My wife and I recently connected with a number of friends from years ago. We were disconcerted to discover that three of the couples we had known back then had since been divorced. These were friends whose Christian faith had been exemplary and whose marriages we had considered good models for our own.

We pondered what had happened and how our own marriage had managed to survive and remain a blessing. We did not judge, knowing that we were no more deserving of God’s grace.

Looking at the damage these broken marriages had brought about, I was convinced again that divorce is a result of sin. After all, in the Bible, God said that it was wrong. Of course, divorces are not all the same, and those who are divorced are not all equally guilty. No person is perfect, but there are certainly cases where the fault lies mainly, even almost exclusively, on one side. When one spouse descends into a maelstrom of alcoholism, drug addiction, sexual sin, gambling, crime, abuse, or extreme mental illness, the other spouse often has to let go to avoid also being dragged into a downward spiral.

But not all divorces are like that. What concerned us is that in some of these cases, the couples seemed to have just “drifted apart.” This was what really bothered my wife and me. Without judging the couples who were divorced, we wondered how such divorces happen and what we could do to make sure divorce did not happen to us. We are happily married and don’t foresee any serious problems, but still…The possibility was worth pondering.  

One thing that occurred to me is that a marriage is a union of two imperfect people and it is important to remember that. Too often, as time goes on, spouses judge the other’s imperfections to be intolerable and their own to be excusable. They demand perfection from the other but not from themselves. True marriage requires loving an imperfect partner, knowing that we, too, are imperfect. Loving imperfect people is what God does for us. One of the secrets to the success of our marriage is that my wife has learned to tolerate my eccentricities (a nice term for my flaws and failures), recognize that she cannot change them, and even laugh about them.

Another of the things that occurred to me is that divorce is a choice. Or, more accurately, a series of choices. Couples do not just wake up one morning and discover the marriage is over. A divorce is usually the result of a long process, a process that was driven by decisions and that could have been reversed at many points. When couples first think that maybe they would be happier with someone else, they should stop and examine their attitude. This suggests that they are seeking their own happiness rather than the spouse’s happiness. When negative thoughts first arise, they can choose to entertain them or reject them. When couples start to drift apart, there are many things they can do. They can rekindle their relationship with a date night. They can talk to each other. They can go to counseling. They can pray for help and guidance. They can change their habits and look for ways to serve and bless each other. They can look for and figure out what might make their spouse more content and do something to make that happen. They can choose to avoid temptation. They can make saving their marriage a priority. Given the damage and chaos that flow from divorce, they can commit to doing something, anything, to avoid it.

Again, we are not judging. We do not know whether the divorced couples attempted all of those things. We do not know if they tried even harder than we have to make their marriages successful. We are well aware of our own inadequacies and shortcomings. Rather, our friends’ troubles have reminded us to be vigilant, to not take our marriage for granted, to remind ourselves of the many things we should be thankful for in the other person, and to look for ways to make our marriage better.

“So, if you think you are standing firm, be careful that you don’t fall!” (1 Corinthians 10:12).