Learn why understanding God’s design for covenant is essential before making one of the most important commitments of your life.
Most of us don’t grow up dreaming about covenant. We dream about getting married. We think about finding someone who loves us, building a life together, having someone to come home to, and growing old with the person God has given us. There is nothing wrong with wanting those things. Marriage can be one of God’s greatest blessings. But before we ask God to give us a husband, we need to understand what He created marriage to be. Marriage is more than a relationship between two people who love each other. It is a covenant, and God takes covenant seriously. Jesus Christ tells us in Matthew 19:6 (NLT), “Since they are no longer two but one, let no one split apart what God has joined together.” Those words should make us think differently about marriage. God isn’t standing on the outside watching two people make promises to each other. He is involved in what they are doing. He is the One who joins them together.
Marriage Is More Than a Relationship
God’s agenda for marriage is bigger than making two people happy, although He certainly cares about their joy. Marriage becomes one of the places where God teaches us how to die to selfishness, extend grace, forgive, submit ourselves to Him, honor another person, and pursue peace without always demanding our own way. In other words, many of the qualities necessary for marital oneness are the very qualities God is already developing in us as followers of Jesus Christ. When He brings two people together in covenant, He is doing more than giving them someone to share their lives with. He is creating a relationship in which they can learn to walk together in a unity that reflects His character.
Relationships can change when circumstances change. People can decide something isn’t working anymore, that they aren’t as happy as they used to be, or that they want something different. Covenant isn’t supposed to work that way. Covenant says that I am making a commitment that isn’t based solely on how I feel today. That doesn’t mean feelings aren’t important. Of course they are. You should love the person you marry. You should enjoy being with him. There should be affection, friendship, attraction, and all of those wonderful things that make two people want to share a life together. But those things alone cannot carry a marriage through everything life may bring. Feelings can change. Circumstances can change. People change. Covenant gives marriage something deeper to stand on when life doesn’t look or feel the way it did on the wedding day.
Covenant Changes the Way We Think About Love
When we understand covenant, we also begin to understand why God teaches us so much about how to love. Loving through Jesus Christ requires something from us. It requires sacrifice. Philippians 2:3–4 (NLT) says, “Don’t be selfish; don’t try to impress others. Be humble, thinking of others as better than yourselves. Don’t look out only for your own interests, but take an interest in others, too.” That kind of love sounds beautiful until things get real.
It means there will be times when we have to put aside our pride, listen when we would rather defend ourselves, forgive when we have been hurt, and consider the needs of another person when we have needs of our own. None of us will do this perfectly. Marriage doesn’t suddenly make us less selfish, more patient, or more spiritually mature. If anything, living closely with another person has a way of showing us the places where we still need to grow. This is one reason preparation before marriage matters so much. We shouldn’t expect a wedding ceremony to produce qualities in us that we have never allowed God to develop.
Covenant Requires Faithfulness
Before we enter a covenant with someone, we should pay attention to what faithfulness looks like in his life and in our own. Does he keep his word when keeping it becomes inconvenient? Does he take responsibility when he is wrong? Is he faithful in the things God has already entrusted to him? And we have to be willing to ask ourselves those same questions. Sometimes we spend so much time evaluating whether someone else is marriage material that we forget God is also working on us. Luke 16:10 (NLT) tells us, “If you are faithful in little things, you will be faithful in large ones.” Faithfulness doesn’t begin at the altar. The patterns we establish before marriage don’t magically disappear after we say “I do.” We don’t wait until the wedding to become covenant-minded people.
That is also why discernment was so important in the teaching we just finished. You are not simply deciding whether someone is a good man or whether the two of you enjoy being together. You are considering whether this is someone with whom you’ll be able to enter one of the most serious commitments of your life. Marriage will ask both of you to forgive, sacrifice, communicate, grow, adjust, and remain faithful when life becomes difficult. There will be seasons when one of you is stronger than the other. There may be financial pressure, sickness, disappointment, family problems, losses you never anticipated, and prayers that aren’t answered the way you hoped. Covenant doesn’t mean pretending those things aren’t hard. It means understanding before you marry that love will sometimes require more of you than you ever imagined. ■
Holy Bible, New Living Translation copyright © 1996, 2004, 2007 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
“Before You Say ‘I Do’ Series- Part 7: Learning Covenant Before Marriage-PART 1”, written by Reverend Fran Mack, edited by Kim Times and KLizzie, for Sundie Morning Sistas ©2026. All rights reserved. All done to the glory of God through Jesus Christ, our Lord! SMS is dedicated to encouraging and inspiring Christian Women to live boldly through God’s Word.
