If you live in the Charlotte area of North Carolina, like myself, you are embarking on week three of quarantine. You are in your home with the people you have chosen to live with. For many of us it is the same person we have chosen to love, followed by the minions that birthed from this love. Your love’s habits that were so cute when you first met are now fingernails to the chalkboard. They have not changed, but we are now trapped. Trapped in the same place together. Trapped with the same people day in and day out. Trapped in a situation we can not change. Trapped with no clear end in sight.
Brandon, my husband of fifteen years, and I have been navigating this new norm. Some days with grace, others not so much. Two working parents, now both from home, while homeschooling three kids, being the referee to arguments, the chef, the maid, the laundromat, the nurse, and entertainer is exhausting. The first week was hard but the second week a better routine was established and we are working on it. Brandon and I can get annoyed with each other quickly when we are both stressed and working. Throw in the chaos of quarantine and it is a recipe for disaster. But by the end of the day, we have come around again and are laughing about it. The other night, after a day of quarrels, I opened the news to an article on divorve rates rising during COVID-19. We couldn’t help but laugh. Not because it isn’t a serious situation, but because we could understand it.
A few months ago I signed up to do a book review and it arrived in my mailbox this week. The Marriage Ark: Securing Your Marriage in a Sea of Uncertainty could not have arrived at a more perfect time. Throughout the book the author refers back to Noah’s Ark. The correlations she makes between the importance of building your marriage and Noah to building his ark is fantastic. In this current time we are not so far off from Noah, especially those who were actually trapped in their rooms on a cruise ship, we are trapped in a place with the people God has placed in our lives.
Just like Noah we couldn’t see/understand what was coming.
In Genesis 6 it says,
13 So God said to Noah, “I am going to put an end to all people, for the earth is filled with violence because of them. I am surely going to destroy both them and the earth. 14 So make yourself an ark of cypress wood; make rooms in it and coat it with pitch inside and out. 15 This is how you are to build it: The ark is to be three hundred cubits long, fifty cubits wide and thirty cubits high. 16 Make a roof for it, leaving below the roof an opening one cubit high all around. Put a door in the side of the ark and make lower, middle and upper decks. 17 I am going to bring floodwaters on the earth to destroy all life under the heavens, every creature that has the breath of life in it. Everything on earth will perish.”
Noah hadn’t seen rain. He couldn’t even begin to wrap his mind around a flood. I feel this way about the coronavirus. I can’t physically see it and I certainly don’t understand it.
Just Like Noah we don’t have any idea when/how this will end.
As you continue to read Genesis you read how Noah did as God commanded him. Then the rain came for forty days and forty nights. But this wasn’t the end. Noah and his family remained on the boat as the flood waters didn’t recede. According to Bible Answer Girl they were on the ark for 377 days.
For many of us, this is an unpredictable time. Many have not only lost their routines but have lost loved ones, jobs, and stability. I can only imagine the losses endured if this continues for 377 days.
As Joe Exotic says in the end of Episode One of Tiger King, “I’m in a cage. Do you know why animals die in cages? Their soul dies.” Right now there are a lot of people who are on the verge of their soul dying.
Just like Noah we know a “but God.”
In Genesis 8
1 But God remembered Noah and all the wild animals and the livestock that were with him in the ark, and he sent a wind over the earth, and the waters receded.
I always love verses that begin with “but God.” Repeatedly God uses the crisis of our situations to step in and make a change. Rarely is it on our time table but it is always in His. Does this mean we will not deal with more loss, hardships, or worry? No. We are not promised this.
So how do we help those who are hurting during this turbulent time? How do we save our marriages from divorce?
We need to first begin with ourselves and the people in our home. I HIGHLY recommend buying this book, The Marriage Ark: Securing Your Marriage in a Sea of Uncertainty. It is a quick read, but is packed full of practical implementations for your relationships. It begins with a Personal Inventory and each chapter ends with Conversation Starters. I personally was excited to see so many of my Marriage Secrets were expanded upon, giving me hope that we are doing something right. I love how the author also introduced some new things Brandon and I have been able to discuss. For example, when she said, “you will be married to many different people. Choose to love them all.” I had to stop a minute. I read it again and thought I must be missing something. She continued on to discuss how over time you both change and you have to “choose to know one another at every phase.”
One of the practical tips the author addressed that should be used during this turbulent time both inside and outside of our marriage is empathetic listening. There is no better time than this to be able to listen to others. We can all take the time to be fully focused. Not to “fix” their situation, but to listen to what they are saying. Right now during this time many of us will need someone to truly listen to our hearts. Some may be on the verge of their soul dying and we have the opportunity to bring a rainbow, a reminder of hope.
Here is how you can participate in the GIVEAWAY of The Marriage Ark: Securing Your Marriage in a Sea of Uncertainty:
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- Giveaway will be drawn on April 5.