Vows are where we give our word, before God and witnesses, that we will NEVER LEAVE, never “’til death do us part”
We are increasingly becoming a nation of liars, so here’s some more accurate vows we might be able to live with:
I, GROOM, take you, BRIDE,
to be my free-trial lover and live-in dog-sitter,
to love until I leave,
for better or for worse, at least at first,
for richer, for poorer, unless I need more,
in beauty and in health, if you take care of yourself
to use and abuse;
from this day forward until someone better comes along.I, BRIDE, take you, GROOM,
to be my beta-test boy, and live-in plumber,
to love until you leave,
for better or for worse, at least at first,
for richer, for poorer, unless you need more,
in muscles and in health, if you take care of yourself
to whine and complain;
from this day forward until someone richer comes along.
from the Millennial\Evangelical Blog
Let what you say be simply ‘Yes’ or ‘No’; anything more than this comes from evil.
Matt 5:37
Sadly, In todays world, your comments seem to be the norm. I agree that the current epidemic of “Till I want something else do us part” is pervading our society. I am currently going through the final stage of Divorce, and I thought, when I married that it would be “till death do us part”, but it wasn’t. The part that was missing was a commitment to those vows. Without a commitment, There is no Vow. Please help us understand the “fix”. I’m just opening discussion for an answer.
I’m not sure there is an easy “fix.”
I think, on the individual level, before one gets married they’ve got to go through some good marriage counseling where and get real. Even talk through possible scenarios. What if they lose their job? What if we have to move? What about when we have kids? I will NEVER leave you, even if you cheat on me, I will be your husband/wife.
I always walk through the actual marriage vows I ask them to say, and I try to get them to see what they are saying.
At the end of the day, we’re sinful people, if that other person isn’t committed to following Jesus no matter what, they might bail.
The real “fix” is to change our culture, and that will take a long long time. We have to hold up marriage and make it a REAL VOW. 40 years ago when our culture decided “no fault divorce” was a good idea we began to destroy marriage.
Legally, I’d like to see us introduce contracts or something to strengthen the marriage vows. In other words, a contract on top of a marriage certificate, a pre-nup, that says something like “if I divorce you, you have a right to 80% of our community property” etc.
Ultimately though, it’s a matter of the heart. Pray pray pray and don’t compromise on who you marry, and who you are. Put Jesus FIRST. If we marry and are faithful to someone because we love them… at some point, that won’t be enough. We should marry and be faithful because we love Jesus.