I once cared for a trellis of wild roses along one side of a stone wall in front of our Massachusetts house. Every spring the plants needed to be weeded and cut back to encourage blooming. Long strands of thick, thorny shoots that bore no flower had to be pruned out leaving the softer, younger plants full of buds to receive all the attention. The thorny stems constantly fought with me, poking through leather gloves and ripping open the plastic lawn and leaf bags I tried to force them into. My hands were puffy for days after this ordeal, and my arms, a road map of scratches.

It is in caring for love that a man experiences his deepest pain. Men are, by nature, irresponsible. To look after a woman in the same manner in which he looks after his own needs and wants is a severe test for any man.

Most men think they got something when they got married, few see marriage in terms of what they give up, and yet this is the fundamental truth for which marriage is the prime human example. “Husbands love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her to make her holy” (Ephesians 5:25).

What does it mean for a man to give himself up for his wife? For Jesus Christ it meant losing his reputation and becoming a servant. It meant humbling himself and becoming obedient to something other than his own interests. For God to lose his reputation and give up the honor due him is no small thing. For a man, it means he foregoes his need for attention and focuses his attention onto his wife. He is over all his insecurities and need for approval. If he never got it, then he is over never getting it. If he got too much, then he is over being special. He does not allow self-indulgence; he lives for someone else. Whether he got praise or didn’t get praise, it doesn’t matter since he sees himself as a servant either way. He is a giver of praise not a praise-seeker. Here is a man whose wife is more important than his reputation. And to get to this place is painful. None of this comes naturally. For Jesus, it came by way of a cross.

No man can expect any less painful a path.

Love is a rose but you better not pick it
Only grows when it’s on the vine
Handful of thorns and you know you’ve missed it
Lose your love when you say the word, “Mine.”
– Neil Young

“Only grows when it’s on the vine.” This is different from the rose a man might bring his wife on a special day (any day, for that matter). That rose has been picked, but his wife is growing in her own garden. You don’t “pick” this rose, you care for the whole plant. You tend to the soil, water it, weed it, and sometimes get scratched up in the process. You don’t “pick” your wife’s beauty. You don’t cut her off at the stem and put her on display. You come to her garden where she is growing and blooming. You appreciate her source of life and you give life to it.

As much as I like this song by Neil Young (most of us know the Linda Ronstadt version), I must take issue with the last two lines. Grabbing a handful of thorns is not proof that you missed it. On the contrary, it is probably the first indication that you’ve really got something there.

In the popular book, The Notebook by Nicholas Sparks, Noah Calhoun has to learn to cope with his wife’s Alzheimer’s disease — the thief of hearts, souls and memories. Whenever he tries to get near his beloved — to take the flower in his arms again — he is stabbed by an armful of thorns. She does not know him. She distrusts him. She is belligerent with him. She is beyond his reach. But Noah has discovered that to love is to lose oneself, and so all his attentions are given over to loving this woman who does not know him anymore, whatever the cost. Meticulously, sometimes painfully, he discovers the love he has had for her all along is enough for the two of them. Sometimes he gets more thorns than flowers, but one whiff of a bloom is enough to keep him going. It is a tender story of how far love can go no matter how thorny the path.

And finally, you don’t lose your love when you say the word “Mine,” as long as you mean by that: My responsibility. My job. My sacrifice. My woman to win, even if it means over and over again.