Kevin Fredericks was talking about a “marriage scoreboard.”
Not the kind you write down.
The kind you carry.
He shared this story of how he had bought his wife an expensive pair of shoes.
He went all out, thoughtful, and spendy (in his mind.)
He even tried to capture her reaction… for the gram.
But she didn’t respond the way he expected.
No excitement.
No big reaction.
And that kinda surprised him.
What struck me wasn’t even the story.
It was what came after.
He mentioned how his wife had never complained about gifts before.
They've been married for 20 years...
and she just took whatever he gave her.
Even the ones she didn’t really like.
But now… she wanted to return the shoes.
She found them gaudy.
And somewhere in the middle of telling that story,
he shared how he had said something along the line of...
“I know some women who would…”
And he didn’t have to finish it.
The whole room reacted.
Because we all knew how that would have played out.
Comparison.
Scorekeeping.
I noodled on the scorekeeping part for a little bit.
We don’t keep a scoreboard when things are good.
We keep it when something feels off.
When expectations are unmet.
When reactions don’t match effort.
When something we did doesn’t get the response we hoped for.
That’s when the tally starts.
“I did this…”
“You didn’t do that…”
“I always…”
“You never…”
Sometimes we don't even say it out loud...
we internalize it.
The Bible says CATEGORICALLY in 1 Corinthians 13:5 that love “keeps no record of wrongs.”
Not because things don’t happen.
But because love refuses to turn moments into measurements.
Because the moment you start keeping score…
you stop relating.
You start calculating.
And here’s the thing about scoreboards.
They are rarely accurate.
They don’t capture context.
They don’t reflect intention.
They don’t account for what the other person is carrying that you may not see.
They just count.
And counting without understanding
will always lead to distortion.
In that moment, it wasn’t just about the shoes.
It was about expectation.
“I did something big…
so I expected something back.”
And when that exchange didn’t happen,
the scoreboard quietly updated.
But marriage is not meant to be transactional.
Not effort for reaction.
Not giving for applause.
Not love measured by response.
Because if we’re honest…
sometimes the scoreboard is not about fairness.
It’s about validation.
Wanting to feel seen.
Wanting to feel appreciated.
Wanting to feel like what you did mattered.
And those desires are real.
But when they are left unchecked,
they turn into silent accounting systems.
It really got me thinking.
What scoreboard am I keeping in my marriage?
What moments have I counted…
instead of understanding?
What expectations have I held…
without expressing?
What comparisons have I made…
without realizing it’s shaping how I see my spouse?
Because the danger is not just in keeping score.
It’s in letting those scores define how you respond.
How you speak.
How you show up.
How you love.
And slowly, without meaning to…
you stop giving freely.
You start giving carefully.
Romans 12:10 says,
“Be devoted to one another in love. Honor one another above yourselves.”
Honor doesn’t keep score.
It gives.
Not blindly.
But generously.
Maybe I don't have to pretend the scoreboard doesn’t exist.
Maybe I just have to choose not to consult it.
Choose to reset it.
Choose to relate… instead of calculate.
Because the strongest marriages are not the ones where everything is perfectly balanced.
They are the ones where love is not constantly being measured.
So again…
What scoreboard am I keeping?
And more importantly…
am I ready to let it go?
👣 Be Better. 💛 Love Better. 🙌🏾 Do Better. 💍Marriage Works.
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