This may take longer than a usual Lunchtime Musing. There's so much to share. I want to tell you how Brenda Lee Koning became my wife 35 years ago on a snowy Saturday, December 19, 1987.
After our wedding in a Chicago area church, we honeymooned on the ski slopes of northern Michigan and then on the Caribbean Sea in Cancun, Mexico. From there, we called Greenville, South Carolina home, where I had one semester of graduate school remaining.
We lived on love with plastic lawn chairs for living room furniture and a blue, vinyl trunk for a coffee table. Money from wedding gifts enabled our first big purchases, a microwave oven and a 19-inch television. Our first home was a small, three-room apartment, one of multiple apartments in an old, transformed southern house in Greenville’s downtown district. The once beautiful maple floors had been freshly coated with chocolate brown paint. Before crawling between the sheets of our twin-sized bed, we’d brush off our feet so paint chips didn’t come to bed with us.
Mornings were quiet as I went off to school and Brenda to work. Dinners were romantic as Brenda would hurry home from work, make dinner, and await my arrival from the university library. I’m sure our story could be repeated by many – young and in love, little money, but over-the-top happy!
Brenda and I met at the Christian school we both attended when we were junior high and high school. The summer before my senior year and Brenda’s junior year we went on our first date. I picked her up in my dad’s 1976 full-size Chevy van, she in her bucket seat and I in mine, as far away from each other as possible, just like my mom wanted it. Miniature golf for her and batting cages for me, followed by some pizza and ice cream, made for a great evening.
We were too young to be thinking love and marriage. We just really enjoyed being with each other. That early infatuation grew into a love that prompted a wedding and a commitment that supported a marriage. We’ve been living life together ever since.
Looking back, it is not incidental that the high points of our marriage bear the mark of together and oneness. That’s exactly what God meant in Genesis 2:24, Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and they shall become one flesh. It’s also true that the low points in our marriage bear the marks of individuality and separation. At those times when I acted in self-righteousness, self-preservation, self-gratification, and self-advancement, my relationship with Brenda always suffered. It isn’t too difficult to see the cause and effect. On the other hand, when I acted in such a way that promoted the righteousness of the two of us, the preservation of both of us, the gratification of each other, and the advancement of what we shared, our relationship has blossomed. It isn’t too difficult to see the cause and effect.
You really need to know this: Brenda is an amazing, godly woman. She’s wired in such a way that she could have been the wife of any one of dozens of other Christian men and made a godly home with him. I, on the other hand, probably fall into that group of men for whom God needed to shape a unique woman to be with me. That woman is Brenda.
The quality that we want most in our marriage is oneness, the sense of together. We want it for our children, and for our married friends and relatives, and for our church. We see this intimate relationship modeled in the intimacy of the Godhead (John 17:21), and we long for that for ourselves and for others. What the Trinity knows for eternity and what Brenda and I know often, I hope can be yours in your relationships – oneness, living the Christian life together.
Any Tips for Christian Marriages from an Older, Married Couple?
Get Married as Young as Possible
It’s math. If you get married younger, you have more potential years together. According to the CDC, “Studies have shown that adults in the United States are increasingly postponing marriage, and that a record number of current youth and young adults are projected to forego marriage altogether.” Here’s a shocking number, marriage has decreased by 40% in the last 50 years. It’s a bad move by society and for society. Many reasons exist for stalling or putting off marriage. At the forefront is a refusal to believe what God says - that one woman married to one man for a lifetime is a great gift from God.
It would have been difficult for Brenda and me to marry any younger than we did. She had recently turned twenty-one and I twenty-two. Brenda made that possible by finishing her undergrad degree in three years and not the typical four. We were young but not too young to marry. We were immature but not too immature to marry. The whole idea of having to have it all together before marriage is a fool’s plan. Instead, find a girl who can help you get it all together as God intended. Find a young man who can lead you to places you could never go without him. This is the way.
Establish the Priority of the Local Church
Christian families come from Christian marriages. The best move a Christian couple can make is to settle down in a local church and raise their family there. The Bible describes the church as Christ’s bride. A Christian marriage reflects the relationship between our Lord and his bride. What better place is there to grow a marriage than in the place where the love of Christ for his church is on display and where the submission of the church to Christ is evident? Christian marriages that view the local church as an accessory quickly fall behind what the Lord intends their marriage to become.
Learn from the Success Stories of Others
Brenda and I don’t have a perfect marriage, but it’s a pretty good one. We know a thing or two because we’ve seen a thing or two. We are working to improve our marriage, and we can help you improve yours. We can tell you how God changed us, protected us, repaired us, taught us, and keeps us. We can tell you the Scriptures that have been lights to our marriage path.
I don’t put a lot of weight in marriage statistics. They are often contradictory, and regularly, the math doesn’t add up, but I’ll give you one anyway. According to the National Center for Health Statistics, the probability of a marriage lasting at least 35 years is about 38%. With every passing year, the percentage decreases. Many factors contribute to the end of a marriage, but here’s the point: if you know a marriage that’s lasted many decades, there is something of value to be gained. Find out what that something is.
If I had to do it all over again, I’d marry Brenda Koning in a heartbeat. I am living proof that “he who finds a wife finds what is good and receives favor from the Lord” (Proverbs 18:22).
Happy Anniversary, Brenda Lee. I love you.
As always, I welcome your feedback and any suggestions you might have for an upcoming Lunchtime Musing.