Eight

I love today.

Today is a testament to God first and foremost.  To His lovingkindness and provision and sovereignty in my life, and that of my bride.  To His chastening and molding and shaping work in our shortcomings.  To His blessing and encouraging and equipping work in our giftings.

But is also a testament to my wife, Jessica.  We celebrate 8 years of marriage today.  8 years of pain and joy.  8 years of frequently undeserved love and respect.  8 years of being a team together in parenting, discipling, serving, training and leading in the body of Christ.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer writes,

“Marriage is more than your love for each other. It has a higher dignity and power, for it is God’s holy ordinance, through which He wills to perpetuate the human race till the end of time. In your love you see only your two selves in the world, but in marriage you are a link in the chain of the generations, which God causes to come and to pass away to His glory, and calls into His kingdom. In your love, you see only the heaven of your own happiness, but in marriage you are placed at a post of responsibility towards the world and mankind. Your love is your own private possession, but marriage is more than something personal – it is a status, an office. Just as it is the crown, and not merely the will to rule, that makes the king, so it is marriage, and not merely your love for each other, that joins you together in the sight of God and man.”
(Emphasis mine / Letters and Papers from Prison, 1951)

Eight years of marriage together.
Seven years of parenting together.
200Six when we first met together.
Five children together.
Four homes (NE, WY x2, TX) together.
Three minivans (after I promised never to own one!) together.
Two flawed humans, redeemed by a good; good Father.
One deliberate, intentional and enduring decision to unconditionally love each other, built on the foundation of first being loved by the Lord Jesus Christ.

Soli Deo Gloria.  Together.

*No judment on my lack skill as a numerologist.