It all depends on the levees now. So many Americans have been watching record high flood waters rising all around them this week. Hoping the wall between them and all that water is high enough to hold it back.
It would be crazy for some town to suddenly say, "Uh-oh. We'd better build a wall here. Fast." No, it's too late when the waters are surging. You've got to build your walls high before the flood comes.
Around a town. Around your family. Around your marriage. Because we're living in a time when we've all seen marriages getting washed away. Couples who promised "til death do us part" and who parted long before that. And let's not kid ourselves. There's a lot of high water threatening every one of our marriages. Financial pressures, medical crises, schedules that turn lovers into strangers, sexual images everywhere, so many opportunities to look for love in all the wrong places. So many detours and landmines. So many ways for disillusionment, disappointment and despair to steal away what was once a committed love.
But, thank God, it doesn't have to be that way. If we build our walls high. Like that wall that says, "Do not let the sun go down while you are still angry" (Ephesians 4:26). Harbored anger is a "bitter root" that "grows up to cause trouble and defile many" (Hebrews 12:15). Smoldering resentment, fueled by wounds not dealt with quickly, will one day be the fire that incinerates a marriage.
Floodproof love needs a high wall that says, "I will set before my eyes no vile thing" (Psalm 101:3). Because there's plenty of vile to look at - websites, movies, TV shows, lots of skin. We just can't afford to feed the monster of desire that's devoured so many. Oh, and there's that wall that says, "Be quick to listen, slow to speak, and slow to become angry" (James 1:19). Some of the floods that ravage a marriage don't come from outside. They come from feelings and needs that got stuffed inside - because the one who loves that person wasn't listening. We can't be close for long if we don't take time - regular time - to know each other's hurts and hearts.
And we've found there's no more important wall to build than the one that reads, "Seek first the Kingdom of God" (Matthew 6:33). Two people living for themselves - or even for each other - just isn't enough to hold back the flood. It takes two people living together for the God who loves them. Praying together often, drawing closer to each other as they draw close to Him. He's a God whose love runs strong when our love runs low. He pours out His inexhaustible, unconditional love, so we have it to give to the one we've pledged our life to.
There really can be a love that lasts a lifetime. That gets stronger with time. That defies the flood. If you build your walls high.