it? None of us would ever let that happen … would we?
