Back in June of 2021, I got to do something truly special. When my older brother Tanner and his now-wife Jess eloped in upstate New York with just 7 guests present, they asked me to officiate their wedding. Despite having been a campus pastor for a year, trained in preaching and writing sermons, the task of writing and preparing a marriage ceremony still felt daunting.

 

However, at that point, Sarah and I were just a few weeks away from our 4th wedding anniversary, and had been together for just shy of 10 years. We had spent much of that time actively working on our relationship, reading books when we could, and seeking advice and wisdom from every happily-married couple we could. In the end, we fell back on the three pieces of marriage advice that our pastor and his wife — the ones who married us on our wedding day — had given us during our very first session of pre-marital counseling.

 

I worked those pieces of relationship advice — our “Top 3 Marriage Tips”, if you will — into Jess and Tanner’s ceremony. And now that our wedding season is over and we have time to begin blogging more content for our couples, these three tips feel like the perfect thing to share! The three important concepts are: oneness, high regard, and covenant. This week, we’re addressing high regard!

 

 

Relationship Advice #3: Covenant

The third and final piece of marriage advice that I gave to Jess and Tanner that day was this: your marriage is a covenant, so treat it like one. Now “covenant” isn’t a word that’s familiar to us, but it is so rich with deep and powerful meaning. The word “covenant” should NOT be mistaken for the word “contract”, because a contract is conditional on performance. As long as you uphold your end of the bargain, and I uphold mine, we have a mutually beneficial arrangement. But as soon as one person fails to uphold their end of the contract, the other can terminate the agreement and walk away.

 

When you sign a lease with your landlord, you’re signing a contract. They give you housing, and in exchange you give them rent. If they kick you out without warning, or you stopped paying them rent, then one of you has broken the contract, and can appeal to the Law to uphold the contract, or it can be dissolved entirely.

 

 

Yet marriage as God instituted it is a lifelong covenant – something that cannot be broken (except in certain rare and egregious cases like infidelity). But in 99.99% of situations, when one of you fails to uphold your end of the bargain, the other responds not by terminating the agreement, but by doubling down and pursuing the other with reckless abandon. In the same way that Christ came to earth to die for those who shunned and rejected him, in marriage God calls us each and every day to die to our own desires, and live instead for our spouse, putting their needs, wants, and desires before our own. When both parties live this way, an incredibly beautiful marriage relationship is born.

 

And – spoiler alert – your partner is NOT a perfect person, and they will hurt you. Daily, if you’re like most couples. But the beautiful thing about covenant is that it says, “When the times get tough, I am not going anywhere. There’s nothing you can do to un-earn my loving devotion, and I am here to stay, no matter what. So let’s work through this.” Covenant, of course, is not an excuse to mistreat each other, but rather, the opposite. It’s a commitment to always pursue the other, no matter what. Making amends for wrongs, asking for — and extending — forgiveness, and pushing through hard conversations are some of the ways this plays out.

 

 

Well, that’s it friends! We sincerely hope that these three quick tips bring you a fuller, more joyful, and more loving marriage! May oneness, high regard, and covenant be three words that always pertain to your marriage ♥

 

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Check out the rest of the series below!

• Top 3 Marriage & Relationship Tips: Oneness
• Top 3 Marriage & Relationship Tips: High Regard
• Top 3 Marriage & Relationship Tips: Covenant

 

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Want more content specifically for engaged couples?! Check out more here!