January 1st, 1865.
IT is a happy and a right thing for each of a young couple, if Christians, to know a little of human nature, of self and of the other too, before they agree to be united together. And an additional experience ere they come together as man and wife (additional to the knowledge they had before the one proposed and the other accepted), too, is a good thing. I suppose I know what is, and she knows what I am, after nearly thirty years being man and wife, and growing in the knowledge of the Lord and His grace, as well as of the world, the flesh, and Satan, better than we did in 1835. It is in the knowledge of one another's infirmities and shortcomings that we find here below (not leaven, which has to be put away, but bitter herbs, which have to be eaten) the occasions of pouring forth our faith and grace one toward another, and as to one another.
Marriage is a reality, and generally a very stern one to both, specially to the wife, on whom all the wear and tear of house and family fall; but you must learn how to let His grace be sufficient for you, His strength made perfect in weakness." Death and resurrection lie in that path as much as in any other for the Christian.
I think as to its being God's will you may rest thus far. What would have been His will may be one thing, what is His will under present circumstances may be quite another. It would not do for me to say to——, " I made a mistake in marrying you." It would not do for the affianced to say, " We never ought to have been affianced." Such a step would be to the Lord's dishonor. Not that I suppose you have any thought of such a thing. Circumstanced as you are in this respect, I should feel that the
Lord's mind sustains the engagement, and that if you discover ten thousand times more defects and weaknesses in yourself than you have, all you have to do is to pour it all out before the Lord, and to seek that His grace may prove itself sufficient for you, His strength perfect itself in weakness.... G. V. W.