MARRIAGE 16 october 2024 www.goodnewsfl.org Good News • South Florida edition As you know, Florida is known for the beginning of space travel and the flight to the moon, but many don’t know that Florida is also known for buried treasure, hence the name Treasure Coast. According to the Spanish Fleet Society, ships loaded with Spanish treasure off the coast of Florida and Cuba in 1715 were shipwrecked due to a hurricane. More than 1500 people died. Hundreds of years later, treasure hunters off the coast of Vero Beach and Sebastian discovered gold and silver. Early in the 1960s, treasure hunter Mel Fisher found some of the 1715 Fleet but much remains scattered over the ocean floor. In 2015, 4.5 million gold coins were discovered off the Sebastian shoreline. Fisher also spent sixteen years treasure hunting in the Florida Keys before it paid off. In 1973, he discovered the Spanish Galleon Nuestra Senora de Atocha, known as the Atocha Motherlode. It included 40 tons of gold and silver, Columbian emeralds, gold and silver artifacts, and more than 100,000 silver Spanish coins known as pieces of eight. The estimated value was $450 million. According to the manifest, they suspect that this represents only half of the treasure, with more gold and emeralds at the bottom of the sea. The allure of buried treasure has created best-selling books, music and movies: the stories of Blackbeard and the Golden Age of Piracy, the Netflix series Outer Banks, Black Sails, the film Fool's Gold, The Deep, Pirates of the Caribbean, and Robert Louis Stevenson's book Treasure Island. The quest for what might be found, the highs and lows, and the sense of adventure are exhilarating, and the discovery is thrilling. Marriage can be like searching for treasure Marriage and treasure hunting are much the same. The theaters, bookstores and streaming platforms are full of stories about our search for love, the adventure of our relationship, finding “the one" and the ecstasy of passion. Like Mel Fisher's investment of time, talent and financial resources in looking for buried treasure, the investment in our relationships and marriage requires the same commitment. I often share with couples that a vibrant marriage is sometimes like searching for buried treasure. It’s there; it can be rediscovered, but it requires grit, self-awareness, time, sacrifice and a steadfast spirit to keep going when the deep lows come. Like the ships on the southern seas, our marriages and relationships experience emotional summer showers that are stickily humid and inconvenient, but it doesn’t last long and the sun comes out. Occasionally, a tropical storm where it rains for days, seas and winds are high, and our emotions are like streets and yards strewn with tree limbs, debris and flood waters, but it passes, we pick up the pieces, and after a while, it's over with no lasting damage. But then there’s a hurricane like Andrew in 1992 with the threat of lost lives, property destruction and evacuations. We remember vividly that it became a marker where all was lost; people moved out of town, communications and electricity were down for weeks, and trench foot manifested. An emotional hurricane is often life-defining; a betrayal of vows or the death of a child can wreck or sink our relationships and marriages, break our hearts into thousands of pieces, blown about by the wind, and sometimes the richness of our relationship feels buried at the bottom of the ocean. So, how do we guard our marriages and relationships from a storm or the destruction of a hurricane? Unlike the sailors of 1715, we have warning signs much further out. What are the bad weather warning flags? Warning flags Do you work more than 50 hours per week? Is the cell phone a distraction in your marriage? Do you take your cell phone to bed? You often miss dinner with your spouse and family. You believe your marriage has fallen into a rut. Your work schedules aren’t in sync. You don’t go on regular dates. Your children take priority over your marriage. You rarely have sex. You don’t worship together. You don’t pray together other than a meal blessing. You don’t share a friend group with the same values. Moorings A vessel needs moorings to keep it secure, and our marriage and relationships need moorings to keep us afloat. Our permanent mooring is God’s Word. Spend time in God's WORD daily. Make time to pray together. Ask one another how you can pray for them during the day. Attend a small group Bible study with couples who share your values. Other moorings, such as a boat anchor or swing mooring, allow more movement, and some are temporary, but they keep us safe. Write one another a love note. Go on a date night regularly. Do something spontaneously. Flirt with one another. Attend a marriage workshop or retreat yearly. take at least three days away together yearly, with no one else. Share your wishes, hopes, and dreams. Have sex often. Even in a marriage that's had an emotional hurricane, there's buried treasure beneath the hurt and pain if you commit to persevering. Research shows that couples who experience the betrayal of an affair who persevere, with help from others, and repent with a teachable spirit after five years say they are happy they continued to dig deep for the beautiful, buried treasure of love again beneath all the pain. Relate Well Live Well (formerly Live the Life South Florida) exists to strengthen marriages and families through skills-based relationship education beginning in middle school through senior adults. We provide workshops for marriage enrichment and HOPE Weekends for marriages needing a deeper work. RWLW.org - Lisa May - Executive Director, Relate Well Live Well Buried Treasure
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