COMMIT - 1. Promise devotion- intransitive verb to pledge devetion or dedication to somebody or something. 2. Promise resources - transitive verb to devote or pledge something such as time or money to an undertaking.
Recently, the word COMMITMENT has been popping in my head and in my life as a point of conversation. Just the other day, I heard a radio minister talk about it in this way (paraphrasing of course):
“These days, no one knows the meaning of the word….If you don’t like your job, get a new one, if you don’t like your car, get a new one, if you don’t like your wife, get a new one…”
I have a new wife and I’m not in this alone because my wife has a new husband. I can tell you this: The fact that we are newly married to one another and that we were previously married has nothing to do with the issue of us not being committed.
From the stories we tell one another about each of our previous marriages, we both were in our own way “committed” to those marriages, to each of our respective spouses. As the definition says, to commit means to pledge devotion or dedication to someone or something. We both did that with vigor.
At the time my children were born, or the time we purchased our first and only house together or while I was going through graduate school, I never imagined that I would be remarried years later. That wasn’t even in the same galaxy. But things change, like people who grow from children to young adults and with change comes re-evaluation.
Someone once described commitment in this way: The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over, knowing the result will be the same. You might ask what does insanity have to do with the topic of commitment and I will say to you that if you are continually committed to someone or something that is giving you the same result (disappointment, rage, anger, hostility, unhappiness, dissatisfaction) not only are you acting insane, your definition of commitment is not really healthy – unless of course, you enjoy the results.
We both were committed to our previous marriages. The difference between then and now is that each of us saw the insanity if you will, of staying committed to something that was not good for either of us and decided for our own health that it was time to heal ourselves. In the process we found each other and though life technically has no guarantees it has made all the difference.
The bottom line: staying committed and being in a place that is worthy of commitment are two different things. Pray that you know the difference.
