Four Things Marriage Has Taught Me About My Relationship With Christ

Hello, All!
Today's post is one that I've actually been considering for some time, but haven't been able to get my thoughts collected clearly enough to write a blog post about it. (Not that this is going to be miraculously coherent now that I'm actually writing it, mind you--I'm not sure I'm capable of such a thing. ;) Still, I shall do my best. 

As most of you are aware, Luke and I have been married for just over a year now, and I can honestly say that I am incredibly blessed to have him for my husband, life partner, and best friend. Marriage has been so different in many ways than I imagined it...different as in FAR better than I ever thought! I'm not saying we've had a perfect marriage with zero problems or difficulties, but I can say that these have been few and far between; mostly because he is so good about patiently dealing with issues when they come along, and putting up with me and my flaws incredibly well. ;)

Over this very new season of life, God has used marriage to teach me some valuable lessons that I believe can apply to anyone, married or not. I hope that these things will be a blessing to those who read it, no matter what stage of life you are currently in! :) Without further ado, here are four things God has been teaching me through our marriage thus far.

1. The importance of serving God with the right motives.
One thing that has struck me lately is the fact that motives do matter. If you are doing the right thing for the wrong reasons or with the wrong attitude, then how much good are you really doing? In 1 Corinthians 13, it talks about all the "good works" that you can do that become nothing without the motive being that of charity. 

Applying this with marriage...I have realized clearly that when I serve my husband out of the deep love and respect that I hold for him both as a man, and as the man in specific that God has placed in my life to lead and protect me, it is so much more fulfilling and full of joy! Tasks can become a blessing and a pleasure, whereas if I'm performing them merely out of duty, they have the potential to become routine or tedious. I believe service to God is the same way--when my heart attitude towards the acts of service are not right, I can very quickly slip into the mindset of either pride ("My church should be thankful they have me") or self pity ("No one recognizes how much I do around here"). None of which is truly pleasing to God. How convicting!

2. My responsibility to invest in my communication and relationship with The Lord.
A few weeks ago this thought really hit me...if I talked to Luke as often and as long as I talked to God, how would our relationship look? Wow. To rephrase, if I were to go days or weeks hardly talking to Luke at all (as I'm ashamed to say I've done with The Lord--short, unfocused prayer times, etc.) we would probably have a really terrible marriage. I know everyone talks about the importance of communication in marriage, so much so that it sounds cliche, but it's really incredibly true. The minute our loving and focused communication starts slipping, our closeness begins to suffer. The sad thing to me is that in the area of my relationship with God, a communication breach is always MY FAULT. Not His. Ever, in any way. God has given me His Word, and promised to speak to me through it. I have everything I need, and yet I fail Him and hinder a close, loving relationship by MY lack of communication. It would be as if Luke came home from work with loving words and arms open wide for me, and I turned my back and ignored him. I wouldn't dream of doing that to my sweet husband...yet how often do I neglect to draw near to my Lord because I "don't have the time"? 

3. How seriously I need to take sin.
When I hurt Luke, even in a small or seemingly insignificant way, it breaks my heart. I can't be content or happy until I have asked and received his forgiveness, and I know that things are reconciled between us. The feeling that I have caused a rift between us is something that I can hardly stand.

And yet, so often I tend to take a light view of "little" sins or offenses against God. I've really been convicted about this lately, because obviously I should be much more zealous about keeping a "clean slate" with God than I am even with my husband!

4. How much God loves me.
My husband loves me with such a selfless and unconditional love. He shows it every day through his words and actions--there has never been a time when I doubted that he loved me dearly. God has used Luke's love in my life to prove to me how much He Himself loves me. As much as I love and respect my husband, he is a sinner, as am I. And yet, if the love and care of a mere flawed human being can be so sweet and fulfilling to me, how much more the love of a perfect and unchanging God? To take this thought a step further...Luke has seen me at my worst and chosen to love me still. But though he knows me better than any other human on earth, even he cannot see my heart and the sin and folly it contains. God can, and His love for me is still perfect. That is amazing to think about! God knows all my deepest thoughts and imperfections, and keeps on loving me in spite of them. 

I hope that these thoughts were a blessing to you, whether you are in a relationship or not. They have been coming back to me over and over during the last few months, so I figured it was about time I tried to verbalize them. :) 

I'm sure once baby comes, I will have a whole new world of things God will want to teach me through that! For those wondering, the pregnancy is going well, and baby seems to be progressing as well as possible! :) I'll be 18 weeks on Tuesday, which means we will be able to find out the gender of our little one in about 2-3 weeks, depending on when I can get the scan before or after Thanksgiving. I'll be sharing on here once we find out!

