25 Years and Counting

4 weeks ago today, David and I celebrated our 25th anniversary. I know it’s cliché, but honestly, time has simply flown by. I was 29 when we got married (go ahead, do the math. I’ll wait.) I wasn’t a spring chicken, but that just meant I brought more maturity into the relationship, right?

We’ve come a long way on this journey, and we still have a long way to go, Lord willing, but here are some things I’ve learned along that journey.

You can run, but you cannot hide. Well, yes, you can hide, but then you won’t be known, nor will you know anyone fully. Hiding might make you feel better for awhile, but eventually you’ll need to come out of your shell. Coming out of hiding does make you vulnerable, and it’s not comfortable, but it’s so worth it to know that somebody knows you well. And loves you just the same.

You might not always know where you’re going, but if you’re walking together, you’re not lost.

We didn’t know when we got married that David would be diagnosed with a chronic illness. We didn’t know that we would struggle to have children. We didn’t know that we would suffer 3 miscarriages before and between our 3 beautiful kids.We didn’t know I would lose both of my parents within a year a half of each other. We didn’t know that David’s parents would divorce after 48 years of marriage. We didn’t know we’d need counseling to get our marriage back on the right path. But we walked it together. And that made all the difference.

The enemy of our souls doesn’t want us to succeed. When we attended a marriage conference after about a year of marriage, we heard a life-changing truth: your spouse is not your enemy. Seems simple enough, doesn’t it? But how often do we blame our spouse for our troubles, or take our frustration out on them, or think that they purposely do something to hurt or annoy us? David is not my enemy. In fact, he’s my greatest ally. It’s Satan who seeks to kill, steal and destroy. And he’s always looking for opportunity to do so. Don’t give him any ground.

Sometimes the directional signals are hard to find, but they’re always there. When life is just going along—you’re raising kids, working your job, living your life—it’s easy to forget to keep asking the Pathmaker where He wants you to go next. I recently was asked to step down from a position that I had filled for many years. It came as a surprise and wrecked me for awhile, but as I was thinking it through, it occurred to me that I had never once stopped to ask the Lord if He still wanted me to do what I was doing. I thought it was a foregone conclusion because I was good at what I did. But stopping to look around and find those arrows that will point us in the right direction is vital to not being taken aback when something happens to our neat little life. David and I have experienced a few of those changes in direction in our 25 years, but we always acknowledge that God is the one laying out the path before us.

December 25, 1991, year 1

December 23, 2015, year 25

photographs taken in the Chuluota Wilderness Area, Chuluota, Fla.

3 Things I Learned On The Day I Got Engaged

Today is the 25th anniversary of the day my husband asked me to marry him.

As I reflect on that day, there are a few things that I might not have realized then, but that I’ve come to see as truths over the last 25 years.

1. Though I always wanted to have someone to love me best, little did I fully know that I already did. Though we loved each other and were excited about embarking on this new adventure, if David and I had any notion that we were the answer to each other’s emotional needs, we were going to be sadly disappointed. David is not the answer to that dream I had of having someone always know where I was and love me more than anyone else, though he does those things (except the knowing where I am part. Sometimes he forgets). Jesus already did that. I know, I know, He doesn’t play favorites, but the fact of the matter is, if I was the only one in need of salvation, He still would have died for me. That’s pretty spectacular.

2. That day was the beginning of a lifelong learning process. I’ve had friends who have struggled with the question: How can I be sure? I would venture to say that it’s not a matter of knowing that your marriage will be all wine and roses, but knowing that this person is someone you’re going to make the choice to stay with and love and support for the rest of your life. I’ve been married 24+ years, and there are still things I’m learning about my husband. And he’s not the same man I married, so I have to grow and learn and change right along with him. Thank God we’re not the same. How sad would that be, to not have grown and changed after 24 years?

3. Getting to be with my best friend every day is the best thing ever. We can look at each other now and see the gray in our hair and the extra pounds which we have to work really hard to keep off. We can look at our 3 kids and know that some day, it will be down to just the 2 of us again (and probably still a multitude of small animals, if he keeps agreeing to me having them) because time keeps marching on. But we still love to do things together. We still have to tell each other we’re sorry and to ask forgiveness. We still have to date and play and laugh together. And we still have to choose every single day to say yes, I’d marry you all over again.

Happy engagement anniversary, Hunny! Thanks for proposing 25 years ago.

You might enjoy previous posts I’ve written on this day last year and the year before.