Many people (myself included) like to use the phrase I married my best friend. And while it's a lovely thought, I think there's two real meanings to that phrase.
There is a difference between marrying your best friend and being married to your best friend. Many people know that I was married once before. I met a guy and fell in love when I was 18 years old. We had a semi- long distance, short relationship/engagement while I finished school, and shortly after moving home we got married (not even a year between starting to date and being married). Cody was a friend to me for a while before we dated. He was my rock when I was in an unfamiliar town, pushing through my school work, and away from my family and friends. He made the 1 hour trip daily like it was nothing just to spend time with me.
He was my only friend. And he was my best friend. Cody and I had a friendship like none I've ever had. The way we were together was unlike any relationship I'd experienced. We were such good friends before we ever started dating that we had such a solid foundation of friendship built before we made it more than that. We knew everything about each other.
Cody and I share something special that I've never shared with anyone. And although our marriage didn't work, our friendship never failed. Through the hardest time in both of our lives (yes, it was our fault), we still counted on each other. There's a familiarity there that will never change. And it's a friendship that lasts forever.
Marrying your best friend is a good idea, so they say, but make sure you're ready.
We were babies when we got married and we just weren't ready. That's not to say we didn't love each other. That's not to say that we didn't want things to work. They just weren't right.
I'm a firm believer that God orders your steps. It's in the Bible so it has to be true (Proverbs 16:9) But he also gave us the option to choose His path or our own. And you're fully capable of taking a step off that ordained path. I truly believe my marriage with Cody was a step off the path. We were not ready to get married, and we knew that. We made the relationship about emotions, and God wasn't the foundation of it. I believe that had we committed to working through our issues, and put God back in the middle of it, He could have made things work. But instead we quit. We were frustrated, discouraged, and just plain done. Divorce shouldn't ever be an option but we let it become one. And because of that, there are consequences.
There's a reason God hates divorce. He says ONE man and ONE woman. Marriage is something so sacred and beautiful that it's to be shared with just one special person. Two people become one, no matter how short or how long your marriage is, you're one with another person. And that's a big deal.
When you're best friends first, and then you fall in love, it's important to realize the difference between marrying your best friend and being married to your best friend. In Cody's case, I married my best friend. And best friends we were. But we weren't ready to grow up and melt two lives into one. Could we have been ready eventually? Probably. But we didn't look past the beauty of a solid friendship to see that it's not just about having fun and spending time together. It has to be about God. It's about having a foundation on God, and building from there. It's about a life together. It's about bringing two different, imperfect people together into one. That's not easy. Especially without God.
Being married to your best friend happens a little differently. With Grant, we were best friends (obviously the person you date becomes about your only friend), but we had such a different relationship. We weren't necessarily friends first. We almost immediately went from being acquaintances to dating. And we were married fairly quickly. (That happens when you're a Christian, and there are certain...things...married people do that dating people don't. So you try and get married quick. If you catch my drift.) Through 2 years of marriage we have become the best of friends. We had a solid foundation on God, each of us our own foundation before we were together, that destined our relationship to be Christ-centered. God has to be your best friend first, then your spouse, for a marriage to work. Grant has become my best friend. We have grown together since we started dating, and have begun to build a life together. Grant was the one God intended to be mine. I believe that. He's the strong Christian leader that I needed, and had I waited for God to bring him into my life, I would have avoided some heartbreak. But that divorce was a lesson that has become invaluable to me, and going through that strengthened me more than I realized initially. I learned so much, not only about myself, but about how to have an effective, working relationship. My relationship with God grew immensely during that storm, and He forced me to come to terms with my salvation.
I've realized my marriage with Grant is more of a relationship with God, with Grant being the side bonus. :) And that's how it's supposed to be. That's what works. I didn't marry my best friend, but now I'm married to my best friend.
If you don't know who you are IN CHRIST first, then you can't become one with someone else. It can't work. You have to be confident in who you are, and WHOSE you are. You have to have a full understanding that you are in fact fearfully and wonderfully made, by yourself with God, and you don't need a man to tell you that. Think about putting two puzzle pieces together. If one of those pieces is torn, and not whole, no matter how right it is (you know that piece has to fit there), no matter how hard you try, those pieces won't fit together correctly. There will still be a hole between the pieces. You have to have two whole people to make a marriage work. And the only filler for that space in between is God.
When things with Grant seem to start feeling rocky, the first place I look is my relationship with God. It's directly related to my relationship with Grant. And if I start slacking on my prayer life, my relationships struggle. My lovely attitude comes out, and I have to get myself back in check.
All that being said, I encourage you to not only marry your best friend, but be married to your best friend. Let God bring that person into your life, and then make the most of it. Keep God in the center of the relationship, and it will work out. Divorce doesn't have to be the end of everything. It may be the end of a marriage but it doesn't have to mean the end of a friendship. When you're married you share a special part of your life with someone, and no matter how it ends, a piece of your heart, and a part of your life, will always belong to the other person. You wouldn't ever marry a person if you didn't love them right? Marriage requires a lot out of two people. And it's hard work.
The most important thing I got out of my divorce? God forgives. Through all the criticism and backlash I got from being "in church" and getting divorced, I learned that all sin is equal. God can forgive any sin, regardless. If your heart is right, God can restore you completely and give you back more than you thought you lost. He's good. And His mercy is new every morning. 1 John 1:9 says If we confess our sins, HE is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and cleanse us from ALL unrighteousness. I don't see a "but" in there. He says all unrighteousness.
No matter how broken you are when you come to Him, He can (and will) make you whole again.
