What it Means to Be Our Husband's Crown, Whether You're Married or Not

When my husband and I were first married, I spent the first few weeks of my time as a new wife searching the Bible for instruction and examples about how to fulfill this new role of mine. How did God envision it? What was expected of me? How did other godly women live this calling out?

At one point, I remember coming across the verse, Proverbs 12:4 “A wife of noble character is her husband's crown, but a disgraceful wife is like decay in his bones.”

I started thinking about this image, of a wife as a crown for her husband.

Who wears a crown? Someone of royalty or great stature—likely a prince or a king. Yet, how do you know that he has that high position? By the crown he wears on his head. Without the shiny, gem-studded crown, he would just be seen as an ordinary man. But it is the crown that shows off his true position, the truth about who he is.

I saw in that simple picture how a wife has the opportunity to show the world the truth about who her husband is. By her behavior, she can showcase whether he is just an ordinary man or whether he is one who stands above the rest and is worthy of respect. In this way, our actions as wives affect more than just ourselves; they directly reflect our husbands, as well, even if they had nothing to do with the action in question.

And when we choose to wield it wisely—conducting ourselves with “noble character”—a wife becomes a crown that her husband can wear proudly. It is not a plastic toy that a child would wear, but a real treasure that makes him walk taller.

It’s a truth that is really quite powerful. It can be something of great opportunity—to shine for the sake of our spouse, or it can be one that begets misery, bestowing instead disgrace. The difference depends completely on how we treasure this truth.

Recently, I was recalling this mental image and I realized that it doesn’t just end there, between a wife and her husband. The Bible is rich with the allusion that an earthly marriage is merely a reflection or a preparation for the eternal union that will bring us together with Jesus. He constantly touts himself as bridegroom and us as his bride.

So just as we can be a crown for our earthly husbands through our actions, so can we be a crown for our eternal husband, too, in the way we act. Our behaviors—especially that of serving—should showcase the greatness of the husbands we so dearly love, both the one we share a name with now but also the One who awaits us in the life to come.

This article first appeared on iBelieve, on December 26, 2012.

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Happy Father's Day: A Post for My Husband

It’s my first Father’s Day married to a father.

Mother’s Day was only a month ago, and yet everything still seemed too new to even spend more than half a minute ruminating over the significance of the day. There was still a baby to be held, diapers changed, and food to be made.

But now, just a month later, Father’s Day is completely different. I can sit here and look back over these past three months that have made my husband and I into parents, into mothers and fathers.

When my husband and I first started dating, I remember our first real conversation. It was on the phone while I was driving back from visiting my best friend an hour-and-a-half away. We talked that whole drive, and then more and more as I sat in my driveway, not wanting to hang up or let that conversation slip away. When we finally did hang up—after talking about life and love and hopes and dreams—I remember thinking clearly: That man is going to make for an incredible father.

I am fortunate enough to say, five years later, that I could not have been more right.

From the moment Claire was born, my husband was a natural at this parenting gig—even in spite of how difficult she proved to be. It was he who had the patience to get her to sleep and the calm to get her to stop crying. He changed so many diapers that it felt like weeks before I ever took over the task. From day one, he was a Daddy and took to the task without hesitation, cuddling our daughter, fawning over her, pouring love all over her.

And in the midst of all that, he also took care of me. Because as I’ve mentioned before, I was something of a wreck during those early days of motherhood, when the sound of Claire's cries ripped and shred my soul to pieces. It’s unlike anything I’ve ever experienced but her stress stresses me, her misery makes me miserable, her cries bring me to tears. And so, I suffered alongside her as she tried to acclimate to this big, bad world of ours.

Yet my husband was there for me, a constant source of encouragement to me. There’s a post-it note he put on the inside of our bedroom door reminding me, “Cast all your anxiety on him, because he cares for you.” (1 Peter 5:7). He encouraged me day after day, held me when I cried, comforted me when I couldn’t shake the feeling that I was a terrible mom because all she did was cry.

He was my stronghold during those dark days, always pointing me back to the Lord and reminding me of His goodness and faithfulness. He truly was the hands and feet of Jesus to me and Claire both during those days. He showed us God when both of us were too exhausted to look for Him ourselves.

And so, on this first Father’s Day, I wish to tell this handsome man of mine: Thank you. I love you. I am the luckiest wife in the world, and our daughter is the luckiest girl in the world. Happy Father’s Day!

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My Secret to a Happy Marriage and More...

While I've been on maternity leave, I've been sharing a bunch of guest posts from some lovely readers and contributors. (Many thanks again to all of you who have volunteered your stories!)

I'll be back to regular posting next week!

But until then, I thought it was a fitting time to share a guest post of my own that I recently did on the blog Ever After Blueprint. Andrea interviewed me about my marriage (which you all know I've detailed in-depth in my Secrets of a Newlywed series, which provides a look at some of the most important lessons I've learned through my first years as a wife, as well as my Our Love Story series, which details how my husband and I met).

Here's a sneak peek at that a couple of questions I answered in that interview:

What was one of your biggest challenges the first few months of marriage?
While there were quite a few challenges, I would say that for me, personally, many of them boiled down to having to let go of my selfishness as well as learning to truly trust my husband and his love for me. In that last regard, it took me awhile to realize how sincerely he did love me and how he really was willing to put me before himself. I knew the Bible called for that, but I don't think I actually expected that. What a pleasant surprise! When I finally let down my guard and trusted that, even if he does hurt my feelings, it always was from a place of love, our marriage became much easier, richer and lovelier.

