While Matt and I have only been married a little over 8 years, we have been in a relationship with each other for nearly 14 years {in March}, having started dating the end of my senior year of high school. Over that time we have had a variety of different seasons in our relationship, from seeing each other every day in school, to colleges 300 miles apart, our early marriage of just the two of us, and now kids. Through it all, we have had to learn and relearn how to keep in relationship with each other.
Let me just start this off with saying that Matt and I are not perfect, our marriage is not perfect. We do fight, but we don’t have fights. We’ve often joked that we’re too stubborn to get a divorce, and quite seriously have always felt that “breaking up” has never been an option.
When we were dating, a lot of people struggled with our relationship, saying that we were too young to be that serious about each other, that we should live our lives and have fun. Interestingly enough Matt’s parents were married at 17/18 and mine at 20/25 {now married 42 and 34 years respectively}.
Many thought that we would be a flash in the pan and fizzle out, and some hoped that would be the case. But we learned a lot during that time, a lot. A lot about priorities. A lot about what a relationship needs to be successful. A lot about what we each needed from the other. A lot about what we couldn’t look to the other to give us. We learned how to pursue each other…
The Written Word
Whether you see each other every moment of the day or it will be weeks or months until you’re together again. I cannot stress just how important the written word is. It doesn’t matter if it’s lengthy epistles mailed across the miles or a post-it note stuck in a wallet, write.
While Matt and I were in college, there were times that writing a letter, and hoping it would reach a port before Matt did was our only communication. We have boxes of the letters and cards that we mailed each other, and boxes of the short notes and cards that we tucked under windshield wipers {in zippie bags in case it rained}.
The letters were not often profound, but it was tangible proof of the other’s love, and when it’s been months since you’ve last seen each other, that’s a big deal. Even if it’s only been a few minutes, there’s not much more pleasant than being surprised with a well placed reminder.
Get Physical
Obviously in a relationship the physical is important, and if it isn’t, it needs to be. As like most kids I didn’t like seeing my parents kissing. My 15 year old self would dramatically cover her eyes and groan, “Get a room!” One day a very dear friend of my Oma’s took my comment to heart, calling my attention to 1 Peter 5:14.
I just continued to roll my eyes, but it stuck with me, 17 years later. The Bible even says that we should greet one another with a kiss, so who am I to argue. Make kissing a priority, when leaving or returning home, that touch is so vitally important for us feel connected to each other. And if you can’t physically kiss each other, then get silly! Mail a bag of kisses or a note covered in lipstick smooches or a racy letter telling your husband just how you want to kiss him!
Let your kids see you kissing {I’m not saying a full on make-out session…} Even though I gagged at the thought of seeing my parents kissing, I grew up knowing that my parents loved each other, even during the fighting. There is not one moment in my young life in which I honestly felt worried that my parents would get a divorce. I was even brazen enough to inform my health class {we were talking about relationships and love} that my parents loved each other unconditionally {boy, did I get made fun of for that comment—and isn’t that sad}.
Kissing and touching our spouse is such an incredible way to pursue them. Is it completely obvious, yea, but how many of us forget to do it?! Hold hands, Kiss, Grab each others’ backsides, dance around the kitchen, be goofy together. God gave us this privilege of touching this person; our bodies are not our own, they are to be shared with this person. {I am in no way endorsing physical abuses or rape with these comments: A touch is only as beneficial as it is desired by the person receiving it.}
Create the Code
My dad is a goofball, which is where I get it from, but the goodball-ness translates really well into pursuing your spouse. My dad would leave coded notes around for my mom and it absolutely drove me nuts not knowing what they said or meant. Part of the fun of a marriage, is that it is just you and your husband. Isn’t that one of the whole points of it?! To set yourselves apart from the world? So why not create a code or a secret language.
It doesn’t matter whether it’s inside jokes or sayings, or actually creating a language all your own. This translates really well to the texting world we live in today…get creative with all those symbols and see what pictures you can come up with. Whatever you do, have it be fun and have it be “FYEO” {for your eyes only}.
The Power of Prayer
This may seem obvious, perhaps too obvious for most of us to think of it. Pray over your husband, pray for him, pray that God will keep His hand on him, pray that your husband will know your love for him and that his heart will turn always to you, pray that God will open YOUR eyes to your husband’s needs and how you can better love him.
This is such an easy thing to do, and yet we forget just how powerful it is, and how intense a pursuit of our husbands this can be. Intense, because it’s not just about us and what we can figure out on our own, but what we will allow God to do. Who is better at pursuit than our Heavenly Father?
Priorities
Oh how hard this one is. None of these will happen if we don’t make them a priority. It doesn’t matter whether it’s jobs, kids, bills, or life, all of it needs to take a back seat to our pursuing of our husbands. The relationship we have with our husbands is the single most important relationship we will ever be in next to our relationship with God <—Click to Tweet, yes even more important than our children.
Take a few minutes and figure out how you can pursue your husband with your priorities. Maybe it is as simple as doing that load of laundry so that he has clean underwear tomorrow…that’s the case in this house sometimes. The most important thing is that we learn our husband’s love language and pursue him through the means in which love is felt by him.
What ways do you and your husband make an effort to let the other one know you love them?
