Key Takeaway
A healthy, God-honoring marriage begins with finding your identity in Christ, not in your spouse, and choosing a partner with a shared mission, character, and calling.
If you're considering marriage, here are six things to note before you make the decision to link arms with another person in covenant.
1. Find yourself in the love of God.
When you're looking for someone to marry, it's vital that you don't look for someone to complete you but rather complement you.
We aren't meant to look for our worth or value in another human.
Read Genesis 1:26-31, 2:2-7,15-25.
According to these verses, it is not good for man to be alone. At the same time, it's important to note that God gives us our value, worth, and identity. These are all things we are not meant to find in our partner.
We were made in the image of God, bought with the blood of Christ, and deemed chosen, loved, forgiven, filled, and called.
The ultimate love of self is to find oneself in the love of God.
2. Marry someone with a shared mission.
You need someone with a passion for Jesus, not just someone who was raised Christian.
Read 2 Corinthians 6:14.
If you’re a “Jesus person” (washed in the blood, drenched in the Spirit, rooted in the Word, eager to worship, engaged to share and serve) and they are not—it's not ideal.
You need not only a shared mission but also a shared understanding of what marriage is supposed to be like.
The husband is intended to be the spiritual leader of the family. If he’s not ready to spiritually lead a family and he isn't spiritually leading himself, it's a no-go.
You need someone with the same purpose who is going at the same pace; find a mission that is bigger than yourselves, your kids, and your stuff.
The greatest gift you can give your kids is a healthy marriage and a purpose that is bigger than them.
Fruit of a shared mission:
Fosters collaboration.
Fights against drift.
Accelerates momentum.
Exponentially increases impact.
Prompts higher and more meaningful conversation.
Helps to resist making idols of things, places, stuff, kids, and feelings.
If you're reading this and you're already married, you may be thinking: "What if it's too late?"
If that's you, the call isn't to become bitter but to reorient and prioritize common goals and passions, overwhelm your partner with supernatural grace, talk about it with kindness, and be strategic rather than nuclear.
Read 1 Peter 3:1-7.
3. Don’t make it your goal to change your spouse.
Many people enter marriage thinking, "I’ll change him. He just needs time. I’ll win him over!"
In marriage, two different people come together to become one.
The only way to move forward is to encourage change, accept unique differences.
Two different people, when moving together with a common mission, have multiplied strength.
4. Understand the highest need/desire of your spouse.
Men want to be respected (honored).
Women want to be loved (to feel valued).
Read Ephesians 5:21-33.
Emerson Eggerichs, the best-selling author of Love and Respect, asserts: “Women need love. Men need respect. It’s as simple and as complicated as that.”
The foundation for his platinum-level, former book-of-the-year is a theorized gender difference he identified by posing this question:
If you were forced to choose one of the following, which would you prefer to endure: to be left alone and unloved in the world, or to feel inadequate and disrespected by everyone?
In his original sample of 400 males, 74% said that if they were forced to choose, they would prefer feeling alone and unloved rather than feeling disrespected and inadequate. He collected data on a female sample and found that a comparable majority would rather feel disrespected and inadequate than alone and unloved.
Based on this data, Eggerichs concluded that a wife “needs love just as she needs air to breathe,” and a husband "needs respect just as he needs air to breathe."
Men don't want to be second-guessed all the time and criticized for every little thing.
Read Proverbs 21:19.
But if you're a man and you want to be respected, be respectable.
Women want to be respected, too. So if you're a husband, listen. Value your wife's discernment and opinions, take her advice, and honor her gifts and abilities.
5. Be kind.
You can be right, strong, truthful, confrontational, and kind at the same time.
Read Ephesians 4:32.
6. Marry the greatest person on earth.
A complementary relationship for God's glory increases intimacy with God, stewards creation, models Christ's relationship with His Church, and has Kingdom impact for God’s glory.
What does it mean to “find yourself in the love of God” before pursuing marriage?
How can we tell the difference between someone complementing us and thinking someone will complete us?
Why is it critical to share a mission with the person you marry?
In what ways can a shared spiritual purpose strengthen a marriage?
How should a believer respond if they feel unequally yoked after already being married?
Why is trying to change your spouse a dangerous mindset?
How does understanding a spouse’s core emotional needs (respect vs. love) change the way we approach conflict or communication?
What does kindness look like in the context of truth-telling and confrontation in marriage?
How can a couple steward their relationship for Kingdom impact rather than just personal satisfaction?
What does it practically look like to marry “the greatest person on earth” from a biblical perspective?