What have you learned since you’ve been married?
I've learned a lot! So much so that I wrote an entire series about some of the lessons I've learned, titled Secrets of a Newlywed. But if I had to pick just one of those lessons, it would be Get Used to Saying I'm Sorry. As I wrote in that post: "Apologizing is one of those things that none of us at any age enjoys to do. It takes humility to say, I was wrong. It takes us being willing to think of another to say, I was wrong. It takes courage to admit, I was wrong. And yet, with that courage, humility and selflessness comes restoration…" I think that goes back to the previous question where I said one of the first things I had to learn in marriage was selflessness, and part of that was embracing the humility to apologize.

What's your secret to a happy marriage?
Listen to the Holy Spirit. Period. And invite him to convict and trust Him enough to act on those convictions. I sincerely believe that the reason my husband and I enjoy a wonderful marriage is because we trust the Lord enough to follow Him, even when it means apologizing or choosing not to complain or whatever the situation might call for. The Lord wants the best for our marriage even more than we do–so we must trust Him with it!

Pop over and read the complete interview (including what I consider to be the best part of being married and what I wish I would have known before tying the knot). Thanks so much for the interview, Andrea!

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Welcoming a Baby into Your Marriage / GUEST POST

A GUEST POST BY ANDREA OF EverAfterBlueprint.com

I have been following Carmen’s pregnancy from the sidelines, rejoicing with her as she found out she was having a girl, oohing and aahing over the cute projects she’s working on, and praying for a smooth delivery and healthy baby. Today I’m so excited to be able to talk about welcoming a baby into your marriage while she’s loving on her new little lady. My husband Adam and I just had our first baby (a boy named Emerson) at the end of October, so the memories of those first few weeks of being parents are fresh in my mind. Well, I guess they’re as fresh as they can be since I still feel a little sleep deprived!

Adam and I were married for 7 years before we welcomed a baby into our marriage. We loved our years just the two of us, but we always knew we wanted a family.  People say you’re never ready to have a baby (and they’re partially right) but we did everything we could to prepare ourselves for this little person to invade our home, hearts, and routines. We prayed, we took a class on childbirth, we asked for advice from friends with kids, and we talked to our parents about raising us.

I’ll be honest, there was nothing that could have fully prepared us for the change that comes with having a baby, but all the reading and talking is worth it! When you’re up for the fourth time in the middle of the night, trying to figure out why the baby won’t sleep, you need every ounce of patience to not lose your cool.

One of the most important things we did before Emerson was born was going through a study called The Art of Marriage. We knew having a baby would be a stressful, a life-altering experience, and we wanted our marriage to be solid before so many things changed. When the study talked about how we resolve conflict, how we communicate, and how we express our love to each other, we considered them in the context of our marriage but in regards to kids. Ultimately we want our marriage to set an example of Christ’s love to our kids.

Before we had a baby we had regular date nights. We didn’t have a specific night of the week set aside for us, but any night could be date night. We could catch a movie on a whim, go out for dinner after a long day at work, or head to a coffee shop whenever we wanted. That all changes when you have a baby. Three months in, we’ve been out on a few dates (which has been amazing) but a healthy marriage needs more than the occasional night out to survive!

Our solution is to get creative with date nights. Who says you have to go out to have a date? These days baby boy goes to bed by 7 so that means we have a few quiet hours to ourselves to play a game, cuddle on the couch and watch a movie or a favorite show, or just hang out! Our goal is to do this once a week.

To make the in-home dates a little more special, we take turns planning them. One week I got stuff to make root beer floats (something we don’t usually have) and picked a game to play. Even though the baby monitor was still on, we set aside an hour free from our to-do list to spend together.

At-home dates are great, but getting out of the house is even better! We’re still working on finding some go-to babysitters, but we’re not afraid to take our friends up on their offers to watch the baby. Some of them have kids of their own and know how hard it is to get out and some of them don’t have kids but don’t mind loving on ours for a few hours. The best part about these sitters is usually they’re free (we usually pay them in baked goods or a bottle of wine).

Our marriage will continue to grow and change along with our baby boy. The important thing is that we make it a priority! When we love each other well and make time for us we are better parents. It’s a win, win!

Andrea blogs about marriage, decorating, and life at EverAfterBlueprint.com. Read about how she fell in love with her high school prom date, one of her favorite things about living in an old house, and why she loves decorating her mantel.

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Adam and Eve, and a God Who Orchestrates It All

I recently shared about a book I've been reading through and loving: Jesus: A Theography. I was just reading a section that made me stop my reading and sit, once again, in awe of what God has done in my life, particularly in regards to my marriage, and the fact that it's the thing he's been doing all along, ever since the first man and woman in bringing them together.

(I chronicled the whole story about how God brought me and my husband together in a series called, "Our Love Story," which you can read through here, if you missed it.)

The authors are talking about the Genesis 2 creation story, where God has made Adam from the dirt and, upon seeing that he is alone, makes all the animals (from more dirt) to give his creation a suitable companion or helper. But none are found. So, he puts Adam to sleep and fashions woman from Adam's rib.

The authors illuminate what happens next in the story: "Once the woman was split apart from him, God 'brought her to the man,' an image that foreshadows the bridal attendant taking the bride to the bridegroom.

When I read that sentence, the word that popped out to me the most was the word "God." It was God who took the woman to the man. They weren't left wandering around the garden only to bump into one another and then fall in love. No, God orchestrated the entire thing, from start to finish, even to bringing them together and introducing them.

That is what I have seen God to do for me in my own life, and it has made for an incredible journey that still takes my breath away to remember all the crazy facets of it.

But it also made me think of all you others out there who are waiting to be that companion, who are waiting to have this story be your own story. I think of you because I remember that season of waiting, too.

And so I pray the wisdom of this Scripture over you: That it would be God who brings you to your mate and that, just as Adam waited on God to bring along his perfect companion, you too would be encouraged in your waiting.

