I had to laugh yesterday afternoon when I opened up my copy of Presbyterians Today… apparently I have been labeled “mean-spirited” for my “hyperbole” about Martha Stewart published in the January/February issue (click here to read the blog post that inspired that article, and here to read the letters about it). If it will make faithful PT readers feel any better, it was Martha Stewart Weddings that inspired the cute little sugar cookie wedding cakes I’m giving out as party favors on the big day. And speaking of mean-spirited, you should have seen Martha take Jason Biggs of American Pie fame down a notch on her talk show a few weeks ago….

Speaking of weddings, I’ve been reading a fascinating article on arranged marriages in India. It comes from the “Imagining Ourselves” project of the International Museum of Women. The young, feminist writer discusses how she met her own husband through the traditional arrangement channels in India, which include parents who scour the “Matrimonial” section of the newspaper and set up meetings with prospective mates and in-laws to display their daughters. The topic has provoked over ten pages of comments, and several other Indian women have shared their stories of either “love” matches or arranged marriages.

This brings to mind other articles I’ve read in the past week or so. The Christian Century, for instance, recently published an article about the “death of marriage” in this country, and how marriage’s transformation from a kinship alliance and property transfer to a love match has in some ways tolled a death knell for it as an enduring social institution.

I've pondered all of this a lot, as I teeter on the brink of taking the plunge myself into what I intend to be a lifelong commitment. In the Christian tradition, the joining of two lives is seen as a covenantal act—one that, like everything else we do, should point to the glory of God and help us live as better disciples of Christ. If you look at it this way, our search for a mate is more about our relationship to God than about us.

Maybe part of the problem with modern-day marriage is that we individualistically rely too much on our own warm feelings toward another person to sustain a relationship. Genuine relationship doesn’t come without problems. Look at my relationship with my mother—frankly, the woman drives me crazy half the time (sorry, Mom). You should have been there the day I told her I was going to Thailand last year! Of course, I wasn’t the best person in the world last Christmas, when I spent three days storming around the house before she finally took me out on the back porch and chewed me out. There are times when I wonder why we put ourselves through this stuff.

But then today, I was listening on the radio to the story of a girl whose mother had multiple sclerosis. Her fifteen-year-old daughter was her caretaker, giving her injections daily and calling 911 when her mom had seizures. As I listened, I knew that my mom would be right by my side to care for me if I were ever in a similar predicament. She would help me, and I would help her.

And maybe that’s how our deep, genuine relationships point us to God—the covenant we have with those we “love,” in the active-verb, “sometimes I just have to put up with you” sense, is the covenant God has with us. We are a broken and flawed world comprised of broken and flawed people, and yet God just refuses to give up; God may take us out on the back porch and chew us out once in a while, but the Holy One will be present when we’re in need. And in our covenants with others, whether spouses, parents, siblings, or fellow members of the body of Christ, we’re called to that same sort of love.

So maybe our search for a compatible partner has less to do with how we meet, common interests, or political stances, and more to do with how committed we are to living out Christ’s command to love one another as God loves us. That will sustain a relationship, even when I can’t stand David stinking up the bathroom anymore.

“I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you should also love one another.” --John 13:34

Kelsey