As iron sharpens iron, so a friend sharpens a friend. Proverbs 27:17
Think about the last time your spouse really irritated you. Maybe it was something small. Maybe it wasn’t.
Most of us get married hoping our spouse will make us happy. That’s not wrong. But it’s missing the bigger picture. Marriage shows you exactly who you are. Consider this: “Marriage reveals sin like an MRI reveals sickness.”[1] Your spouse isn’t creating the irritation inside you. They’re just close enough to show you it’s there.
One pastor admitted: “I can be really pleasant to everyone I interact with all day and immediately irritable when I’m alone with her. What is that? That is my ongoing formation into the image of Jesus and the gap between who I am and who I want to be.”[2]
That gap is uncomfortable … and by design.
The Bible calls this process sharpening. It says, “As iron sharpens iron, so a friend sharpens a friend” (Proverbs 27:17). The sharpening process can involve friction. Resistance. But Scripture adds, “Put on love which binds everything together in perfect harmony” (Colossians 3:14 ESV). When two people wrap conflict in love, what results is beautiful individually and in the marriage itself.
Marriage has been described as “ … a way for two spiritual friends to help each other on their journey to become the persons God designed them to be.”[3] So it’s not: why is my spouse so irritating? But: what is God doing in me through my husband or wife?
Your marriage is the place where God does some of His most patient, most personal work in you. The things that frustrate you most may be exactly what He is using to shape you into someone more like Jesus.
[1] John Ortberg [@formationjohn], “Excerpt from Episode 001 of Formation Podcast with Tyler Staton,” Instagram video, May 4, 2026, https://www.instagram.com/reels/DX7SkdvjCve/.
[2] Ortberg, “Excerpt from Episode 001.”
[3] Tim Keller, The Meaning of Marriage: Facing the Complexities of Commitment with the Wisdom of God (New York: Dutton, 2011), 82.