(And, if you need encouragement while you wait, consider signing up for the monthly Women Praying Boldly newsletter that I send out to a group of one hundred or so women who are committed to praying for one another as they all await God to work this very same way in their lives!)

Plus, you can read more about this book in my review, or you can find Jesus: A Theography on Amazon.

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Our Love Story: Becoming Husband and Wife

(This is the story of how my husband and I met and fell in love. If you are just now jumping in, you can catch up on last week's post or start back at the beginning.)

Over the course of this Our Love Story series, I've been looking back at how my husband and I met and fell in love. To give you something of a timeline of everything that's happened so far: We met in June, started dating in August and dated long distance for the next nine months. During that time, we had our share of ups and downs, but through it all, we became more convinced—even after less than a year—that we wanted to be together. Like, get married.

To some, it might seem that we had no idea what we were getting ourselves into and that we were letting our emotions rule our heads. I understand the sentiment and the fear, but the truth is that there was more at work in this relationship than just me or him. I truly believe that from the very beginning, God was at work here, too.

So in May, after nine months of dating with a 16-hour car ride between us, my husband asked me to marry him. By this time, we had gotten to know each other very well through our daily phone chats, which weren’t just limited to how you spent your day but also what you think about this aspect of faith or how to deal with this dilemma or that hope. We also had gotten to know each other through even the conflict that comes hand-in-hand with relationships.

Through it all—the ups and the downs—we knew that this was the real deal. We saw in each other things that made us both want to be better people, to love God more deeply, to have a more humble and compassionate spirit. In some ways, we were very different (I talked a little bit about that here), but we saw in each other complements—that we had so much to learn from one another and be inspired by and be challenged by.

So that night in May, when my husband got down on one knee, I said yes. (After inquiring multiple times, "Are you serious?" because I had convinced myself an engagement wouldn't be happening for a few more months and was actually shocked it was happening! Plus, I'd also gotten upset at him earlier in the evening so the fact that he still proposed even in spite of that added to the shock.)

As I’ve said all along, this relationship was nothing if not humbling for me. How he could keep loving me after the things I said or the way I behaved just was proof to me again and again that this man really practiced what he preached. He loved a compassionate God, so he showed compassion. He loved a forgiving God, so he forgave.

It was truths like that that made it easy for me to say yes to him and be ready to marry him. Ready to marry him, like, tomorrow.

But of course, that’s not how weddings work. They take time and planning. And so even if you’re ready to get married tomorrow, you usually don’t. You print out invitations and buy a dress and make cute little crafts and have everything look picture-perfect.

So since tomorrow wouldn’t do, we settled for ten weeks. (If you're doing the math, we got married just a few weeks shy of the one-year anniversary of our first date and only a year and a couple weeks after the first time we met.)

I think a lot of people probably thought we were crazy for that, too! But for us, we were simply ready. It wasn’t a wedding we cared about, but a marriage and a life together that we were after. It’s kind of what we’d been after all along; neither one of us were dating for the fun of it. We were doing this thing because we thought it had potential, and for us, that potential all along had always been marriage.

That was just over three years ago. And now we're getting ready to add even more love to the union with our baby-on-the-way!

It’s thrilling now to look back on all that’s happened between us and to see how the Lord wrote and directed this love story of ours from the very beginning, when it seemed like all I could do was put my foot in my mouth and make a fool of myself. But of course, God is bigger than that and he always has a way of working these things out, whether it’s overcoming our own mistakes or hundreds of miles of distance.

And here we are today, three years in and it keeps getting better every day. Thanks, one hundred and ten percent, to the grace of God who cares about every detail of our lives, even who we fall in love with.

Thanks for reading along in the Our Love Story series. You can catch up on all the posts in the series here.

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Our Love Story: The Ups & Downs of Dating

(This is the story of how my husband and I met and fell in love. If you are just now jumping in, you can catch up on last week's post or start back at the beginning.)

Because we were dating long-distance, much of our relationship took place over the phone with long conversations, which really helped us get to know one another in a concentrated sort of way. So much so that just a couple of months in, we both were pretty sure that we could see ourselves getting married.

Things between us—mainly our minds and hearts for God—just clicked like they never had with anyone else before. I remember thinking that sometimes when I talked to him, it was just like I was talking out loud to myself or to an imaginary friend, the conversations just flowed so naturally and we were crazy in-sync on tons of things that mattered, like how we wanted to raise children someday or what we saw as priorities in our lives.

Being with him also really challenged me. I mentioned before that I was so impressed to see him hunkered over his Bible while the rest of the world was swirling about him; he always made that a priority. At that point in my life, my Bible reading was not so intentional (whenever I could spare the time), but he challenged me on it. He set the example but he also called me out on my own passivity. Part of it bothered me, of course, but it also showed me who this guy was. He was willing to journey through the discomfort for the sake of truth and obedience. And for my sake, too. He was a man of integrity, and I saw that through and through.

I remember early on in our relationship reading a verse that says, "I will bring you gold in place of bronze, silver in place of iron, bronze in place of wood, iron in place of rocks." (Isaiah 60:17) In its biblical context, that verse has nothing to do with dating, and instead comes when the Lord is calling his people to be faithful again and promising them that their punishment will not endure forever, but mercy is on the horizon.

But during that time in my life, I saw in that verse how the Lord makes it his gift to take what we have and dazzles us with things more brilliant than we could have even expected, much less deserve: We have bronze, but he gives us gold. He gifts us riches that make us stand in awe. I had expected someone who was "bronze." And yet the Lord did not stop there, but gave me a man who was stronger, purer, wiser than my wildest dreams. God chose to, in love, give me “gold.”

