My parents celebrated their 39^th

Wedding Anniversary this past month.  When talking to my father last week I asked him what the secret to their successful marriage was.  My father’s answer was simple, “Always forgive”.  There seems to be a lot of wisdom in those words.  Ephesians 4:32 puts it this way:  “And be ye kind one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God for Christ’s sake hath forgiven you.”  A story is told of a grandmother who, on her golden anniversary, revealed the secret of her long and happy marriage.  She said, “On my wedding day, I decided to choose ten of my husbands faults which for the sake of our marriage I would overlook.”  When her granddaughter asked her what those faults were she replied, “To tell the truth, I never did get around to listing them.  Whenever my husband did something that made me hopping mad, I would say to myself, ‘Lucky for him that’s one of the ten.’”

Although we’re a long way from our golden anniversary, Dana and I have had a very successful 15 years.  One thing that we decided early in our marriage was that we would not fight over anything that would not matter in 5 years.  Do you know many things are argued over that really doesn’t matter?  Instead, when it comes to a disagreement we do as it says in Romans 12:10 and ‘in honor prefer one another’.  One of the things that Dana’s mentor, in Arkansas, use to say was that a Christian marriage is like a triangle with the husband and wife at each bottom corner and with God at the top.  The closer they individually get to God the closer they move toward each other.  We have seen this truth played out in our lives.  As we become closer to God our marriage flourishes.  As we grow spiritually there are just certain things in this world that doesn’t matter anymore.  Within the last few years we have made one change to our original agreement about fighting and that is now unless it matters in eternity, it’s not worth fighting about!