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Friday, August 9, 2013

ten years

Today is our ten year wedding anniversary.

Bryan and I met when we were just 17.
We began dating seriously at 18,
engaged at 21 and married at 22.

Now at the age of 32 and after being together for 14 years I can say two things for sure about marriage: it is wonderful and it is hard. HaHa... hopefully you weren't expecting something profound right there.  I have no true actual words of great wisdom to pass on to anyone. Plus every marriage is so different. I am quite sure though that every marriage has both hard and joyful parts to it.  We have made it this far because we eventually figured out how to fight through the hard parts together.

Just last week Bryan and I had our turn to share our life stories with our Life Group.  We had never shared them together in a group setting before.  I've told mine to small groups of women and him with men.  He has even shared his in Uganda during a Sunday morning church service which feels both crazy and awesome, or maybe brave is a better word.  Last week was different than those other times we've shared.  We sat side-by-side and took turns as we shared about our life's details from birth to present.  We shared everything. And for us, everything has some real hard areas.  Areas that aren't easy at all to share.  Sharing everything for us has messy parts.  We enjoy sharing our story though, even the messy parts.  We are amazed at the gracious ways people respond to it.  How they cry and celebrate with us as we share.  God has redeemed so many things in our lives.  He is so good.

The truth is, Bryan and I would possibly not be married today and possibly wouldn't have had our daughter Avery, if God hadn't helped us save our marriage six years ago. Sharing our story helps people see how God has worked in our lives. How loving and forgiving He is.  Each and everyone of us has a story.  They are all different so that we can speak into different lives. All of our stories are powerful and I believe they are meant to be shared.

I am thankful that we happened to be scheduled to share our story just one week before our TEN year anniversary.  It was an unexpected but wonderful present for us. A wonderful reminder of the journey we've had and how thankful we are for every step of it.

Happy TEN YEARS to you and me Bryan.
I love you more today then I did ten years ago when I said "I do" and celebrated the beginning with you.  The beginning was fun but right now is so much better. Ten years is a great place to be but now I'm looking forward to what twenty-five and fifty years will look like for us. I'm looking forward to the rest of our lives together.


17 comments:

  1. YAY!!! Happy 10 years, lovely!!!

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  2. You two are just the sweetest couple :) Happy 10 year anniversary!!!

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    1. So nice of you to say that Chelsea... thank you!

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  3. LOVE this!! It's always such an honor to hear your story! Congrats you two!!! =)

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  4. Happy 10 Year Anniversary! :)

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  5. Aww, I love this post. Happy anniversary :)

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