That is not to say that things were perfect between us. Things were better with him than they were with anyone else I’d ever dated and I felt more accepted and loved and more myself around him than with anyone else, period. But we also did our fair share of arguing and not seeing eye to eye and getting frustrated with each other. (A lot of it was over issues that really probably weren't the effort. I remember getting into a fight once about the evils of big-box stores and another about how much the Old Testament applies to our lives today.)

Yet, it was conflict, and conflict was something we had to learn how to process and address early on, since nearly all we had was the phone to keep our relationship going. We couldn’t just go buy an ice-cream cone and push it under the rug. It forced us to really weigh what we were doing here; were we going to fight for this relationship even when it’s difficult and when it hurts and when it isn’t pretty? Or were we just going to give up on it? We decided to keep fighting, to keep working through the issues, to get really good at apologizing and to start to figure out the dance of communication and conflict resolution and compromise and picking our battles.

But I totally believe that was another aspect where God knew what he was doing as he was writing this love story of ours. We had to face those situations (which we all face at one point or another) while we were still dating, which gave us a chance to address and learn from them then, before our hearts were married together.

And by addressing them then, those times of conflict gave us the chance to work on our communication even more. I think it really paid off down the road because although it felt like we had a lot of arguments while we were dating, once we were married, the frequency really abated and today, we find ourselves in disagreements very rarely and even when we do, we’re able—because of all the “practice” we’ve had—to address them in more constructive and loving ways that make them a lot more effective a lot more efficiently.

In that aspect, even though there were tons of bright spots in our dating relationship, it was also hard, as I think most relationships are at one point or another, in one way or another. I don't want to gloss over that because the truth is, that's par for the course in any human relationship. But it's also a chance for us to learn more about ourselves and what it looks like to live in Christ's footsteps, forgiving and serving and loving even when it takes effort to do so. And only then can we learn to appreciate those hard parts because they have the potential to shape and chisel our hearts so intimately—if we let them.

Click here to continue reading the next post in this series. Or, you can catch up on all the posts I've shared in Our Love Story.

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Our Love Story: A Long-Distance Relationship

(This is the story of how my husband and I met and fell in love. If you are just now jumping in, you can catch up on last week's post or start back at the beginning.)

One of the things that I learned during that three-hour-long phone marathon with my husband-to-be was that he was only going to be in town for two more weeks before moving back to Georgia when fall semester started back up because he was still in college.

Two weeks isn’t very long at all, but I’d already become so enamored with him that I felt—and he did, too—that it was worth it to take a chance on the relationship and see where it would lead. Even though the circumstances might make it seem like there was no hope for the relationship to flourish, there was something in me that knew that wasn’t the case.

I had been praying boldly for a godly husband for a couple of months at this point and so I had to trust what God was doing—and that God was, in fact, doing this. That he was the one working all of this out right now, and that he would continue to work it all out in the future, when we’d live more than a 16-hour car drive apart from one another.

So, we decided to take full advantage of the two weeks we had remaining and spend much of it together, going on dates, meeting one another’s families, getting to know one another better and better. And in that time, my husband was always aware of what we were doing—we were not biding time but we were exploring a relationship.

So he brought up things like our intentions and what we expected from the relationship and what we hoped for in the future. It was the first time that I was with someone who was so intentional, who cared about guarding my heart just as much as I did. It was a breath of fresh air for me—and made me attracted to him even more.

It was a whirlwind two weeks, to be sure, but it was clear by the time that he had left that we were falling for one another, and we decided to continue exploring this budding relationship of ours as a long-distance one and decided to officially make ours an exclusive ("boyfriend-and-girlfriend") one. That night, upon determining that this relationship was to be an exclusive one, we also had our first kiss, and I swear I saw a shooting star overhead.

The thing was, I wasn’t afraid of having a long-distance relationship. In my mind, I figured that if that was the way that God was going to write my love story, then it must be that it’s for the best. God could have brought us together earlier in the summer, but we spent almost that entire time avoiding each other or thinking the other person hated us. It wasn’t until time was dwindling that we actually overcame all those thoughts and fears and questions and discovered that there really might be something here.

And so I just simply trusted that that must be what was for the best—for us to live far away from each other, at least for now, and get to know one another via near-daily phone calls and the occasional weekend visit. As it turns out, of course, that was the case—God did know best.

We both look back on those times now and know that while long-distance dating is not for everyone, it was for us. It gave us an incredible chance to get to know one another’s hearts without the distractions or temptations that come with in-person dating. Much of those things were filtered out so that all we had was time to talk and learn and work through getting to know one another. We read books and discussed them together via our phone dates, talked about our days, about our dreams, about what God was doing in our lives, about everything.

It's funny to look back on it and see how simple my faith was during this time. I so simply trusted. Sometimes it baffles me to see how I responded to situations, to see the faith God gave me to traverse what would have otherwise been trying and heart-wrenching decisions. I mean, dating across the country is not a task without its cost (emotionally, relationally but also financially). Instead, he gave us both a deep peace that seemed to melt the miles and fold away the distance.

Click here to read the next part in Our Love Story. Plus, you can catch up on all the posts I've shared in Our Love Story so far!

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Our Love Story: Our First Date

(This is the story of how my husband and I met and fell in love. If you are just now jumping in, you can catch up on last week's post or start back at the beginning.)

At this point, we were back in town after spending a week chaperoning a youth group trip where we got to spend more time together and get to know each other better (the good and the bad).

Even though there'd been plenty of things that should have turned my husband off, there was still something in him that kept him interested in me, despite all my flubs and goofs. He decided to talk to the youth pastor at our church (who knew both of us quite well by this point) and tell him about his interest in me.

