Charity can mean multiple things to different people. When I was young, I thought charity meant giving to the poor. Even understanding that fractional portion of the word “charity” did not give me more of it. I recall a time many years ago when I was young, inactive and hard-hearted. It was Christmas time, and it seemed every store I went to had a Salvation Army representative at every front entrance to collect donations with that distinctive ring of their red bell. After a long season of shopping and who knows how many trips to the stores, I grew weary of the constant beckoning for more money, and experienced the “guilt trip” each time I walked by without donating. To compensate for my guilt, I defaulted to resentment. “Can’t I just walk into a single store without being bothered for more money? Haven’t I given enough already??” As I grew older and became active in the church again, I realized that was a dark period in my life where I lacked charity. Not just in failing to give to the less fortunate. I lacked charity in my heart and successfully found reasons to blame them for my lack of it.
How often in marriage do we lack charity? How often do we grow weary of giving more, tired of the constant beckoning to meet more demands, more requests, more “to do’s?” And how often do we use resentment to shield us from our own guilt for what we lack?
As Goddard reminds us in Drawing Heaven into Your Marriage, “In an effort to understand charity, it is important to know what it is NOT. It is not artificial good cheer. It is not a thin veneer of politeness on a distressed soul. It is not holding our tongues while judging and resenting others.“ In marriage, we often endure shortcomings in our partners until they become an inconvenience to us, and then we go about our uncharitable ways of trying to fix our partner instead of humbling ourselves. We naturally focus our attention on their failings instead of their strengths, and view the relationship in terms of how it should benefit us instead of how we should give more. Instead of exercising the humility to allow our spouses to teach us how to meet their needs, we lecture on how our own needs are left unmet. When things get tough, we let inconveniences and irritations crowd out the goodness and blessings marriage brings into our lives. Goddard points out, “It is my view that most of us have misunderstood the purpose of marriage. It is not a picnic with friends. It is more like a college education with occasional joys, lots of growth, and abundant homework.”
Marriage is hard work, but the work is fruitful if rooted in the foundations of charity. This is centered on how we choose to see our partner, how capable we are of loving them in spite of their shortcomings, and how interested we are in seeking their best interest instead of our own. Marriage gives us the best opportunity to develop the character of Christ simply because it is filled with so many opportunities to overcome the tests of our patience. We are given the test over and over again until we can finally get it right. Nothing develops patience more than the very moment that requires it.
In life we often find what we are looking for. Charity in marriage means not just seeing the good, it is looking for the good, actively appreciating the good, and generously expressing that gratitude to the ones we love. It is the condition of our hearts when we communicate how we feel, realizing that the combination and delivery of our words are the very essence of how our message will be received. As Goddard so perfectly states, “There are no right words when our hearts are wrong.”
When our hearts are soft, when our minds are humble, it is then the Lord can teach us what we have yet to learn about applying charity into our marriage. It will likely take a lifetime to get there… The point is to start the journey.