What to Expect When You Get Married...Continued from page 1

Counselor H. Norman Wright says, "When people marry, they bring with them a hidden agenda of expectations. ... Unfortunately, these expectations create the hidden, painful surprises that spring up later." Eventually, we discovered most marriages began like ours, and that it takes a lot of talking and effort to flush out differing ideas about what a marriage will be like.

Why didn't anyone tell us how much we would have to adjust to being married? we later wondered. We had attended premarital counseling, which included chats on finances and sex. We had talked about preparing for marriage, and I had even started keeping our future apartment tidy. Together, we had read books on marriage ― written from a Christian perspective. On several occasions we had met with a mentor couple and talked about married life, but nothing prepared us for the fundamental shift that occurs once you've said your vows. I had based my decision to marry Clarissa on how I felt, but our marriage could not depend on my feelings.

In marriage, God teaches us the virtue of loving someone else more than self. Mike Mason writes in The Mystery of Marriage, "The Christian faith, like marriage, aims at teaching us that the time when we are most ourselves is, paradoxically, when we are busy losing ourselves in another." He says, "A marriage lives ... upon those almost impossible times when it is perfectly clear to the two partners that nothing else but pure sacrificial love can hold them together." As a married couple, we have the perfect picture of true love: Christ.

Over time, Clarissa and I discussed our marriage and what was and wasn't working. I learned I would have to give up a lot of reading time. We found things we liked to do together and we began taking walks each evening. I learned not to start reading until we had spent some quality time together. After we spent time together, Clarissa was happy to grade her students' papers while I read.

It was only after I put down my books that I began to experience the true joys of marriage. When I learned to first love my wife, the sacrifices I thought I was making turned out not to be so difficult. Soon, walking around the block was much more exciting than reading, and I realized what I'd been missing while I had my nose in a book.

My parents have many more stories from their first years together. I now have a better understanding of why my father always laughs when he talks about my tricky mother. He knows ― and I'm learning ― that you marry someone because you fall in love with them, but you nurture that love by practicing Christ's example.

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