Dear friend,
Jacob served seven years for Rachel. They seemed to him but a few days, for the love he had for her.
I have been thinking again about how trouble in a marriage does not stay contained to the hard conversations, but leaks into the quiet ones too, until even ordinary evenings feel like they are being negotiated.
There is a moment in Genesis where Jacob works fourteen years for the wife he wanted, and the text moves through it in a few short verses, as though that much labor and disappointment could be summarized quickly. It cannot. I notice the account does not tell us Jacob and Leah found tenderness eventually, only that they stayed inside a household together, complicated and unresolved, for the rest of their years. Scripture does not promise every hard marriage resolves into ease. It records people remaining, which is a different thing than being told it will feel good.
I was married thirty-five years to a man I loved and still found exhausting at times, particularly the winter of 1989 when we barely spoke without friction for months. I do not have a tidy account of what changed. What did stay the same was that neither of us left the table. What is the smallest true thing you could say about this week, without deciding yet what it means?
A prayer
God, You see what is strained between them and what has gone unsaid too long. Give her honesty without despair tonight, and some small mercy she was not expecting. Amen.
If any part of this conflict includes fear, threats, control, or harm, you do not have to stay or work harder at it. In the U.S., confidential support is available 24/7 through the National Domestic Violence Hotline: 1-800-799-7233 or text START to 88788.