Concluding our story……
(If you haven’t joined in this week,
please go back from the beginning and see just how good my God is!)
So now we are about 11 years into our
marriage and I was thoroughly enjoying my time as a stay-at-home mom. But when
Callie was two and Ben entered school at WCA, I began work at our church preschool
to help out with expenses. What a blessing that was! I fell in love with all
those sweet students and my coworkers. Callie was in preschool with me and Ben
was in 1st grade. It really seemed as though things were finally
falling into place. But as a couple of years went by, Matt’s company was
struggling to keep the doors open and we knew he needed to find work. We put
our house up for sale, Matt began searching, and within 3 weeks our house sold
and Matt began a new job. Wow! Things don’t usually work that quickly for us!
Lol! Matt’s new job would take him to Lakeland, FL, for about a year and then
from there we didn’t know where it would lead. There again, we found ourselves
at a crossroads of what God would have us to do. We made plans to stay put here
in Wilmington and see Matt on the weekends but after flying down there to help
him find an apartment, God made it clear to us that we should not live apart
for a year. So, when God speaks, we listen and obey! I loaded up Ben and Callie
and moved to Lakeland, FL, into a one-bedroom apartment and began
homeschooling. Wow! That was an intense but beautiful time for us as a family.
Ben and Callie shared the one bedroom and Matt and I would blow up an air
mattress every night, roll the couch out of the way, and sleep on the living
room floor. It wasn’t exactly glamorous, but it was home because we were all
under one roof. Just as God intended! One of the perks of living in Lakeland,
FL, was season tickets to Disney World and we got to visit quite often. We are
BIG Disney fans!!
So, there we were in a one-bedroom
apartment enjoying life as a family of four and then God began to
move…..again….
It was during that time that God
began working on our hearts about adoption. Nothing about that made sense at
the time. It was expensive, we were comfortable with our two children, and we
didn’t even know where we would end up after Florida.
Well, there again, when God calls you
to something, He will see you through it. God had already begun putting the
details together and this was a true test of our faith and trust in him. Matt’s job
moved us back to Wilmington in December of 2005 and the adoption process began.
I was able to go back to work at the preschool and we were enjoying the total
dependence on God through it all. God put a love in my heart for a child I
didn’t even know yet and it was clear we had to move forward to bring our child
home.
(I will not go into all the details
of our adoption here, but you can read that journey at the link below)
All the way around the world in a
town called Guangzhou, China, we welcomed our precious Caleb into our hearts on
May 9, 2007! It was absolutely beautiful and God continues to amaze us with his
love and grace today through that experience! Now we are a family of five!
These last few years of our marriage,
God has taken us through some other challenges when I had some health
difficulties, but each and every hardship that has come up in our marriage, God
has been faithful. Did you get that, GOD HAS BEEN FAITHFUL! There have been
tough times, but the blessing is that God has been there every step of the way and
made something beautiful out of each mess!
What we have discovered is that God
desires us to be holy more than happy. When we seek holiness from his perfect
will, there is a joy unspeakable.
When you are down on your face and
have nowhere else to look but up, you see his grace and mercy in ways that
bring peace and healing. I can look back over our 22 years of marriage and,
yes, I see those difficult times, but more than that now, I see the beauty that
God brought from it. I see how much more Matt and I have fallen in love. I see
the deep faith it has instilled in our marriage and family. I see the
incredible strength God gave us and continues to give us. Most importantly, I
see the love of a Father on his precious children and how that deep love
changed our lives!
I have fallen in love with my husband
deeper than I ever thought possible over these last 22 years. When I said, “I
do”, I never thought I could love him more than at that moment but God has
shown me differently. The love grew and took shape into something deeper, more
meaningful, just like the love for my God. I cannot begin to explain how much I
love my Jesus on this blog. When I hear his name, my heart is full! I long to
spend time immersed in his Word and at his feet in prayer. He is my Lord, my
Savior, my Redeemer, and I am so in love with him!
Throughout this week, I have shared a
brief part of our married life together. This may have been more information
than you cared to have heard, but there is so much more than can’t fit onto
these pages. Most of these treasured moments are written on the delicate places
of my heart and will remain. Our lives are rich and full of love. Our marriage
is not perfect but it is OURS! We work hard at it. We show each other grace and
forgiveness and we know that through every day as our relationship with God
grows, so will our relationship with each other. It’s all about HIM!
That is the secret to a great
marriage….God! If you do marriage any other way you will miss out on all the
benefits that God makes available to you. God designed marriage and we will
continue to give HIM his rightful place in ours. I pray you will do the same in
yours.
Thanks for taking the journey with me!
I wish I could have sat across the table from you at the coffee house and
shared this story because there is just so much that God has done in my life
through this blessing of marriage. But I am grateful you joined me here.
Tomorrow is the “big” day! 22 years! Hallelujah!
Thanks for sharing my memories and allowing me to take up some of your day as I
rambled on about my marriage. Lol! I pray, in some way, that you have been
blessed! I know I have!
God is so faithful and he continues
to amaze me every day! To HIM be ALL glory!
“Hear, O Israel: The
Lord our God, the Lord is one. Love the Lord your God with all your heart and
with all your soul and with all your strength. These commandments that I give
you today are to be on your hearts. Impress them on your children. Talk about
them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and
when you get up. Tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your
foreheads. Write them on the doorframes of your houses and on your gates.”
Deuteronomy 6:4-9 (NIV)
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