Alan King once said, “Marriage
is nature’s way of keeping people from fighting with strangers.” But sometimes strangers get married. Maybe you’ve heard the story of David
Weinlick and Elizabeth Runze and their “arranged” wedding. David had years earlier picked the date, time
and place of his wedding. He just did
not have a bride. He said he got sick
and tired of people asking him when he was going to get married so he set the
date: June 13, 1998.
Two dozen women responded to David’s advertisement and applied
to be his bride. They showed up at the
Mall of America on the day of the planned wedding and were interviewed by David’s
family and friends for the role of wife. His friends and relatives thought that David
and Elizabeth were the best match with similar interests, senses of humor,
intellectual abilities, and emotional chemistry so the wedding followed.
Now, more than ten years and three children later, David and
Elizabeth are still married and their kids say they’re kissing all the time. While the concept may seem a bit out of the
ordinary, for this couple things are working out.
As much as it pains me to admit this, success in marriage is not the length of the courtship, or even the quality of
the pre-marriage counseling (although I won’t perform a wedding without it). The secret to making a marriage work is having
the will to make it work.
None of the articles about David and Elizabeth mention if
they are Christians or not but they seem to be taking the Apostle Paul’s
advice: “Yield to obey each other as you
would to Christ.” [Ephesians 5:21 New
Century Version]. Long-term successful couples
keep coming back to the fact that their main commitment is to being a couple. Mutual submission is powerful!
May all your relationships produce life-long friendships!
