Start a 9:9 marriage movement

There is a marriage movement today that asks the question, “What if God designed marriage not to make you happy but make you holy?” I’m not part of that movement. I, and many others take a different approach. Liz and I are trying to build our lives around Ecclesiastes 9:9. “Enjoy life with the wife whom you love, all the days of this meaningless life that God has given you under the sun…” It looks to me that God wants us to enjoy being married…not just at the beginning of a marriage but “all the days” of the life God gives us. Everything we do to enrich our marriage is geared towards enjoying one another and making our marriage last. So there are times we just don’t enjoy each other and that lack of enjoyment or appreciation serves as a cue to what we need to change about ourselves—annoying habits, interrupting conversations, unkind or hurtful words. But the place we want to get back to is enjoying one another…every day (Proverbs 5:18-19). That’s the high bar. Growth then is a byproduct of learning to love better.

Part of clever Christian branding today is to use a Bible verse to identify a movement, an organization or a theme: 2:10, 3:16, and (Isaiah) 58. What if “9:9” became the calling card for couples who wanted a lasting marriage and a happy marriage? A scale of 1-9 is quite typical with an X-Y axis. A 9-1 marriage would be happy but not lasting. A 1-9 marriage would be lasting but not happy. What if we always had as our goal…our ideal, a 9-9 marriage? What if all that churches did with couples in preparation, establishment, enrichment, or repair was designed to bring lasting enjoyment to couples. “This will help you enjoy each other more.” “This will help make your marriage last for a lifetime.”