For Better, For Worse

By Rev. Ernest O'Neill

 “I take you to be my lawful wedded wife to have and to hold from this day forward for better for worse in sickness and in health for richer for poorer.”  And our mistake is we slide over the worse.  We do.  We say, “For better for worse, in sickness and in health, for richer for poorer.”

Now loved ones, why did they put it in?  Why did they put “for worse” in?  And the truth is that when the other one is at her worst you are driven to grasp most vehemently for the peace, and the gentleness, and the long suffering, and the love of Jesus and no Christian marriage can exist without the supernatural power that you draw down from Jesus at the right hand of the Father as you at last die to whether this loved one is blessing your life or cursing it and you grasp for Jesus’ life so that you can be a blessing to her or to him.  And so in individual marriages loved ones, those sore spots are rubbed again, and again, and again until you see there’ll be no heaven for me until Lord Jesus, you’re able to transform me so that I can bear this loved one with love and so that I can bless her when she perhaps curses me, or so that I can bless him when he perhaps curses me.  But loved ones, the purpose of marriage is to reproduce the image of God in us and that’s the primary reason for it.