I'd already told the pastor about my desire for a godly husband and that it was something I was actively praying about, so he urged him to go on and ask me out. They decided to make it a group date along with the pastor and his wife.

(Of course, with the two of us, nothing is ever quite that easy!)

My husband called that night, around 9pm, but I didn’t see the missed call until after 10pm and my mom always taught me that after 9pm, it's not polite to call someone you don't know well. The voice message was brief and didn't really give any details, so even though my curiosity was running wild, I decided to do "the right thing" and wait until the next day to return the call.

(Due to the delay, my husband became even more convinced nothing was going to happen.)

But, as I was leaving work the following afternoon, I called him back. He told me he was calling to see if I wanted to “hang out” with him and the youth pastor and his wife that coming weekend. It sounded like a double date, but it also sounded just like, well, “hanging out.” I agreed but I hung up the phone still unsure what was going on here.

Fortunately for the sake of my curiosity, there was a planning meeting later that night at the youth pastor’s house. My husband wasn't at the meeting, so after everyone else left, I asked the pastor what was going on. “Is it a date or what?”

He laughed and laughed, because it was too obvious that I was totally interested in this guy. To my relief, he told me that it was indeed intended to be a date but that he’d encouraged my husband to phrase it casually so that it wouldn’t sound too intense and scare me away.

With the situation clarified, I started to get really excited. I honestly had never seen this actually happening! Hoped? Of course. But given all that had come before, I never expected anything to come of it.

The date came that Friday night, when he picked me up and we drove downtown to meet the pastor and his wife for dinner. After dinner, we walked around downtown and grabbed some dessert.

It was a fun group dynamic, but by the end of the evening, I didn’t feel like I knew him much better—or whether the two of us would actually click or not. At one point, when my husband was off in the restroom, our pastor asked me what I thought. I told him I had no idea, as much of the evening had been based on small talk and stories—not really heart issues, which is what really mattered most to me. That's what I was waiting on!

One of the things my husband will now say that attracted him to me so much back then was that I knew what I wanted. I’m not sure how I conveyed that, but I guess he knew that I wasn’t just dating for the fun of it. If I was going to do this, there wasn’t going to be any playing games or hard-to-get. Fortunately, he felt the same way, which is why he called me the very next day. None of that “wait two days” or however long “the rule” is supposed to be. He called the next day, which I appreciated.

When he called, I was a couple of hours away, visiting my best friend. So I called him back on my drive home. I had no idea what to expect when I called him back; all our other interactions had been so brief.

But this one was different. It finally felt like the walls came tumbling down and I got to really know this man. It was a two-hour car drive and I was still talking to him while sitting in my driveway for another hour or so before going inside.

I can’t remember what all we talked about, but we talked about enough stuff—real stuff, meaningful stuff about God and family and character and priorities—that when I hung up that phone that night, I knew that whoever got to marry him—me or anyone else—would be a lucky woman. It was evident from that moment that he was the real deal. He was the kind of godly man I’d been waiting for.

Click here to read the next part in Our Love Story. You can also catch up on all the posts I've shared in Our Love Story series.

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Planning A Surprise Date for My Husband: Two Years in the Making

A funny thing happened the other day.

My husband was reading through the posts in the Our Love Story series (checking them for any errors, he says!), when he somehow ended up at an old post I’d made more than two years ago.

It was on the cusp of my 27th birthday, and I came up with a list of 27 things I wanted to accomplish that year. Some of them were easy, some were meant to help me spread my wings, and some were simply nigh-on impossible that I'll be chasing after for years to come. (You can see all the goals on that list with a bunch of the updates I made here.)

As my husband read through that list, he came across one particular goal that never managed to get accomplished that fateful year:

#26: Plan a date for my husband. (He deserves it!)

Well, truth be told, that never quite happened. Not because I didn’t want to, but because when I’ve tried to plan surprises in the past for him, they’ve never quite turned out as exciting or as perfect-for-him as I’d hoped. He always appreciated the effort, but usually it just wasn’t what he would have envisioned the gift or the outing.

So, that goal fell by the wayside for two years, until he rediscovered it and brought it back to my attention.

Fortunately, he also pointed me in the direction of what he thought would be a great surprise—a trip to a local brewery. I don’t drink at all and my husband only has a beer every once in a blue moon, so it definitely wasn’t something I would have thought to do. But, it seemed like a neat way to get out, explore the town (especially now that we’re out in the ‘burbs!), and even learn a thing or two.

I did a bunch of research on what else was near the brewery and came across a couple of different restaurants that I thought would be up my husband’s alley, as he has recently begun eating vegan. He looked at the menus and we settled on a cute little place that is definitely nicer than our usual outing (typically something like Moe’s or Chipotle).

We got a little dressed up, drove down to the brewery (where I ohhed and ahhed over the brewery’s outdoor wildflower landscaping!), my husband sampled a couple of different beers (a blueberry and a raspberry), and we learned quite a bit about the history of this local business.

Then, since I hadn’t had anything to drink, I drove us over to the restaurant where we settled into a dark little corner and ordered what ended up being positively delicious meals (I picked a peppercorn-encrusted tempeh over mashed potatoes, which was fun, as I’ve never had tempeh before!). We both practically licked our plates clean.

Afterward, we stopped for some coffee and tea before heading home.

We’re typically pretty big homebodies, preferring to pick up a pint of ice-cream at the store and scoop it out over a Netflix movie or bring home take-out to eat before playing a board game. So this date night was pretty special for us and one that we savored.

