“I Am Also Human, But I Can!”
This week during a counselling session someone said something that got me thinking, and that was: “I am also human”. There is no doubt that marriage is a serious business, it will try you and test you to your very limit. There comes a point when your efforts to try to save your marriage seem to be in vain. It is then that you start wondering if there is any point in continuing to try. I have heard people say: “What about me? I am also human, I’ve feelings, and I am also hurt”.
This is the time when you decide to take the matter (marriage) into your own hands. But before taking the matter into one’s own hand the following questions begs the answer. Where is God when all these things are happening? Doesn’t He care that your marriage is falling apart? Doesn’t He see that you’ve done your best and now you’ve reached rock bottom. Isn’t marriage His own institution that He created to bring glory and honour to His name? In Mal 2:16 the Bibles says that He hates divorce, why is it that it seems like He has left you without any choice but to do that which He says He hates? Does God want you to suffer in an unhappy marriage forever, or even to die in order not to break the vow you made: “until death do us apart”?
As I have said before, marriage was not intended to be practiced outside of God. It was meant for people who know and love God. Having said that, it is therefore important that we see marriage within the broader view of the Christian journey. The Christianity is the journey from here to the Promised Land. Christianity is not an end in itself, but it is a path that lead us to the destiny. Even though much has been promised along the journey, daily manna, the pillar of cloud by day, the pillar of fire by night, etc., real benefits of Christianity are at the destination, which is a place, a land that flows with milk and honey, the New Jerusalem.
It is therefore important that we don’t confuse the temporary benefits and provisions for the journey, with the future benefits that we’ll receive when we arrive Home. Our trials and challenges along the way should not discourage us from reaching the destination. The Apostle Paul gives the reason why we should not be discouraged; he said “I consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us.” Rom 8:18.
It is with this understanding that we should face our current marital challenges. Marriage is not the end in itself, but is part of the Christian journey. Some of the trials that we need, in order to purify us spiritually, as part of the preparation for the destination, are packaged into the marriage union. There are some people that the devil knows he can’t touch them unless he touches their families. He knows that if he tempts them to do adultery they won’t fall for it. He knows that if he brings incurable sickness, they will die holding on to God. He knows that if makes them to lose their jobs / homes, they will continue trusting the Lord regardless. But when he enters their spouses, and makes them to do strange and hurtful things, not once, not twice, but over and over again, and it seems like they will never stop, then he gets them. You’ll them hear say, “I am also human”, “I can’t take it anymore”. It is when the anger, bitterness and “righteous” indignation has take over. And by so doing, the devil wins them over, and tries to divert them from the destination (the land that is fairer than day).
Whether we are married or not, we must never lose sight of the goal (the place prepared). We must not allow anything, including marital challenges, to makes us violate God’s laws, our vows and His will for our lives. As long as He gives us life, God will be there with us. He will change our setbacks to be stepping stones, and our trials to be testimonies. Yes, we are human, but there is someone who is not human with us, and in us, and we are in Him (Christ). And we can join the Apostle in saying “I Can (yes, I can) Do (action) All Things (even “impossible” things) through Christ (not human, He is God, and all powerful), who Strengthens me (for He knows your strength is not enough)
