Humanly speaking, it is impossible.

But with God everything is possible.

LAURIE

People say our marriage is impossible. They’re right.

My husband, Matt, and I are in what some call a “mixed-orientation marriage,” meaning that, for at least one of us, our default sexual attraction is not toward the gender of our spouse. It’s toward our same gender. In our marriage, that would be me: my default attraction is not toward men but women. Matt’s is toward women too.

When we speak about our marriage publicly, or one-on-one with new friends, they often respond to our marriage description by cocking their heads like a puppy learning a new command. “I’m sorry, what? I don’t get it.” Depending on how comfortable they feel, they might even articulate their confusion. “So, are you attracted to your husband at all? How does that work?”

The implication is, “Your marriage is impossible.”

It is impossible . . . if we don’t understand what marriage is for.

Underneath the question, “How does that work?” are unspoken questions that expose what we believe about marriage. “How in the world do you have a sexual relationship with your spouse if you aren’t naturally attracted to him? Isn’t the purpose of marriage—or at least the glue that holds it together—sex? And to have sex in a marriage, don’t you need attraction?”

In this understanding, the goal of marriage seems to be the kind of unity that results in the climax of many chick flicks: the couple sleeps together.

It is fascinating to us because no one ever publicly asks Matt if he wrestles with attraction toward me. No one seems to even think to ask it. The implied statement behind the lack of questions for him reveals something of the audience’s beliefs about marriage and men: Matt is a man. He must always be ready to have sex with his wife. Sex fuses marriages together. Therefore, perhaps, he is the one holding the marriage together.

Little do they realize, Matt’s attraction toward women almost imploded our marriage. For five years, Matt hid a pornography addiction that began not because of sexual issues as a result of my orientation but because he bowed to the same idol many do—thinking that sex would bring him the fulfillment he craved.

But it didn’t. It doesn’t. It can’t.

Just because Matt is attracted to women doesn’t mean our marriage is whole.

Just because I am attracted to women doesn’t mean our marriage is broken.

As we speak more openly about our marriage, straight women open up about their marriage struggles too: “When I share my lack of desire to have sex with my husband, other women tell me, ‘Just do it, and then he will open up emotionally to you.’ Or, ‘Pray that God will put passion into your marriage.’ Or, ‘Feel sexy so that you want to have sex.’ I mostly feel guilty because my mind wanders during sex, and I am hardly attracted to him at all.”

We hear the exchange rate for emotional connection. Sex will satisfy him (and get him off my back), and I’ll get what I want. We hear the idolatry. Emotional connection will scratch the itch of my heart. We hear the lack of natural attraction.

Straight men open up about their marriage struggles when we speak too: “I love my wife, but I can’t stop looking at pornography.” Or, “After thirty years, I wrestle with desiring her at all.” Or, “I hear sex begins in the kitchen. I serve her and meet her emotional needs, and then I get what I want.”

Again, we hear the exchange rate for connection. Emotional connection will satisfy her (and get her off my back), and I’ll get what I want. We hear the idolatry. Sex will scratch the itch of my heart. We hear the lack of natural attraction.

The default attractions of these straight people are toward the gender they married, but neither spouse always naturally desires a mind/body/spirit connection with their spouse.

Is attraction really our issue?

Is my lack of attraction toward men what makes our marriage impossible? Or is it that all of our default attractions are toward self, and selfishness is what makes all of our marriages impossible?

I want . . . I need . . . You give me . . . we say.

• • •

What is the purpose of marriage?

Let’s back it up: What is the purpose of life?

Well, as image bearers of a holy God, we are called to bear his image—serve as a visible picture of God—to the rest of the world (Genesis 1:26). We do this when we love each other, forgive each other, and work with one another in tandem with the Holy Spirit to bring restoration to a broken world (Matthew 6:10).

God is one, and we look like him when we are one with him, one within ourselves, and with each other. Then, we invite others into oneness with God. When people look at us, they are supposed to get a sense of the One who made them too. As they see a representation of God and feel a hunger for him, we are to declare him as the One all of our souls crave. In our image bearing, we are to point to Jesus. We are called to make disciples in our living and in our verbal invitations. We are to tell fellow image bearers that there is a Rescuer for our restless souls (Matthew 28:19; Romans 10:14).

So, if the purpose of being human is to point to God and, in so doing, point to Jesus as our rescuer, what is the purpose of marriage?

To point to God.

When a man and woman are united as one through marriage, we become a metaphor of “the way Christ and the church are one” (Ephesians 5:32). Marriage points to both the future and present reality that Jesus Christ wants to marry us, the church. Married people embody the gospel. Married people embody Jesus’ embodied, sacrificial, one-flesh love for us in their sacrificial, one-flesh love for one another.

It is a great mystery.

The mystery is not what I’ve heard joked about at marriage events: A man and a woman grow attracted to each other, fall madly in love, hormones trick them into marriage, and putting a ring on it makes lust Christian-legal. But surprise! They’re in a covenant now (and God hates divorce), so they have to figure out how to get along until they’re dead.

No. Attraction is not the mystery. Falling in love is not the mystery. The great mystery is that Christ wants to be one with us! Marriage simply and profoundly illustrates this incredible reality to an aching world.

“God is infinitely other, infinitely different from his creation. And yet this infinitely different Creator does not hold himself aloof,” Christopher West writes. “God wants to be one with his creation. God wants to unite with his creation. God wants to marry his creation.”1 God wants to marry us! This desire for divinity’s oneness with creation is the theme of the whole Bible—from the first marriage in Genesis (2:21-24) to the final marriage in Revelation (19:6-9).

The purpose of marriage, then, is to tangibly demonstrate God’s marriage proposal to us to our spouse and to the world. He is “the one.” He is our lover. He is our savior. Jesus laid down his life to be one with us, so we must lay down our lives to be one with each other. “Like a bridegroom Christ went forth from his chamber,” Saint Augustine said. “[Jesus] came to the marriage-bed of the cross, and there in mounting it, he consummated his marriage . . . and joined himself to [his Bride] forever.”2

• • •

People say our marriage is impossible. They are right.

But so is yours.

My natural default is toward disunity with Matt, and his default is disunity with me.

Your natural default is toward disunity with your spouse.

And yet God calls us married folk to love him and to make disciples as one.3

Our marriages feel impossible. But they aren’t. Nothing is impossible with God.

My natural default is toward disunity with the church as we press into The Marriage with Christ.

Matt’s natural default is toward disunity with the church as we press into The Marriage with Christ.

Every person’s natural default is disunity with the church as we press into The Marriage with Christ.

And yet God calls us to make disciples as one—to be unified (John 17:20-21).

The Marriage feels impossible. But it isn’t. Nothing is impossible with God.

• • •

Before we begin this impossible-made-possible story, we have some words for a few specific kinds of readers.

People who are single. You might well be thinking, “Oh no, not another book about marriage.” We have found that we are equally as passionate about singleness as we are about marriage and are committed to exhorting the church every time we speak on marriage to see singleness as we believe Jesus does. Married or single—these are the modes in which we undertake the mission to make disciples (1 Corinthians 7:35). One is not better than the other; they’re just different—different modes and different metaphors.

When we married people love each other well, we serve as a metaphor to single people for how God wants to become one with them. When single people love Jesus well and have a beautiful relationship with the church body, they serve as a metaphor to us for how we will all be in eternity....