The funny thing is that while it took me two years to finally sit down and do it, now that I have, I’ve started brainstorming a bunch of other date ideas for us—especially things like day trips to nearby towns and nature spots. So, even though I probably could go on and cross that one off my list, I plan on leaving it there for awhile, and seeing what other surprise dates spring up…

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Our Love Story: Seeing is Believing

(This is the story of how my husband and I met and fell in love. If you are just now jumping in, you can catch up on last week's post or start back at the beginning.)

At the same time, while I was trying to actively pull myself away from him and fight the attraction I had felt from day one, there were other things going on that made that harder and harder to do.

While we were serving as adult chaperones for the youth group trip (which I talked more about here), I got the chance to see who this man was in a rare, close-up way. We saw each other every day, whether it was congregating in the cafeteria, meeting together in discussion groups, attending worship services together, or just hanging out as chaperones while the kids were in different sessions.

While we didn’t talk too much in a one-on-one setting, I had the advantage of seeing him interact with the teens and with the other adult leaders. I remember one day at breakfast, while a bunch of the boys were goofing off and scarfing down McDonalds, he was sitting amongst their antics, calmly and deliberately reading his Bible.

As with any teen trip, there were plenty of issues that we had to deal with, from unruly behavior to flirting to picking on each other, I got to see how he handled some of those instances, how he was talking to the guys and quoted from Proverbs or explained why, as Christians, this kind of behavior was or wasn’t right.

Since it was the heat of summer, I also remember one time when all the chaperones were going to meet up and we were trying to sort out details. My husband was the one who suggested that the guys get the van and bring it to pick us ladies up. Not sure the other guys were too thrilled about it, but I certainly was impressed!

So I got quite a few glimpses to see more of what he was like, in a real-life kind of way, that made me appreciate his heart more and more.

But at the time, I still was convinced that he did not like me, and as it turns out, he was convinced that I did not like him. So none of that really mattered all that much at the time—since it seemed it wasn’t going anywhere. Plus, there was the fact that I’m 4.5 years older than him, so that was a big factor in him believing nothing would pan out. (That and all the kind things I said to him so far that summer!)

Still, something in him told him to at least try.

For some reason, even though he thought I hated him and that because I was older there’d be no possibility, he actually was interested in me and decided to ask me out anyway...

Click here to continue reading the next part in Our Love Story. You can also catch up on all the posts I've shared in Our Love Story series.

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Our Love Story: Attempting to Guard My Heart

(This is the story of how my husband and I met and fell in love. If you are just now jumping in, you can catch up on last week's post or start back at the beginning.)

Finally, it was time for the teen conference, where both my husband and I would be serving as chaperones.

By this point, we’d talked a few times, with plenty of them involving me making personal character flubs. Humbling, humbling, I tell you.

So it wasn’t too hard for me to convince myself that he was not interested in me in the bit, which is why at the conference, I made a sincere attempt to not interact with him too much. For me, it was a matter of guarding my own heart and not let my emotions get carried away. I was sick of crushes and didn’t want to nurse this one.

There are a couple of moments during the conference that I remember vividly about this interplay where I intentionally pulled away not because I wanted to play hard-to-get, but simply because I needed to guard my heart. It was still a part of me sticking to my no-flirting vow:

At one point, we all had to squeeze into a van and the only space left when I got in was, you guessed it, right by him. At another time in my life, I would have been thrilled, but this time I nearly groaned because I was trying to avoid getting too close to him (literally and figuratively!) for the sake of my own heart. I frantically looked around for any other place I could sit. Alas, that was really the only seat, so I think I sat half hanging off to leave as much room between us as possible.

I don’t think he noticed that one, but I know he definitely did take note of this next one:

Near the end of the conference, we were to divide up into groups to pray with the teens. The youth pastor assigned me and my husband to the same group. I immediately asked if I could instead be in a group with one of the female leaders, who was also one of my best friends. I wasn't trying to be rude but I was desperate to quell the crush and keep my distance from him, even when it was under the most un-flirty of circumstances.

(When my husband remembers this incident, he took it as pretty insulting that I wasn’t even willing to pray with him. He thought I pretty much hated him. Especially after all the other run-ins we'd had since meeting. It's really a wonder anything ever happened at all. But of course, that's part of God's graciousness in this whole story, and more about all that later...)

The youth pastor (a smart man, who later presided over our nuptials) denied my request and we sat in the same group. We gathered around a picnic table with the students and again, when it came time to sit down, the only space left was directly beside him. I couldn't get a break even if I tried!

As a group, we all held hands to pray, which meant we ended up holding hands since we were sitting next to each other. At the time, I remember being surprised that when we held hands to pray, there was no “electricity” that you sometimes feel when you hold someone’s hand for the first time. It was surprising but also almost comforting in a way. I thought maybe my efforts to guard my heart were working...

But that didn't last long.

In spite of my efforts to peel my heart away from being interested in this guy, I couldn't help but think, as we sat there, holding his hand and praying together, “I could do this for the rest of my life.”

How right I was!

Click here to continue reading the next part in Our Love Story. You can also catch up on all the posts I've shared in Our Love Story.

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Our Love Story: Things Get Off to a Rocky Start

(This is the story of how my husband and I met and fell in love. If you are just now jumping in, you can catch up on last week's post here or start back at the beginning.)

As I documented before, my first words ever to the cute-new-guy-at-church-who-would-later-become-my-husband were as humbling as any: “Hi, I’m Carmen, and I need to apologize for what happened earlier…”

(If you need to catch up on what prompted the apology, you can read about it here.)

So I guess even from the beginning, God was really helping me to stick to my no-flirting vow. Because I don’t think having to apologize and admit you were wrong is going to get you very many numbers at a bar.

