Love....

Early on in my relationship with Dustin I read a book titled Sacred Marriage.  The premise of the book is the idea of what if God designed marriage to make us more holy than happy.  I found it an interesting concept and after reading it decided to try to implement it in my approach to my relationship with Dustin.  It was a totally foreign concept when compared to the way I had at one time devoured fairy tales and romance novels in an attempt to find the "meaning of true love".  I will say that I believe reading that book was one of the best things I could have done for our relationship.  It made me take a more balanced approach to dating with the goal of marriage.  It made me plan more long term and not focus so much on the instant gratification of the moment or on what I felt at the moment.  I find in many ways it has made a huge difference in me.  It's easy to fall into the trap sometimes of thinking I've waited 32 years for this. I deserve ____ (insert what I'm wanting from Dustin at the moment).  However when you start to focus on marriage or the relationship being about what God is using this other person that you have joined or are getting ready to join your life with to teach you it somehow changes things.  There's part of me at times that wonders exactly what it looks like after marriage because it already feels like I'm learning so many things about myself, but then God throws in the twister of letting me understand more about him through some things that happen with Dustin.  This weekend was a case in point.  I've developed a tendency over my life of holding things inside, through counseling I've learned to process through them, but I find that there are times when I still pull into myself to do that processing.  I'm not completely for sure why I've developed that rather interesting coping mechanism, but Dustin and I both are learning about that particular quirk of mine and how best to deal with it.  I learned something very interesting through it this weekend though.  I have to say that Dustin is good about letting me work through whatever it is I'm dealing with and supporting me as I do it even if it means I'm not quite ready to talk it out yet.  This weekend as I waded through the mess of emotions surrounding me the pulling into myself had a different effect than it's had in the past.  I found myself feeling incredibly lonely.  Here I was even with Dustin present during parts of it, but feeling isolated.  In the middle of it all I did find myself asking God exactly what it was I was suppose be learning in this.  It's taken me a couple of days, but I find myself looking back over the experience feeling that with the combined experience of Dustin and myself I have a visual of how it really should feel to us when we are experiencing distance and separation from God.  Now I by no means am implying that Dustin and I are some super spiritual couple, but this weekend was an amazing experience even in the middle of the sadness and loneliness that I was experiencing.  I mean the reality is that I knew all along that Dustin was there wanting to help me, wanting to offer his support and love, but for a period for whatever reason that I really don't understand even now I couldn't let him.  I'm not sure if I thought I had to get the answer myself or maybe it was I felt I couldn't bother him with something so trivial, but the truth...  He wanted me to bother him.  He wanted to be there for me even if he couldn't fix it he wanted to experience it with me.  It makes me see a little differently the idea of how it looks when we act like God doesn't need to be bothered with things from us.  It's like having a comparison of what it's like when we pull away from God to try to deal with things on our own.  He's sitting there waiting patiently, asking us occasionally are you ready to let me help yet (yes, Dustin asked multiple times if I was ready to tell him what the problem was).  There was something this time in seeing the look on Dustin's face each time I couldn't bring myself to share what it was that was bothering me when he asked that has me right now as I write this crying for a couple of reasons.  I realize in a relationship perspective that it hurt Dustin in a way each time I couldn't bring myself to share, but even more is the thought that the look I could see on Dustin's face is nothing compared to the agony it causes God when I try to push through every day life without him.  The moments when I push him away like a 4 year old saying "No!  I can do it myself!"  The interesting thing I found out after I finally was able to open up and start to process with Dustin rather than internalizing everything was the view that Dustin's perspective adds to complete the pictures.  His very simple response that made me pause was that he didn't like the feeling of separation and distance.  It sounds so simple, but it's so profound!  That's exactly how God feels when we push him away and don't allow him to be a part of our every day existence!  I know that the love that Dustin and I share is nothing compared to the love that God has for each and every one of us individually so if this is how Dustin and I experience this one moment in time how much more does God experience that distance and separation on such a large scale?  And He still doesn't leave us on our own!  It's pretty incredible!  I still feel like I've only scratched the surface on the magnitude of the realization from this weekend, but even that little tiny piece that has me understanding God just a little differently makes me so grateful that He has given me Dustin to learn these lessons a little better!  

Fun moments...

 

 

 

Just so no one thinks I never get to have any fun in the middle of wedding planning I thought I'd share my favorite picture from the bridal shower some of my family threw for me last weekend.  I have to say it was a fun and festive shower (with some really cool presents).  In keeping with the 50's vibe we are trying to capture with pieces of our wedding the decorations were really fun and cool with a very retro feel.  It was a really fun day which ended in a fun if impromptu pizzia party with some of my dad's family at a local pizzeria.  I think my favorite part of the day though had to be when at my mom's suggestion the game where it was required to make a wedding dress out of toilet paper the models became the 4 little girls at the shower.  It was cool in several ways.  The different pieces of my life were represented in the picture you see above. 

Chloe, the little girl on the far left is the daughter of one of my childhood friends (ok, I'll even confess one of my crushes in  grade school) next to her is Dustin's niece, Shae.  On the other side of me, my families are represented as Breanna, the little girl right next to me is my cousin's daughter on my mom's side (I'm never good with the first and second cousin thing, so feel free to figure that out yourself) and last, but not least is Mary, one of my younger cousins on my dad's side.  It was kind of neat when I realized that I'm kind of in the middle of these little brides that represent the pieces of my life coming together which happened at my shower.  Friends and family came together representing so many pieces of time and relationships that have led to this moment I'm preparing for.  Kind of a cool way to sum up an entire bridal shower in one picture isn't it?

