The Honeymoon
We awoke side by side for the first time. It’s a memory we’ll never forget, and an experience we have yet to grow tired of. It felt too good to be true. All the life that we’d been so earnestly waiting to share together: sleeping, showering, dressing, learning one another’s bodies – the simple activities that were “off limits” were now suddenly our living reality. No more goodbyes, and no more restraints. Our souls were soaring!
We left our hotel room and shared breakfast together. Every plain, commonplace activity suddenly felt magical. We were Mr. and Mrs. Sawyer. And we were ready to take on the world. But first, we were set to take on our honeymoon 🙂
Departing from our hotel, we set our bearings for Myrtle Beach. A tidy and romantic cottage was awaiting us in a quiet neighborhood on the beach. It was a perfect week. No cellphones. No computers. Not a care in the world. It was a vacation the likes of which we had never experienced.
Starting Life Together
Following our week at the beach, we had a second work-free week planned for settling into our new abode. If you recall, our wedding planning had it’s genesis in an outdoor Jacuzzi belonging to Tom and Donna Wolford. And, it was in Tom and Donna Wolford’s basement that our married life began. The Wolfords were (and still are!) some of our dearest friends, and as a matter of fact, each of us had separately lived in their basement for a time in the years before our marriage. Back in those days, the basement was just that – a basement. When our house-search began in earnest, though, following our engagement, the Wolfords offered to convert it into an apartment with a full kitchen. It made a perfect residence for newly weds, and we look back fondly on our time there.
Those first months were about as close to blissful as you can get this side of heaven. Thinking back, it’s hard for us to even fathom how carefree our lives were in those days. It was a blessing. As any married couple can tell you, though, the honeymoon doesn’t last forever. That’s not to say that the joy evaporates, or that the love grows cold. No, rather, as the trials of life close about in due season, you learn to cleave to one another more deeply, and cultivate a more powerful love.
As the first year flew by and the thrill of a new season waned, many familiar struggles rose to the surface once more. Learning to battle them together as husband and wife was a new and rewarding experience – albeit a challenging one. When you get married, neither of you are fighting for just one any longer. You’re each fighting for both of you. The battles your spouse is facing, whether spiritual or physical, very literally become your battles. If they don’t, they will divide you. Our pastor (Scott Bradshaw) recently defined love along the lines of seeing who God is calling someone to be and what He’s placed inside of them, and earnestly desiring to participate in bringing it to fruition. Nowhere does that definition of love ring more true than in marriage (though it’s certainly applicable elsewhere, too).
The ache you feel in seeing your spouse struggling or defeated is unlike any pain imaginable. In the same way, the joy and ecstasy of seeing them soaring and thriving is beyond description. There is no challenge like learning the tension between cooperating with God in challenging, encouraging, and occasionally rebuking your spouse, and getting the heck out of His way when you find yourself trying to take control. For a husband, this looks like learning to both serve and lead lovingly, while constantly leaning on and submitting to the Lord. For a wife, it looks like building up and investing in her husband, without becoming controlling or demanding. For both, it looks like humility, respect, patience, and lots of communication 🙂
It most decidedly does not look like self-preservation or “respecting one another’s individuality.” It’s about becoming one. It doesn’t look like tolerating sin or deception in one another, either. Yet, neither does it look like finding every fault or imperfection. “Love covers a multitude of sin (1 Peter 4:8)”, and, it “keeps no account of wrongs.” At the same time, love doesn’t stand idly by while the enemy of our souls deceives, ensnares, or afflicts our other half. Love looks like patiently bearing with those things while earnestly endeavoring with all that’s within you to see freedom and truth break forth.
Transition
As we began our second year together, a semi-frustrated restlessness began to set in. Brandi had been without work for some months. That, along with a dryness that had been characterizing her spiritual life had caused a bored paralysis to begin setting in. Meanwhile, Phil was experiencing a renewed sense of dissatisfaction with life as well – discouraged that the life of ministry he had desired since his teenage years still felt withheld. After much deliberation, it was determined that a transition was in order.
To that end, Phil began to wrap up his ties with a business venture he had been engaged in for over a year with a friend and business partner. In it’s stead, he took a part-time job at Camna (his previous place of employment and an on-going source of contract work). The goal was to get involved with the Fredericksburg Prayer Furnace in a more significant part-time capacity. Little did we know, though, what lay just around the corner. Nothing could have prepared us for what we were about to face.