Fairy Tale Marriage, Soul Mates, or Journey Partners

THE OTHER DAY as my husband and I were enjoying some quiet moments together, I started thinking about our marriage and how to describe it. I knew we didn’t have a fairy tale marriage because even though it started out that way, it obviously didn’t continue. Otherwise, we wouldn’t have experienced a three year separation after over 20 years together.

Soul Mates

As for being soul mates. I hear couples talking about that. But we are not ones who know what the other is thinking. We don’t finish each other sentences—unless I’m listening to my husband telling jokes or repeating stories I’ve already heard dozens of times before. And although we share some of the same interests and opinions, we diverge in a number of others. We process things differently and solve problems differently.  Our personalities are entirely different, and sometimes we just don’t understand each other. So we’re not soul mates.

Then, as I thought more about soul mates, I realized that although I don’t actually have a soul mate with skin on, I do have a soul mate. And his name is Jesus. Jesus is my soul mate. He’s the one who knows my every thought. He’s the one who can finish my sentences. He’s the one who is heart of my heart, who I can call on at any moment and feel the peace of His presence. The Faithful One who knows my weaknesses and failures and loves me anyway, always reassuring me of His love.

So if my husband and I don’t have a fairy tale marriage and we’re not soul mates, who are we?

Journey Partners

I believe my husband and I are the reality of what God designed marriage to be. Not fairy tale lovers, but journey partners.

We’ve journeyed through this life together and experienced the good and the bad, the for-better and worse, the in-sickness and health. My husband is the one God brought into my life and gave to me so we could grow together. God’s plan was to use our similarities and differences to teach us what He wanted us to know and to grow us into the man and woman he wanted us to be. And, ultimately to use us for His purposes in our lives and the lives of others.

God has often used us as sandpaper in each other’s lives, to challenge us in our behavior and assumptions and shave off rough edges, to cause us to go deeper in our thinking and in our faith.  We’ve grown together over the years as we each took inventory of mistakes, past and present.

When I look at this man today I may not always see the funny, carefree, easy going young man I married so many years ago, but when my heart lingers a little on the man beside me, God opens my eyes to see that, yes, this is the man I fell in love with, the man who won my heart, the man I didn’t want to live without.

The fairy tale didn’t last, but the commitment did, and as I found my real soul mate in Jesus, I also discovered the precious treasure I had in giving and receiving the love of my husband as journey partner – not perfect, but wonderful, warm and comfortable, a listening ear when I want to talk, an encouraging presence in lonely, unsettling, discouraging or stressful times, an old friend who remembers the same movies I do, and a partner who cheers me on in my hopes and dreams.

We’ve traveled through life together. We’ve experienced it all—together. Our pasts are linked with an assortment of memories entwined through decades of laughter, grief, tears, happiness, plenty and want, discovery, celebration, disappointment, joy, and sorrow. We share memories together only the two of us can know.

This is my man, my journey partner, the treasure God gave me to share life with, the love of my life—my husband.  I thank God for His precious gift and pray that He will never let me forget that my husband –though not perfect in himself – is God’s perfect gift for me in the purposes He wants to accomplish in my life and his through our relationship.

Today, as we share this quiet moment together, I look into my husband’s face and see him again– the man I married, the man I love, the man I chose to live my life with, and the man I would choose again if I had to do it all over again.

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If you expected to have a fairy tale marriage, but your marriage has come to crisis instead, my book, Fighting for Your Marriage while Separated may help you learn the secrets of becoming journey partners and finding the happy marriage you’re hoping for.