Beyond Ordinary: When a Good Marriage Just Isn't Good Enough Read Free Page A

dissatisfaction, misunderstanding, and stale love. Ordinary is the birthplace of adultery. Ordinary is a place where divorce looks better than staying together. Ordinary is the subtle trap that convinces you that your marriage is as good as it will ever get. Ordinary marriages lose hope. Ordinary marriages lose vision. Ordinary marriages give in to compromise.
    The way to an ordinary marriage is the path of least resistance. If you want an extraordinary marriage, you will have to choose it.
    This book is a weapon designed to wage war against ordinary. It isn’t about communicating better or learning what planet your spouse is from or what love language he or she speaks. Instead, this book is a transparent look into the lives of two people who have journeyed from extraordinary to ordinary to nightmarish—and back again, by God’s grace. This is a book about the heart: our hearts, your heart, and the heart of every marriage.
    If you’re looking for a book that lists five easy steps to a great marriage, go back to the bookstore. But if you remember what extraordinary felt like and are determined to do whatever it takes to get back there, keep reading.
    There will be times when it will feel like it’s over, but it’s not over. There will be times when you will be tempted to throw this book across the room. Go ahead—it can handle it! This book will challenge you to ask questions about yourself and your marriage that will be uncomfortable to consider. Embrace those questions and be honest. It is as we face our fears and learn to tell the truth that we begin to leave ordinary behind in our relationships with God and in our marriages.
    Ordinary will be defeated with each turn of the page and with the belief that God is fighting for you more than you are fighting for yourself.
    Welcome to the movement beyond marriage as usual.

1.
    NO ORDINARY BEGINNING
    For many of us there is a gap between the marriage we have and the marriage we thought we would have. Sometimes that gap is created by unrealistic dreams and expectations. But more often that gap is created by a subtle equation that defines many marriages:
    Time + unintentionality = ordinary marriage.
    It isn’t that we intend to drift away from our spouses, but over time it just happens.
    Do you remember the hope you had the day you got married? Do you remember the vows you made—“in sickness and in health,” “for better or worse,” “till death do us part”? Your marriage was going to be different. Your marriage was going to be special. Your marriage was going to be anything but ordinary.
    Is your marriage extraordinary today? Or are you miles awayfrom those early feelings, hopes, and dreams? Even the healthiest marriages have the potential to drift.
    You may not be sure how it happened, but over the course of time, your marriage may have become ordinary. You are not the spouse you imagined. You don’t have the marriage you dreamed of when you said, “I do.” Words that once defined your relationship—intimate, fun, exciting, romantic, growing, loving, patient, forgiving—now seem to describe another time and a different couple.
    It isn’t that you wanted a marriage of mediocrity; it’s that you’ve drifted into it.
    Do you remember what it felt like the first time you met your spouse? How about the late-night conversations and the crazy things you did to impress him or her? What was your first kiss like? Can you picture the backflips your stomach was doing before you asked her to marry you, or while you were waiting to be asked? No matter how long you’ve been married, there is something special about remembering the extraordinary beginning of your relationship. It takes you to a place of hope, allows you to remember your dreams, and reminds you why you chose to commit the rest of your life to your spouse in the first place.
    JUSTIN:
    When I started college in 1991, I had my life and my future planned out. I had played basketball in high school, and