Since it was summer, every Sunday night the youth group got together just for the sole purpose of having fun. There was water balloon capture the flag, a night of playing cards, and plenty of impromptu trips to Sonic for milkshakes and mozzarella sticks. The youth group wasn’t especially big, so there weren’t very many adult volunteers—maybe a dozen, max. Sometimes we’d both be there and sometimes we’d chat, but it was never for any length of time at all, really. Because we were there to hang out with the teens. More often than not, if I wasn’t playing spoons with the kids, I was hanging out with the other women leaders.

About a month after we’d met, there was a weeklong youth-group trip planned to Illinois, and we both signed up to go as chaperones. As we geared up for the trip, the youth minister wanted to have a big kick-off party the night beforehand, complete with a bonfire and songs. My husband plays guitar and has even put out a CD, so he was the natural choice to lead worship for the event.

A week or so beforehand, he sent me a message on Facebook, asking what kinds of songs I thought might be good for him to play. I tried not to read too much into the question, telling myself that he was asking me because I’d been helping out with the youth group longer and knew the girls well.

So I suggested my at-the-time favorite Christian artist (who remains a personal favorite of mine to this day), John Mark McMillan. I had just gotten his cd with the song “How He Loves,” which was before David Crowder Band had covered it and it was hitting airwaves in a major way. Meaning, that not too many were familiar with it, so I made a copy of it and the next week at church, I offered it to him, as a way to help him learn the songs.

He declined and told me he wasn’t into burning music.

I know he did it in a gracious way, but at the time, it caught me off guard and felt like a complete rejection. So do you know what I replied? “Oh, well, if you have morals or something…”

Oh my.

It still makes me cringe thinking about it to this day and still makes my husband laugh and laugh. (Although at the time he was certain I couldn't stand him, which of course was the furthest thing from the truth.)

He ended up taking the cd (because, like I said, he’s a gracious guy) and singing the song at the bonfire. But it was just another proof that God was totally at work helping me stick to my no-flirting vow. Almost too much, it might seem!

Click here to read the next part in Our Love Story.

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Our Love Story: The Prelude

Last week, my husband and I celebrated three years of marriage, which on the one hand seems like hardly anything at all but also like forever. It is a good thing and one that still takes me by awe some days when I realize how good we have it.

In celebration, I thought it’d be fun to take a couple of trips down memory lane about the early stages of our relationship.

In case you’ve missed it, I have written a few posts here and there on the subject, most notably documenting the first time we met (which was about as unromantic as it could get) and a lesson I learned early on in our relationship when we were grocery shopping together as well as how I knew my husband was “the one.”

So, where to begin? Well, at the beginning, I suppose…




Before my husband and I even met, I was in a season of intentionally praying for a husband after my latest failed relationship had left me broken hearted and wounded. One of the things I determined during that time was that in my next relationship, I would not try to force anything, whether it was getting someone to notice me or try to meet him or anything. I had done that in the past and every time it had ended miserably.

I had to trust that God knew who was better for me than I did. I had dated different “Christian” guys who seemed great on the outside but on the inside, they didn’t stand up to the test of how a godly man ought to act. Looking back on my past record, it was clear that I had no idea what kind of guy was right for me. I could look at his resume and say, “Well he sounds like a great Christian guy!” but then still be disappointed and hurt in the end.

So, I decided to take an incredibly hands-off approach to dating, which may or may not be the right decision for everyone. In a book I can heartily recommend, Get Married, Candace Watters talks about getting yourself noticed by a man you’re interested in and how it can be done in a godly manner without overstepping a man's role as the one doing the pursuing. It’s kind of that whole Ruth-and-Boaz dance where Ruth took the reins to let Boaz know she was interested in him—and that can be completely biblical. But for me, at that time, it was not. The Holy Spirit was telling me to step back and let him do the leading this time.

Admittedly, that proved hard to live out upon meeting my someday-husband.

From the first time I saw him (toting a bucket filled with water balloons at a youth-group event), I was attracted to him. I remember, I had picked up one of the youth group girls to take her to the event and when we drove in and I saw him standing there, I blatantly checked him out. I caught myself immediately, totally embarrassed, because what kind of role model is that?!

All that to say, from day one, this guy had caught my eye.

Click here to read the next part in Our Love Story.

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Telling My Husband I Love Him, in Three Words

There is something to be said for the vulnerability of the words, "I need you." Whether it's to God ("I need you"), to my husband ("I need you") or to my dear friends ("I need you") these words are some of the most powerful  I've found—and also must unspoken.

In marriage, those words can seem scary even though, whether you utter them or not, they are incredibly true. I need my husband. Of course I do! He holds my heart in his hands. Everything he does or says affects me. His sentiments and love dance in my heart. Of course I need him. Who do I turn to when I'm having a bad day? Who do I tell my fears and my ideas to? Whose opinion matters most to me? I need him and his care and his heart and his strength and his encouragement and his wisdom and his protection. That's what marriage does. Two become one and you need each other. But that doesn't make you "needy."

I remember realizing this—that I need him. And I don't remember the specifics of it, when or where or how, but I told him, I told him that I need him. Even now, if I'm having a down-and-out kind of day and I need a hug or an encouragement, I'll whisper those words to him. "I need you." And with that, I put my heart out on the table.

Isn't that what C.S. Lewis said about love, though? "To love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything, and your heart will certainly be wrung and possibly broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact, you must give your heart to no one, not even to an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements; lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket—safe, dark, motionless, airless—it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable."

And yet, when you admit that vulnerability out-loud, that is when the depth of your love starts to come into view and you realize the enormity of it all.
  
For the month of December, I’m taking a break from writing new posts to better enjoy the holidays with family and friends. Instead, I’ll be sharing some of my favorite posts from my first two years of blogging here. I hope you enjoy getting to do a little time-traveling with me, and I’ll be back to ring in the new year with all new posts! (Click here to see today’s original post.) 

