We all know the Christian maxim that the best thing a parent can do to bless a child is to love the other parent well…
In my life I have seen a few what I would call A++ marriages. The husband obviously adores his wife. The wife loves being adored and is secure and content in the relationship. There is a discernible, ongoing physical attraction that most of us would associate with very new marriages.
Beautiful! Biblical!
But I have seen over the years often – to my complete surprise and mystification – that the children of the marriage do not do well. The only conclusion I have been able to reach – and this is by no means a real answer – is that the children are, somehow, not ‘drawn up’ into the relationship. And, honestly, I have not even quite known what I mean by that. But it is as far as I have been able to get in my understanding.
Well, Tim gave me the book “When Character Was King” when I saw him on Sunday. It is Peggy Noonan’s biography of Ronald Reagan. In it she touches quickly on this very phenomenon. Although she does not deal with it from a Christian perspective, she deals with it succinctly and clearly. See what you think:
“The writer Marie Brenner wrote in ‘The House of Dreams’ her biography of the Binghams, the great newspaper clan of Louisville, Kentucky, of the closeness of the patriarch Barry Bingham and his wife, Mary. They were like ‘two halves of the same whole’. Their union was so close, their relationship so consuming of the other’s self that….it left their children out. There was no room for them in their parents’ completion. Barry and Mary were The Relationship and The Relationship took the oxygen out of the room; their children went elsewhere to breathe.
The same, essentially, has been said of the Reagans. Their marriage was a small house with one room and it was theirs. All of the Reagan children have spoken of this in one way or another, that they felt at different times and to varying degrees kept away, kept out, and it is no doubt true.”
Life in a fallen world has such unpredictable elements, doesn’t it? So complex!
Is the basic problem simply the exclusivity of the relationship, as Noonan outlines? Could it be sexual overtones that children perceive on some level and are not able to deal with?
I don’t know.
I have simply observed it.
Good observation. I have just a few brief thoughts:
Even the best marriages are tainted by sin.
Fallen human nature can refuse to benefit in any situation, no matter how idyllic it is (or seems to be).
The grace of God is needed just as desperately in homes with wonderful marriages as in homes with miserable marriages, or with no marriage at all.
God’s grace can bring wonderful, vibrant, graciously saved people out of the worst of circumstances…and sometimes even out of the best of circumstances. And maybe, just maybe, it’s less likely to happen in the “good homes” precisely because so many of the good homes tend to rely on their own goodness. God’s grace is just as desperately needed, but the need is harder to see.
The “solution” (which is not the best word), must be to seek to be a Gospel home, more than a “good” home. Of course Gospel homes will be good in countless ways, but they will also have (and provide to their children) the one divinely-given tool for dealing with all that is not good in the individual and the family.
Great comments, Betsy. Thanks.
Very interesting, Barbara. And I loved Betsy’s comments as well–so insightful and true. An additional thought: if a couple is very compatible and the marriage is “easy,” exclusivity and selfishness would more readily be fallen into. A more difficult marriage could potentially provide children with a glimpse into brokenness,
unselfishness and Spirit-bred character: “I love, not because it is easy and always pleasurable, but because Christ loves me and died for me, and I love Him and will “die” for Him–and for my spouse.” Not the world’s idea of romance, but certainly God’s idea of good.
Interesting thoughts from both you and Betsy. I had not thought of things from that angle. Thanks!
Well, good thing Pat and I have healthy tension often..sounds like our kids are in very good hands, with a bright spiritual future ahead!!:)
Interesting mom! If we were perfect…I wonder what the perfect balance would be?
Great thoughts from blog author and commenters. It may be that some couples (parents) “love” each other so much that there isn’t love “left over” for the children. I imagine these couples looking dreamily into each other’s eyes with words like “You complete me”. Maybe if one’s spouse is where one’s completeness comes from, even one’s own children can’t compete or may even threaten it.