Is the Marriage Vow Losing Relevance?

 

Whenever people want to be taken seriously, when they want their word to carry certain levels of integrity and trust, when they want the other party to believe that they will perform, they will usually find stronger terms of expression to cement their commitment to deliver. This assurance can be either verbal or written and depending on what is at stake may either involve witnesses and/or oath as the case may be. Failure to perform as promised will always spell doom for the enterprise at stake and the individuals involved.

Marriages are also considered to be serious enough an undertaking that it has to be sealed by a vow. The marital vow contains some very serious words of commitment, devotion and dedication that should not be taken lightly.

While we take covenants of business agreements seriously, I don’t think intending couples actually think through the marital vows as a prelude to the marriage. The divorce numbers does not suggest that these vows are even remembered and never really understood.

We often hear of couples jumping ship at the slightest change in fortunes for their spouses, we have seen women moving out to rent another apartment instead of staying back to support a jobless husband, we have seen men running off on a spouse with health challenges, and generally, the peace of many marriages have been threatened purely by mere fact that certain conditions that existed prior to the marriage have changed.

Most couples rush to the altar to take vows they do not have capacity or even the slightest intention to keep, this is very dangerous. It is very precarious for you to sign up to start a war when you have not calculated the cost of the battles that will ensue.

I heard a Pastor discussing the fact that some of our fellow Pastors have started changing the vows, to reduce the huge commitment embedded in those words. I heard for some officiating Pastors at weddings, it is no longer “for better, for worse”, but rather “for better, for better”....”in health and in health” as against “in sickness and in health”. While this revised marital vows seems to be in line with the gospel of faith, but faith should not deny the existence of certain realities like sickness, loss of job, financial problems and other things that show up in the course of life. If people who vowed for better, for worse can run for cover at the slightest discomfort, what do you think will happen to those who swore to “for better, for better”?

Before you get to the altar, or if you are getting confused in marriage due to the fact that things are not going as planned, remember these words, “for better, for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health, till death do us part.......”, these are serious words of covenant, would you keep to the bargain?

Whichever vow you took, just remember that marriage is a commitment and that life is a journey on a road with so many twists and turns. If you jump ship at a point when your spouse is going through a turn, and join a free riding fellow at the other lane, trust me, you will soon get to another turn with your new riding partner.

Won’t you rather stay true to your vows?