spanish for "life".
It's been almost two months since the wedding day, and I'd say that we're both loving married life. We make dinner together every night, play lots of Monopoly Deal, read Harry Potter out loud to each other, decorate our new apartment, and now are starting up a blog together. We have game nights with friends, go on moto rides together, hang out and just talk. Being married is lots of fun if you ask me.
(on a hot air balloon ride on our honeymoon!)
Of course, there are some challenges. After all, two becoming one isn't the easiest thing to do. There have been a few disagreements and learning moments in the past seven weeks. All those little details of your life, all of a sudden, have to combine with someone else's details. It gets a little messy sometimes.
Frederick Buechner has a few things to say about this. Buechner is my favorite author, hands down. He is a theologian who writes beautifully about God and the every day world. He writes the following about marriage:
"They say they will love, comfort, honor each other to the end of their days. They say they will cherish each other and be faithful to each other always. They say they will do these things not just when they feel like it, but even- for better for worse, for richer for poorer, in sickness and in health- when they don't feel like it at all. In other words, the vows they make at a marriage could hardly be more extravagant. They give away their freedom. They take on themselves each other's burdens. They bind their lives together in ways that are even more painful to unbind emotionally, humanly, than they are to unbind legally.... They both still have their lives apart as well as a life together. They both still have their separate ways to find. But a marriage made in heaven is one where a man and a woman become more richly themselves together than the chances are either of them could ever have managed to become alone. When Jesus changed the water into wine at the wedding in Cana, perhaps it was a way of saying more or less the same thing."
- Frederick Buechner in Beyond Words, "Marriage"
Life together. Every day I am learning more and more what this looks like. Two months ago I made these promises to this incredible man; I gave him my life, my freedom; I vowed to take on his burdens. But I love that, through it all, I am becoming more myself. I can feel it. I am a better person because of Brad. I feel more confident, more beautiful, better at my job, and so much more.
In the same way, years ago, both Brad and I gave our life to another Someone. And our lives haven't been the same since. While we love our jobs and where we live, we wouldn't be here unless we had given up our lives, our freedoms, and traded them in for something better: Jesus. Because of Him, we are becoming more and more ourselves every day. It's this amazing process of life and love. It can get messy, but it's worth it. Like He says, "Whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for Me will find it" (Matthew 16.25).
Keep checking back to this blog for more stories about our life and about our love for each other, for the country of the Dominican Republic, for the students we serve, for our friends and family, but mostly for our great God who is at the center of all life and who is Love.
(written by Emily)
