oh how He loves us :: #SheSharesTruth

What do you think of when you hear the word “marriage”? I think of Ben (of course), I think of my amazing parents, who modeled what a Godly marriage is. I think of our amazing friends who have shown us grace through our first nine years of this chapter. And probably more than anything, I think of Christ and the church.
Ben and I celebrated our 9th wedding anniversary last week. The beginning of the week was great. We celebrated a few days early and my parents kept the kids overnight for us. We reminisced memories that have happened to us thus far, both the good and the bad. A friend of ours even made us a “Happy Anniversary” cake for church Wednesday night. But then, life happened, and some events came to light, and there was pain and emotion and a roller coaster of thoughts. All of a sudden, the beginning of the week seemed like years away. There was forgiveness that needed to happen, grace needed to abound, and love needed to transpire everything.

The #SheReadsTruth community has been doing a study on the book of Hosea for the past couple of weeks. When I found out that Hosea was the next study, I was very excited and anxious to get started. Hosea starts off rough. The Lord is not pleased with Israel and how they are not listening to anything He is asking of them. But, what they don’t realize is that all He is asking them to do is to come back to Him. When we follow Christ with all that we are, and want grace to abound in every area of our life, things fall into place. The sad thing is, is that we are just like the Israelites. I fail every.single.day. All of my friends, my husband, my parents, everyone fails every single day. However, Jesus doesn’t fail. Even in my weakest moment, Christ always is waiting.
Hosea 14 says

I will heal their apostasy; I will love them freely, for my anger has turned from them. I will be like the dew to Israel; he shall blossom like the lily; he shall take root like the trees of Lebanon; his shoots shall spread out; his beauty shall be like the olive, and his fragrance like Lebanon. They shall return and dwell beneath my shadow; they shall flourish like the grain; they shall blossom like the vine; their fame shall be like the wine of Lebanon. (‭Hosea‬ ‭14‬:‭4-7‬ ESV)

I am more than thankful that He still is waiting for me. That He is longing for me. I pray that we do this for each other as we become more like Him.

7 years

the mister and i shared our anniversary yesterday of 7 years. 7 years seems like so little time to so many people, but i’ll say it as my mom did last night “7 years. whew! doesn’t seem like that long!” i was so thankful to hear those words. it seems as though we have been together forever, and at the same time, i can’t wait to see what comes our way for the rest of our life!

ben and i have a lot of amazing conversations. some are about dumb and dumber or other silly things, and some are about life, and why we do what we do. we are destined to be selfish people. i don’t know anyone who is totally unselfish. i know a lot of people that come close, but we realized at dinner last night that our selfishness or unselfishness is all part of being married. that’s what love is. love is not conditional. we can’t ask our spouse to love us only a certain way. sometimes it’s good for us to tell them what we like or need, but we have to know that that is not always the way that our spouse will choose to show us love.

and we love them through that.

i’m no expert on marriage, but one thing i’m very thankful for is the way my discipleship has grown since meeting ben. ben could tell me something, and i would believe it. if someone else told me something, i’d take it or leave it, or have to figure it out on my own. marriage is a picture of what Christ has done for us. we daily die to ourselves in marriage. it might not be huge, but it does have to happen on both sides of a marriage. Christ died for us on the cross. the least i could do is die to myself in marriage, or any other relationship that comes my way. scripture says “⁷ Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God.⁸ Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love.” (1 john 4:7-8)

when i think about love like this, it makes me want to love more.

i love you, ben williams. here’s to the rest of our life together.

on our honeymoon in new hampshire

at the beach, 3 weeks ago