For King & Country's Luke Smallbone Shares Hard-Earned Marriage Lessons
- Milton Quintanilla CrosswalkHeadlines Contributor
- Updated Apr 18, 2024
Luke Smallbone, one half of the Grammy-winning Christian duo For King & Country, recently shared the difficulties he and his wife faced over the years which ultimately strengthened their faith.
“I fiercely love my wife,” Smallbone told CBN News in a recent interview. “And a lot of that has to do with the fact that we’ve actually been through some things. We actually lived out or vows in our 20s. Not many people are saying, ‘Hey, I’ve lived out my vows in my 20s.’ They usually think that’s gonna take place in their 60s and 80s.”
“But for us, living out those things has given our relationship the ability to look back and say, ‘Hey, if we went through this, why can’t we go through that?’ And I think that’s been nothing but a good thing for us,” he added.
His wife, Courtney, previously told CBN News about her past struggle with anxiety and drug addiction in light of a rare disease diagnosis and severe morning sickness during her second pregnancy. She shared that her husband’s support and God’s faithfulness helped her ultimately break through the addiction.
During the recent interview with CBN News, Smallbone shared how God used those rough seasons to minister to him and his wife.
“When pain comes, allow that to be an opportunity for change,” he said, noting that its a lesson God has taught him throughout the years. “[I]f something catastrophic happened and I lose my marbles, it probably says something about me. It probably has less to do with the circumstance.”
The singer also shared that dealing with difficult relational issues, rather than running from them, has helped deepen his bond with Courtney.
“What I realized about being in a family, in a marriage, is, when resolved conflict takes place, it breeds a stronger relationship, it breeds a stronger friendship,” he noted.
As Faithwire reported, Smallbone shared that one trial that helped him and his wife grow was when their then-2-month-old son almost died from Sudden Infant Death Syndrome in 2018.
“It’s still one of the things, when I think back, I can get a little emotional,” he said. “We found him certainly not conscious getting up from a nap, blood coming out of his nose.”
The couple then rushed their son to the hospital, where he was stabilized and doctors classified the condition as a Sudden Infant Death Syndrome incident, where they did not know what caused the ordeal to take place.
“A little while after that, my sister [Rebecca St. James] called me and said, ‘Luke, you’ve had your fair share of trials at this point. What do you do with this one?’ And that question really lingered with me,” Smallbone recalled. “I said back to her, ‘Bec, I feel like God allows these things to happen because, in the process of the story, it reflects His faithfulness in my life. And it’s my job to tell that story.'”
Ultimately, Smallbone says that all the trials that both he and his wife faced have been material to minister to others who listen to For King & Country.
RELATED: Unsung Hero Is a Film about the 'Hands and Feet of Jesus'
“I’ve written songs about… nearly every struggle I’ve had in my life,” the singer said. “I feel like God’s given me those stories and I’m trying to shepherd those stories, steward those stories because I think that, if storytelling was good enough for Jesus, it’s probably gonna be pretty good for us.”
“At the end of the day, I feel like He’s given me these stories to share with people,” he added. “He can have all my stories, and I’m gonna do my best to tell those stories in a way that hopefully impacts another, and, hopefully, someone will hear a song and they’ll say, ‘Maybe I’m not alone. Maybe there is someone out there that’s just like me.’ …And, in [the] inverse, it makes me feel less lonely, because I know there’s someone else resonating with the things I’ve walked through.”
Unsung Hero, a movie about the parents of Luke & Joel Smallbone and Rebecca St. James - David and Helen Smallbone, who moved from Australia to the United States with their six children in 1991 but faced immediate hardship - opens in theaters April 26.
Image credit: ©Getty Images/Amanda Edwards/Stringer
Milton Quintanilla is a freelance writer and content creator. He is a contributing writer for CrosswalkHeadlines and the host of the For Your Soul Podcast, a podcast devoted to sound doctrine and biblical truth. He holds a Masters of Divinity from Alliance Theological Seminary.
