You know the couple at your church who leads the marriage ministry? What if you knew they were getting divorced?
Nobody knows yet. Not their pastor. Not their small group. Not the people who comment “relationship goals” on their Instagram posts.
But I know. Because they were sitting in my office a while ago.
Sarah just said the most heartbreaking thing I’ve ever heard: “We were so good at performing happiness that we forgot we were dying inside.”
Mark hasn’t said anything. He’s just staring at his wedding ring.
This is the third couple like this I’ve seen this month. Not struggling couples. Not the ones everyone worries about. The perfect ones. The ones who smile in the church lobby and hold hands during worship and post sunset photos with Scripture captions.
They’re the ones closest to divorce.
And nobody sees it coming.
Here’s what happened to Sarah and Mark.
They started performing about four years ago. Not intentionally. It just sort of… happened.
Someone at church asked how they were doing. Sarah said, “We’re blessed,” even though they’d fought in the car fifteen minutes earlier. The person smiled and said, “You two are such an example to the rest of us.”
And Sarah felt something she didn’t expect: pressure.
Not to fix the fight. To hide it.
Because if people see you as “the example,” you can’t admit you’re struggling. That would shatter the image. Disappoint people. Prove you’re not as godly as they thought.
So Sarah kept saying, “We’re blessed.”
Mark kept smiling in the lobby.
They kept posting the happy photos.
And every time someone complimented their marriage, they felt a little more trapped. Because now they had an audience to maintain. A reputation to protect. A testimony to preserve.
Your church community was accidentally training them to lie.
Not maliciously. Not intentionally. But every compliment rewarded the performance. Every “you two are goals” reinforced the mask. Every “we wish our marriage was like yours” made honesty feel like betrayal.
So they kept performing.
And the performance slowly killed the real relationship underneath.
By the time they came to me, Sarah said she couldn’t remember the last time she told Mark something real.
Not the sanitized version. Not the small-group-appropriate version. The real version.
When someone asked, “How are you guys doing?” she’d say, “Great! Marriage is hard but God is good.”
When Mark asked, “What’s wrong?” she’d say, “Nothing, I’m fine.”
When her friends posted about marriage struggles on Instagram, she’d comment with encouragement and Bible verses, while sitting in her car in the church parking lot, crying.
Because she’d trained herself to perform so well that she’d forgotten how to be honest.
Mark told me something that broke me.
He said: “I spent twenty minutes in the car last Sunday before walking into church. Just sitting there. Practicing my smile. Rehearsing what I’d say if someone asked about us. I used to just walk in. Now I have to prepare. Like an actor getting into character.”
That’s the cost of the performance.
Not just pretending for others. Pretending so hard you lose yourself.
I told them something that felt harsh, but it was true.
“Your marriage isn’t dying because you stopped loving each other. It’s dying because your church community is rewarding you for lying, and punishing you for being honest.”
Think about it.
When you post the happy anniversary photo, people celebrate you.
When you admit you’re struggling, people get uncomfortable.
When you smile in the lobby, you’re “an example.”
When you ask for prayer for your marriage, you’re “going through a rough patch.”
When you perform, you’re praised.
When you’re real, you’re pitied.
So of course you perform.
You’re not fake. You’re not a hypocrite. You’re human. And humans do what gets rewarded.
The problem isn’t you. It’s the system.
Your church community, without meaning to, has created an environment where honesty feels dangerous and performance feels safe.
And that’s killing marriages.
Here’s what I gave Sarah and Mark.
I said: “For one week, no performance. Just honesty. If someone asks how you’re doing, tell the truth. If you don’t feel connected during worship, don’t fake it. No Instagram. No small group performance. Just reality.”
Sarah looked terrified. “What if people judge us?”
I said: “They might. But right now, you’re judging yourselves harder than anyone else ever could. And it’s destroying you.”
They agreed to try.
Day one: Someone at church asked how they were. Sarah said, “Honestly? Not great. We’re struggling.” The person looked uncomfortable and changed the subject. Sarah cried in the car afterward.
Day two: Mark’s dad called and asked how things were going. Mark said, “Dad, I don’t know if we’re going to make it.” His dad was silent for a long time. Then he said, “I’m glad you told me. How can I help?” Mark broke down.
Day three: Sarah told her mom they were in counseling. Her mom asked why she didn’t say something sooner. Sarah realized: “I didn’t even know I was allowed to.”
Day five: They had a fight at the kitchen table. A real one. Not the silent treatment. Not the passive-aggressive comments. A loud, messy, uncomfortable fight about things they’d been avoiding for years.
And then something happened.
The yelling stopped. The room got quiet. And in that silence, something broke open.
Mark said: “I feel like I’m failing you.”
Sarah said: “I feel invisible.”
And for the first time in years, they weren’t performing. They were just… there. Broken and honest and terrified.
Mark reached across the table and held her hand.
Not for the audience. Not for Instagram. Not because it looked good.
Because he finally saw her again.
By the end of the week, Sarah sent me a text:
“I don’t know if we’re going to make it. But at least now we’re dealing with the real problem instead of pretending it doesn’t exist. And that feels like hope.”
That’s the shift.
Not from broken to fixed. From performance to truth.
Because here’s what I know after years of working with couples:
You do need more prayer. You do need more Scripture. You do need more date nights.
But! what you need MOST is you need to stop lying about how you’re actually doing.
Your marriage doesn’t need to look perfect. It needs to be real.
I wrote an entire book about this.
Not just the philosophy. The actual roadmap. The conversations Sarah and Mark had. The questions that broke through the performance. The frameworks that rebuilt intimacy.
If you’re tired of performing and ready to rebuild, start here →
Here’s what I want you to do right now.
Ask yourself: Are you building your marriage for your spouse, or for your audience?
If the honest answer is “audience,” you’re in the trap.
And the trap doesn’t end well. Because you can’t sustain a performance forever. Eventually, something breaks. The mask slips. The exhaustion wins.
And by the time you realize what you’ve lost, it’s often too late to get it back.
If you’re reading this and thinking, “This is us. We’re performing,” I want to help.
Book 20 minutes with me here → and we’ll figure out exactly where the performance is hiding in your marriage, and what to do about it. No pitch. No sales call. Just clarity.
Your marriage doesn’t need to be perfect.
It just needs to be yours.
Not the version you show everyone else. The real one. The messy, complicated, imperfect one.
That’s where healing starts.
P.S. — The question you’re avoiding right now is: “What if I stop performing and they don’t like who I actually am?”
That’s the real fear, isn’t it? Not that your marriage will fail. That your spouse will see the real you and walk away.
But here’s the truth: they already know. They’re just waiting for you to stop pretending so they can stop pretending too.
All the best,
Jai Singh
Christian Life & Relationship Coach