Good marriages require sweat work

Wedding season is in full bloom in local parks and downtown churches. I've seen the lovely dresses spilling from stretch limos, flowers flowing and jewelry sparkling. Looking at this outside view, I see the signs that the couple spent countless hours sweating the details of their lavish affair. But long before this summer spectacular, I hope someone has asked the couple this question: You've prepared for the special day, but what have you done to consider the lifetime you are committing to? It's a question I always asked the couple in my role as officiant and premarital counselor. But it was the questions the couple asked of me that sometimes threw me off guard. For instance, just a few weeks before a wedding, I once had a groom-to-be toss me a "by-the-way bomb." "My fiancée wants to omit the promise, 'Till death do us part.' Would that be a deal breaker for the ceremony?" Déjà vu. It was the same question from a bride-to-be who asked me to change the promise to read, "Till love do us part." I told both couples, "I really have to stick with the unabridged format." The first couple responded by finding another chaplain. The latter couple dissolved their marriage when the groom left on a Navy cruise and the bride parted to go with a land lover. Unfortunately, marriage counseling is far less comedic and much more frustrating. The most frustrating thing is I feel like I have been blessed with a marriage I cannot clone in others. A good marriage is a complicated dish, and I don't have the recipe, or I'd publish it. Often, I've come home from a difficult counseling case, and I'll hold my wife tight. There is no greater priority than my marriage, because I believe God gave marriage to mankind as the closest equal to unconditional love. Despite God's intention for marriage, many are willing to take the risk of making marriage analogous to hell. While working as a hospital chaplain, a respiratory therapist burst into my office, "Chaplain, Chaplain! She said 'yes!' " "She" was another therapist who just accepted his wedding proposal after two years of dating. I knew them well enough to assume their biggest challenge would be to quit smoking. Despite what respiratory therapists witness, some still smoke like chimneys. He heralded the news from floor to floor until he arrived on the bottom floor – literally and figuratively. His last stop was the nurses' station where his old girlfriend was the shift manager. She invited him into a supply closet, where her congratulatory "hug" went much farther than it should have. In a hot Texas minute, a two-year relationship went up in smoke. Hospital administration congratulated them both with unpaid vacations. When I've seen people like these therapists risking something so precious, I'm often left shaken. It makes me try to define and categorize what I have in a vain attempt to keep it and control it. I wish it worked that way. I am not entirely sure what my wife and I have. It's the kind of love that continues, whether I burn the toast or burn my temper. It's a love that tells me I'm forgiven before I ask. It's the kind of love described in our wedding vow that "halves a sorrow and doubles a joy." Like many couples, we sometimes go to bed dead tired, sometimes too tired for the fun I seek and too tired for the prayers she wants. But we rarely are too tired to talk out our day and absolutely never too tired for our three good night kisses and "I love you." Still, maybe there is a thing I know about marriage that respiratory therapists also know about smokers. Therapists, who watch smokers die, know they are no less likely to become smokers. Ministers, who watch marriages die, aren't any less likely to divorce. It takes work to quit smoking, and it takes work to make marriages successful. So, at the end of the day, I realize there is something Freudian about the way my fast fingers often seem to mistype "sweetheart" into "sweatheart." The typo is a great reminder that a good marriage takes a lot of work and spiritual sweat. Good marriages require honest heart work, but most especially real sweat work. "I love you Sweat-heart!" Sign up to receive this weekly column by email at www.thechaplain.net/newsletter/ or send your email address to comment@thechaplain.net. All of Norris Burkes' books can be ordered on Amazon. Autographed copies can be obtained on his website www.thechaplain.netor by sending a check for $20 for each book to 10566 Combie Road, Suite 6643, Auburn, CA 95602.