Marriage

I hear that Jessica and I should be on the back side of the honeymoon phase right now. Thats funny because I'm thinking more about our actual honeymoon right now than I have since I was on it. (I really want to go back. See the previous post). But thats not what I meant to be talking about right now.

I understand that marriages/relationships begin with a period of "great excitement and the thrill of discovery" (Sacred Marriage). I see that in my marriage. We had been dating for five years before we were married. I thought we wouldn't have a honeymoon phase, but we did anyway. Its pretty great. I also understand that the excitement levels out, and the relationship deepens, puts down some roots.

It seems pretty common among folks my age to be a little confused about their relationship with God right now. We were youth group kids. We sang our brains out to "Open the Eyes of My Heart" in ninth or tenth grade with a passion for God that just hasn't been matched in intensity since. I'm thinking the two are connected.

In the marriage realm, I love Jessica much more deeply than I did when we were married, even though that super-high excitement has leveled out. What if it isn't that we loved God more or better back then? What if we were flipping out about really discovering God for the first time... a lot like a honeymoon? What if we're off that kick and not getting back on it and it has long since been time to suck it up and do the real work of pushing and growing and deepening in our relationship with God, apart from the excitement/discovery thing, just like in marriage after things level out. Hanging onto the old instead of pushing into the new.

I'm not sure, but I've got a hunch that a lot of us, myself included, didn't know there was a honeymoon phase, and to a large degree we've been waiting for God to show up and sweep us off our feet again like the first time we really met him. Just like a lot of marriages, we've floated around, not doing anything to intentionally hurt our relationship, but not doing as much as we could be to further it either, all the while thinking back to how great it used to be.

I'm thinking that some of the apathy and laziness in our walks might be tied to some bit of disappointment we've (I've) got tucked away back there from things not being the same as they were. I totally get the logical answers to this stuff, but I'm trying to understand the issues behind those answers; the "why" questions.

What do you think?

Josiah's Bay

I was thinking about (read: longing for) the island we went to on our honeymoon, and especially this stretch of beach called Josiah's Bay. Its perfect. Anyway, I found some shots that give you a glimpse into my memory.

Missions

Its missions week out here in Texas. The chapel speaker from today encouraged all of us good seminarians who go (cough...are forced) to chapel to be open to the work God has for us in international missions. He had a nicely worded sentence that was supposed to be easy for me to remember that has now escaped me, but that was the general idea. Leaving chapel, I wondered out loud to a friend of mine how to equip, encourage, prepare, involve the local church in international missions. Its an area that I feel ill prepared for. I have not yet had the opportunity to be apart of any such project. We're planning on it, and you can send me some money if you want, but as of right now I don't have much to go on. Furthermore, I'm ignorant. When missionaries give messages about the needs of the world, I am learning. That isn't really a good thing. They breeze through a grotesque list of things that I know nothing about. Today's specifically included things like kids being chained to a board that they sleep on, 1.3 billion people who had never heard Jesus' name before, and oh yes, the people of somewhere who sell their children into slavery. I don't know where most of these places are. I don't know what the people in those places are going through. I certainly don't know how to instill a sense of responsibility to help or to facilitate an ability to follow through for the members of First Church USA concerning the people of... somewhere.

I'm called to student ministry. I have a booklet thing that an IMB guy gave me today. Page 16 has a picture of a 16-17 year old girl named Nic who is apparently a skateboarder from South Carolina (go figure) holding a naked baby in Bratislava, Slovakia. I'm not really sure what to do with that.

The Bumper Project

So check out the picture set of my bumper project over on the right

New Bike

The newest addition to the bike shop we've started in our apartment (a Trek 4300). We're currently the proud owners of this one, another trek, a specialized, a giant, and a cannondale. I think we have our bases covered.

P.S. we really don't have a bike shop.