I’ve been reading Intimate Allies, a wonderful book by Dan Allender and Tremper Longman. Each page is deliciously romantic and points me back to God’s love for us.
For years, I’ve been advising young men and women to marry the person they are willing to spend a lifetime getting to know. So today I find myself particularly moved by the following:
To delight in and enhance the glory of our spouses, we must equally be drawn to their mystery and in awe of their hearts. Too often we assume after a few years of marriage that we know our spouses; we think we have explored their hearts and mapped all the territory. Nothing could be more untrue and more destructive to glory.
One’s spouse is a mystery – a terrain that each year will reveal more depth and beauty than could have been imagined when we walked out of the church as husband and wife. We should appreciate each other with a sense of eager anticipation, as if we are exploring an uncharted island paradise. The fruit is delicious and ample, the terrain beautiful and overwhelming. The foliage is dense and demanding but opens to waterfalls, vistas, and Edenic beauty. An entire lifetime will not provide ample time to explore the depths of uniqueness found in this one embodiment of God’s image.
When we glory in our spouses, we approach the mystery with circumspection and awe. I am not to approach the soul of my wife with a familiarity that forgets that nothing on earth more clearly reveals the holiness and mercy of God than she does. I am to talk with her, make love to her, shop with her, plan a vacation with her in ways that reflect an awe of her being; otherwise, I will approach the holy fire in her with my shoes on, cavalier and ignorant of a hidden but enticing beauty that beckons me to praise and gratitude. (pp. 34-35)