Married for more than thirty-five years, with three grown-up kids, today my husband and I are in a new phase of life and love in our marriage.
Our first child was born after one and a half years, followed by our second child three years later, and our third six years after the second one. We were both working, but I chose to stay at home after the third one so I could balance caring for the three with home chores. With three kids, a single income, and a tight budget, everything stretched us thin — schoolwork, sickness, outings, celebrations, and the constant juggle of family and extended-family responsibilities.
My husband was the primary breadwinner, so the rest of us juggled everything to support his career and keep our household running. Then, the Lord called me to the ministry, and with my husband’s blessings and cooperation, I joyfully entered the work of the Lord. Naturally, this meant no salary for me. So, to help make ends meet, I picked up a few hours of part-time work as a news researcher and analyst each week. Though the income helped, it was not very lucrative and required me to set aside time each week for work. The list was endless: sleepless nights, school drop-offs, homework, my husband’s work travel, providing for a growing family, and caring for parents on both sides. All of this — plus church and family functions — had to be managed while doing ministry.
Being the facilitator of the marriage enrichment course in our church meant that my husband and I had to attend the final session of each course, usually held as a weekend getaway at a resort. This was our quality time together, and I guarded it fiercely — arranging child care, setting aside the money, and treating every moment as the date night it was meant to be. At home, we would invariably fall asleep, exhausted by all the things involved in raising a Christian family. Being physically and mentally away from all normal duties helped us maintain a modicum of romance and intimacy, but despite this time, nurturing teens through to adulthood did take a toll on us.
We didn’t drift apart — we simply lost sight of one another. The demands were relentless: guiding our children through school and career decisions, caring for aging parents in declining health, keeping up with church, and facing the changes in our own bodies. Somewhere in all of that, we stopped seeing each other. We felt rewarded when we saw our family flourish even amid societal pressures, political changes, and environmental disasters.
When my husband retired, I stepped back from my ministerial responsibilities to serve as a consulting elder. Our parents passed away, and our children left the nest — we were finally able to relax and rest physically, mentally, and emotionally. I then found that the normal duties of life had worn away our intimacy and closeness, and though we didn’t feel like strangers, we didn’t feel like partners either.
We each navigated our responsibilities in our own way, our paths running parallel — close, but never quite converging. We lived contentedly in the same house, each busy with our own work; we shared a room and a bed but were more like roommates than life partners. This was quite nice for a while, since we were both exhausted and needed time to recover and relax after running a strenuous race. Yet, I saw that if we didn’t reset and rebuild our relationship, we would drift apart in our senior years.
We needed to rebuild our intimacy and closeness more than when we were newly married, becoming each other’s mainstay and friends. Now, intimacy is far more than just the closeness created by the joining of bodies, for it’s the joy we feel in each other’s company, sharing even small things such as a walk or a cup of coffee. At this stage of life, physical attraction was not the trigger, but a heart connection would knit us together. Being a family of two, we now had the time, space, and energy to cultivate new habits to sustain this connectivity and closeness. We remembered that God created marriage to be the closest bond of intimacy between two people, and, apart from drawing security from being His own, this was the one relationship meant to be till death do us part!
Here are some tips that helped me rebuild our marriage and work to make it a fulfilling relationship of love and respect.
1. In Song of Solomon 2:10-13, the man calls to the woman to come apart and be with him, and this call recurs throughout the book. The problem is that women tend to relax only when every chore is done perfectly, while men tend to be hung up on work and making a name for themselves, rather than providing for the family. Both need to take time out to talk and share, for communication is the key to connection and closeness. A body needs food, water, and shelter to thrive — and a marriage needs the same kind of nourishment: unhurried, undistracted time together, just the two of you.
2. However, you make it work — date nights, daytime outings, or a few stolen hours — prioritize regular time alone together. Save for a babysitter, call on a friend or family member, and protect that time as the essential investment it is. Vacationing as a couple, without kids, even for just two days, should be part of our yearly calendar, and our budget planning should include vacation expenses. Cultivating and maintaining a good relationship with grandparents will help with this, as many of them would just love time with the grandkids.
3. Date and vacation times should be quality time to share thoughts and feelings, rather than for discussing household or other stuff. Hurts and misunderstandings can be cleared up together before they grow into bitter roots of unforgiveness that quietly damage your relationship. This isn’t a time for confrontation — it’s a time to gently clear the air and address any hidden hurts or overlooked slights before they take root.
4. Taking time for worship, prayer, and reading the Word or a book together will draw you closer, lifting you to oneness in spirit and heightening your sense of intimacy. Time spent in His presence will renew your perspective and provide the strength to continue building your marriage.
5. Finally, time taken for sexual intimacy will empower the union, sealing your closeness with a powerful exchange of love through self-abandonment to serve the other. Proverbs 5:18-19 asks us to be satisfied and rejoice in our spouse and allow them to always delight in us. When intimacy is rooted in all of this — the time together, the clearing of hurts, the intentional pursuit of one another — it becomes so much more than physical passion. It becomes an act of the whole person — spirit, soul, and body. Pursue each other gently, honor each other’s rhythms, and don’t let weariness steal what God designed to draw you closer. This is how you build a marriage!