Lessons Learned....

I love it when I have that sort of "Ah ha" moment.  The moment when some things that I didn't quite get fall into place.  A few weeks ago I was asked to lead worship at church while our associate pastor was away.  Today was the day that happened.  Now it might seem a bit strange that on a blog regarding my bride-to-be status and wedding that I rather randomly throw in this, but this has been a pretty amazing experience.  You see...  When I went to church to meet Dustin over a year and a half ago I had no idea the events that God was setting in place.  In some ways meeting Dustin was this entirely new beginning to my life.  There were things that happened and people that had become a huge part of my life prior to that, but somehow God used Dustin as this catalyst to take all of those moments that had happened over the course of my life and make them start to come together to make sense.  Somehow from the moment I stepped into a church for the sole purpose of meeting this friend of a friend my life changed.  In other posts I've mentioned the impact of that first message from the man that would become my pastor that day.  I've mentioned Kirby and Jaimy and just a few of the lessons God has taught me through them.  Today I find myself thinking about the impact that our associate pastor has had on me.  Jeremy was one of those people that when I first started going to Mooresville Church of God that because of the nature of his involvement in and surrounding the service I really didn't interact with a lot in that first month or so.  The interesting thing about my "big brother" Kirby is that you don't stay uninvolved when you adopt him as a brother and the church needs choir members for Easter....  Yes, I was volunteered...  A month and a half of attending church and I found myself in the choir for Easter.  That was how God brought Jeremy into my life in a totally different way.  Choir involvement led to filling in over the summer on the worship team which ended up turning into long term involvement in the worship team.  I think it's amazing how God brings people into your life at just the moment you need that relationship to develop so it's at the exact place it needs to be for a certain moment of time.  Somehow the last couple of weeks have made me realize exactly how much Jeremy has affected my life in this subtle way that I hadn't totally realized.  In tackling the challenge of leading worship something that in all honesty scared me to death at times and having come through it with the realization that it wasn't perfect, sure I could stand to build some confidence where leading is concerned, but with Jeremy's help, encouragement and faith in me and most definitely a large dose of God's intervention I did something that even a year ago I would never have been able to even think about taking on without having a full blown panic attack.  You see I love music.  I love to sing, play and listen.  I love the moments when music makes me feel close to God on some level.  I also have a tendency to fear failure.  To worry about the fact that I might hit a wrong note or mess up the word to a song and then (in my mind at least) that's the only thing anyone is going to remember.  I will have looked bad and failed.  Those are the fears I have struggled with.  In some way that I'm not sure I even understand completely God has used Jeremy in a nearly indiscernible way at times to teach me ways to deal with and turn those fears over to God.  Through Jeremy I've learned how to worship God in song.  I've truly learned that God doesn't want us to act like we're sucking sour pickles while singing Holy, Holy, Holy or How Great is Our God.  He wants us to experience his Spirit in our song.  Now believe it or not I truly do feel that these lessons I've learned from Jeremy do blend with the overall theme of my blog.  You see, these subtle lessons that God has been teaching me through Jeremy help me discover and learn more about who God wants me to be.  There is truly no way to describe the freedom I felt today after the church service was complete.  The best way I can describe it is that there was a sense of victory in being able to walk away and realize it wasn't perfect, I need some practice, but with God's help I did something that I never dreamed I could do.  I was able to give my fear and apprehension to God for him to show me exactly what He's capable of doing in my life if I will let him use me.  He will give me the courage to face the fears I have and in taking the first of many steps in learning that lesson it impacts my relationship with Dustin.  My life isn't divided into separate compartments.  What I do in one area impacts all of the areas of my life so when I can learn a lesson in worship from Jeremy, directly or indirectly it impacts my relationship with Dustin.  It's a pretty amazing thing when you think about it! 

And in the Middle of Planning a Wedding....

So it's been a while since I've posted, but it's been crazy!  Of course we've managed to get a lot of things accomplished and it feels like things are starting to come together and it feels like we have a solid direction.  It's kind of nice getting so many big things out of the way early on.  It's nice to get to relax in regards to the wedding arrangements.  I think God must realize once in a while that need a distraction in another area.  The last couple of weeks that has come in the form of God pushing me out of my comfort zone.  It's funny that for all of my intense focus on wedding planning when I was asked to undertake something new at church all of the sudden wedding planning took back seat to this new thing to undertake.  I'm not entirely sure what I'm suppose to get out of that change in events that shifted my focus.  I mean it hasn't entirely distracted me.  I still had this excitement like a little kid on Christmas morning when it came to opening the box my unity cross was in and of course Dustin and myself had to put it together right away to see what it looked like.  I've still taken an interest in cake testing, gathering information on flowers and the other little things that need to be handled, but maybe the piece I'm suppose to be learning right now is to not become overly obsessed with the details.  To not pour my entire energy into one thing, but to keep a healthy balance.  I'm still working on what the particular lesson is, but I'm sure I'll figure it out eventuatlly!