Don’t let passion drop off in your marriage and Christian life
Song of Songs is a book that is full of passion. The woman dreams of being with the man, and the man looks at the woman and sees the one who has captivated his heart. They speak to one another in poetry and use colourful metaphors to describe each other’s body parts. When they are apart, they dream of being together.
Maybe you’ve seen a couple who are like this. People usually early on their relationship who cannot get enough of one another. The way they look at each other and their body language screams to you that they have passion for each other.
When a couple has been married for a long time, things change. They settle down. The emotions calm down and things become more comfortable. The compliments become less frequent and the practicalities of life start to dominate instead of the poetry and joy of an early-stage relationship. Sexual activity often drops a lot. And it can happen that, before you know it, the marriage has become more like a flatmate kind of relationship. It works, it is functional, but the passion has gone away.
Why does this happen? Part of it is just a natural progression of life. Emotions change and mature. We don’t always need to manufacture some kind of feeling. The problem becomes when we no longer make the effort and stop to appreciate what we have in the other person.
We should remember the wonder of the gospel. God loved us so much that he sent Jesus to die on the cross for the sake of his people (John 3:16). He loves us with a love that is permanent, which nothing can ever take away (Rom 8:31-39). Jesus’ death in our place set up a covenant relationship that will last forever. Our response to this should be to live a life of love towards God, consistently serving Him and seeking to glorify Him in all that we do.
If our marriages are supposed to be an illustration that points to the relationship between Christ and the church, that should make us think hard about what our marriages look like. We should not be satisfied with just being comfortable flatmates. We need to remind ourselves often of the one who loves us and whom we love. This can be setting aside time together, making an effort to show love to our spouse, and growing the relationship over time. All relationships need effort to thrive; just because you are married does not mean that the relationship will now take care of itself.
This also has implications for our Christian lives. People who have been Christians a long time often don’t feel the depth of passion for Jesus they once did. While this in itself is not something we can control, we should be striving to glorify God in all we do, to live out of love for Jesus. That will mean reminding ourselves of God’s goodness often, to make effort in prayer, and to grow in knowledge and service.
God has shown his deep love for us in Jesus. Let’s live lives that show our passionate love for Him in response.