Eight and a Half Years In...

I was disillusioned by what i thought love, marriage, sex was all about. And was lost, mad, hurt, angry, continue with the descriptive words, when i thought it had been missed or lost or taken away by our circumstances or whatever 'it' was that was keeping us from what i thought all this was supposed to look like.

I kept trying. I kept pushing. I kept forcing. I kept seeking. I kept controlling. I kept waiting to be loved. I was waiting for Matt to fulfill me, to be the movie star husband in the Oscar winning roll to hold me right, say it right, do it all right, so i could respond...right. And then I'd know how to be happy. I was seeking an illusion.

One of the biggest differences in how God paints marriage and how our culture paints it, is this: culture says marriage is to make us happy, God says its to make us holy. Our culture wants us to believe a healthy marriage consists of toe curling sex, every night, or maybe more...blissful walks in fields of flowers, maybe a dark cloud here or there that the happy couple grasps each other's hand and blink through and its over. That doesn't exist, and Matt is not capable of making me happy like that. He is only human. And I finally decided(not on my own, of course, God had to yell and hold up flashing signs) there is nothing I can do to guarantee a fulfilling marriage with my husband...
besides choosing to follow God's will for my marriage.

God said, "Do you love me? Then follow..."

And i did...often failing, i set out to honor Matt, even when he hadn't earned it. Is that how i can be more like Jesus? Isn't that the point here? I get so much from God--unearned. Learning to give to Matt in that way honors him and honors God. I glorify my savior when i submit to my husband. Ha---submit---after trying for so long to do everything but submit...inadvertently, of course.

At first, i thought it would leave me empty. I thought I wouldn't be getting anything from him, and i'll just be left. I thought, you know, the honoring God part would be good adn all, maybe He'll show me how to be happy honoring Matt, but i'd just be left...a doormat...but i was willing...without any promises from God of how i'd feel or what i'd get in return.

But something rather amazing has happened(shocking, i know), and I'm only now aware enough to begin putting it into words. When i stopped waiting for Matt to go first, when i stopped using a checklist to tell me when it was 'right' and i could be happy only after each item had been checked off(those items coming from a culture that told me what a marriage should consist of to elicit happiness), I found God filling me up with something so much better than fleeting, contrived happiness. I'm finding unspeakable peace. There's lasting joy and satisfaction in my far from perfect marriage that God wants to perfect.

I'm taking the burden off Matt to meet my unattainable goal to be fulfilled by another human being, and that doesn't leave me empty or unhappy, but freer and happier than ever. I'm not waiting for my feeling to lead me to love him, i decide to love him. and the feelings...they do come...overwhelmingly.

And it's all GOD. Spouses putting each other first isn't all it takes to heal a marriage. It's God, every single day.

Scandalous Love, Scandalous Night

By entering through faith into what God has always wanted to do for us—set us right with Him, make us fit for Him—we have it all together with God because of our Master Jesus. And that's not all: We throw open our doors to God and discover at the same moment that He has already thrown open his door to us. We find ourselves standing where we always hoped we might stand—out in the wide open spaces of God's grace and glory, standing tall and shouting our praise.

There's more to come: We continue to shout our praise even when we're hemmed in with troubles, because we know how troubles can develop passionate patience in us, and how that patience in turn forges the tempered steel of virtue, keeping us alert for whatever God will do next. In alert expectancy such as this, we're never left feeling shortchanged. Quite the contrary—we can't round up enough containers to hold everything God generously pours into our lives through the Holy Spirit!Christ arrives right on time to make this happen. He didn't, and doesn't, wait for us to get ready. He presented himself for this sacrificial death when we were far too weak and rebellious to do anything to get ourselves ready. And even if we hadn't been so weak, we wouldn't have known what to do anyway. We can understand someone dying for a person worth dying for, and we can understand how someone good and noble could inspire us to selfless sacrifice. But God put his love on the line for us by offering His Son in sacrificial death while we were of no use whatever to Him.

Romans 5:1-8 (The Message)


At the wonderful tragic mysterious tree
On that beautiful scandalous night, You and me
Were atoned by His blood
Forever washed white
On that beautiful scandalous night

Oh, Boy

I'm a bad blogger. Yes, I know. And because there's far too much substance and depth to the things in my brain, i bring forth a true tale today as related to me by my sister-in-law, LeeAnn. She is known in the fam as Aunt Nize, shortened from her childhood nickname of Futon Nizey. Don't ask me...these people i married into are some strange, strange folks, indeed. It seems my son took on a good bit of the genes. Let the tale commence:

As my dear sweet offspring was to be attempting sleep yesterday afternoon, Aunt Nize had already been in to check on him to see what ruckus was abounding, as it was not sleep. He was playing with a mountain of toy cars that he'd taken with him to bed. She advised him that his cars needed to sleep also, and had taken them out of his crib and placed them in their own 'bed' so that they may get their own version of much needed car 'beauty rest'. That's important, you know. She rocked him, had him pretty much out, placed him gingerly back in to sleep and covered his little body, and he sprang back to life. Apparently covering him with the 'big, 'ol covers' wakes him up. So she left him alone to hopefully find sleep on his own.

As Nehem is alone in his bed, it is common to hear many entertaining sounds through the monitor in his room. Aunt Nize is well versed in the trappings of my two year old, and went about her business, keeping an ear out for any odd sounds. Many days you can hear interesting conversations, fine singing, and he also uses this time to perfect language and other things that he doesn't want to do in front of others. On this particular afternoon she began hearing, "thump, thud, bump." It appeared that he was throwing stuff out of his bed. That's all good and well, sometimes he thinks he's 'cleaning' his bed.

Suddenly, there came a decidedly electric "whirrrrrrrrrr," from the room. That would not be in the normal category, so upon investigation she discovered that my dear son had systematically pulled a vacuum cleaner that had been sitting by his crib around to the front, and thrown stuff out of his crib to trigger the power button that one usually pushes with his foot to trip. Yes. He did this all by himself. She came into the room and he was vacuuming the floor through his crib bars, and he said, "What is it?"

I know there is a reason he's still in a crib. I should thank God right now he has not learned to exit the crib. Yet.