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Secrets of a Newlywed: That Which Sanctifies Us

This is the last post in Secrets of a Newlywed, a series where I open up and share some of the lessons, insights and understandings--the little secrets--that have made my marriage the wedded bliss that it is. Like anything else, they are easier said than done. But I know from personal experience that when I do manage to live them out, I've seen what beautiful fruit they bear in my relationship with my husband. 

So, today, I share another with you: That Which Sanctifies Us.

sanctify: to make holy; to set apart as sacred;
to purify or free from sin

Thumb through the Bible and you’ll see how God constantly compares our relationship with him as one of being married. We are called his bride, he is the bridegroom. Heaven will be like a wedding ceremony. We have made a covenant with him, to be his people, not unlike the wedding vows we recite today. “For better or worse, till death do us part…”

And I believe that in much the same way, our earthly marriage is a tool that God uses to prepare us for that heavenly matrimony: Like no other relationship or experience, my marriage has been the greatest sanctifying force in my life. It has been through this union that I have seen my selfish self exposed like never before, that I have realized how imperfect I really am.

Because before being married, I could close the door on my problems. If a friend or relative or coworker was bothering me, I could get away from them, ignore them and let it wear off without every really addressing it. Not so with a spouse. You are forced to confront your demons, you are forced to realize the role you play in these problems, you are forced to acknowledge truths about yourself that you never imagined.

This is the blessing tied up in marriage. Sure marriage is great because you always have a best friend. You don’t have to show up at parties alone. You have someone you can always confide in, someone who knows you better than anyone else in the world. But even that—all the heartwarming, lovey-dovey stuff that sends us swooning—isn’t what makes marriage so powerful, so beautiful.

Marriage has the potential to transform us into a better person, if we let it. If we’re willing to look our own sins square in the face and confront them, then we can see our hearts softened and start looking more Christ-like.

On the one hand it’s the hardest thing about marriage, because it’s a process that is never without pain. But when you’re willing to walk through that pain, it also because the most beautiful as the sins and selfishness begins to be pulled away.

We must make it a point to be willing to walk through these scuttles and skirmishes that come with any marriage. We must be willing to look at them rather than the other way, willing to look more at our ourselves and our own sins and inadequacies rather than those of our spouse. We have to trust that it’s for our own good to deal with the problems and see the parts we played in them.

Therein lies the potential for transformation. A transformation that prepares us for our next and eternal marriage: to the Bridegroom. In that way, marriage is not just about us, during this time on earth. But it is a means to point us to the union that awaits us, a means of teaching us what that relationship requires.

And because of that—because of that sanctifying aspect that comes with any and every marriage, which cannot be avoided no matter how perfectly suited we are for one another—we take joy in these daily struggles to learn to love selflessly. They are not done in vain!

(To read through all the posts in this series, click here.)

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Secrets of a Newlywed: Who Are You Complaining To?

This is the next post in Secrets of a Newlywed, a series where I open up and share some of the lessons, insights and understandings—the little secrets—that have made my marriage the wedded bliss that it is. Like anything else, they are easier said than done. But I know from personal experience that when I do manage to live them out, I've seen what beautiful fruit they bear in my relationship with my husband. 

So, today, I share another with you: Who Are You Complaining To?

I hope that you will never hear me complain about my husband. I hope that you will never hear a negative comment about him slip through my lips.

It’s not because he’s perfect, because he certainly makes mistakes—just as I do.

But it’s because I value our marriage and don’t want to give, as Song of Songs calls them, the “little foxes” room to roam free and wreak havoc in our relationship.

You see, I believe in the power of words. As James says, the tongue can be “a whole world of evil among the parts of our bodies” and “it starts a fire that influences all of life.” (James 3:6) Even when we’re simply joking about how he leaves dirty clothes on the ground or the toilet seat up, I think those conversations can plant seeds of discontent in our hearts that, over time, can grow into jungles of festering resentment. All because we opened our mouths and breathed life to negativity.

That’s why I greatly desire to keep any venting out of conversations with man. Instead, they only have room in my conversations with God. And I can tell you that it’s these conversations that I’ve come to see bear much fruit. I don’t know that any one can say the same of the other kinds of conversations. Simply because the Lord is the only one who can actually do something about these issues!

There have been times when I’ve found myself frustrated with situations in my marriage, but taken them to the Lord earnestly in prayer. And I’ve seen the Holy Spirit work in our relationship, softening both my own heart and that of my husband.

Because hardly ever is conflict a one-way street. Yes, it may be the actions of one. But it doesn’t often stop there. We carry logs in our own eyes, whether it’s the ways we overreact in perceiving things or in expecting perfection from another human being. The Lord steps in with sanctification even in these moments, when we think we’re blameless!

The beautiful thing about that is that my husband hardly ever knows about these things, which keeps our relationship intact and healthy. And at the same time, it grows my dependency on and faith in the Lord, to know that with him, all things are possible and that he is the rock upon which we built our relationship. I let go, and let him work.

But the tongue can also be used for good and bring life. “Careless words stab like a sword, but wise words bring healing.” (Proverbs 12:18) And so it is true in our marriages, as well.

Instead of airing complaints, we ought to sing our husband’s praises. We put words to the things we appreciate about him. We tell others of the things he has accomplished. We only let words of encouragement flow from our lips.

And it bolsters our hearts, reminding us how much we do have to be thankful for in our marriage. Because if we look hard enough, there’s always something to be thankful for. Even when there’s dirty laundry on the floor and he left the toilet seat up, again.

(To read through all the posts in this series, click here.)  

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