Have a wonderful week! 
Mykaela

A Love Story Long Awaited

Hello, all!
The story I'm about to tell has been much requested, and there are many of you I've never given the detailed version to, so brace yourselves. ;) In my last post, I mentioned a special young man that had entered my life. His name is Luke, and this is the story of how we met. :)

In order to tell that, I have to back up around 4 years, to 2013. That year, my parents took a trip out to Missouri for a conference. While there, my mom met a young lady named Bethany, and they totally hit it off. My mom has 8 kids, and doesn't normally keep in close touch with people, because life is just crazy...but for some reason, (which I can now see was God's hand :), she and Beth kept in contact pretty regularly over the next 3 years. I always enjoyed hearing about her family and how things were going, but never really talked with Bethany myself. 

In our hectic and long drawn out shuffle of moving from Omak to Wenatchee, they lost touch for over a year. Fast forward to August of last year (2017). One evening, my mom was on the Bible app, and it "randomly" popped up with a name--Bethany is on this app, would you like to connect with her? My mom promptly emailed her and did some catching up. 

She remembered that Bethany had a brother, and asked right out if he was still single. ;P Subtle, mom. Thanks. ;D Anyway, Bethany informed her that he was, and of all things, my DAD totally jumped on the wagon and started immediately trying to initiate us getting to know each other better! Both Luke and I were completely uninterested at this point. We had both only recently come to the point of being completely and fully surrendered to being single, for the rest of our lives if that's what God's will was! And now, all of a sudden, we were supposed to start getting to know this perfect stranger?! Literally all I knew about Luke at this stage of the game was his name. That's IT. But, we both agreed to pray about it for two weeks. At the end of that time, it didn't seem like there was a neon YES in the sky, but there also weren't any red flags. Reluctantly, we started emailing.

We did a few "hello, my name is" type emails, but after that it felt so awkward, at least for me. I didn't know where to go from there. Luke's dad suggested that we could write actual paper letters, which I was very much in favor of. For some reason, it's a lot easier for me to express myself with a pen and paper than in an email. 

After about 3 letters, my interest level had spiked by approximately 100%. ;P I wanted him to visit. Very much so. ;) I'll never forget getting the email from my dad while I was at work that Luke was actually going to come!! On December 29, 2017, my dad went and picked him up from the airport, and we met for the first time at my workplace. Over the next few days, I pretty much lost my heart to him. ;) I didn't mean for it to happen, but it just did! I felt completely at home and comfortable around him almost immediately, which is not a typical thing, even for mostly extroverted me. We had the time of our lives.

Luke and my dad left on the same day...Luke to go back home, and my dad to fly down to Jamaica for a week to teach some classes. That was honestly one of the longest weeks of my life. ;) A few days after my dad got home though, Luke made it official, and our relationship really began! :)

We talked via Marco Polo pretty exclusively at first. After a while, we started using FaceTime as well, and although they aren't NEARLY as nice as talking in person, I am incredibly grateful for technology like this that allowed us to get to know each other!

I realize I'm rambling here...I'll speed things up. In April, my entire family took a three week trip, driving down to MO for the missions conference at Luke's church. Yet again, I had an absolutely amazing time, and was more sure than ever that I really, REALLY liked this guy. ;) 

A month later, at the beginning of May, Luke flew out for 4 days and surprised me. It was the most awesome surprise ever...wow. I couldn't believe he'd pulled it off!! Obviously, lots of help was involved from family on both sides in order to keep it a secret. ;) Saying goodbye at the airport at the end of that visit was one of the hardest things I have ever done. 

And then, I booked a ticket to fly out there on July 4, only a month ago. I got in on a Wednesday afternoon, and on Friday, Luke and I went to a place called Hahatonka State Park with his mom and one of his sisters. All day, we wandered around the beautiful trails and hills, just enjoying the day (though it was pretty hot ;P).

Eventually, we made our way down to a beautiful spot down by the water. I took my shoes off and waded a bit, and when I came back up on the bank, Luke suggested we take a picture. We stood together and his mom started videoing, unbeknownst to me. ;) Before I knew it, Luke was down on one knee, asking me if I would be his wife. I was SO utterly overwhelmed and overjoyed!!! When I got my breath back, I said YES! (I actually said it 5 or 6 times, I think. ;) He put the most lovely ring I'd ever seen on my finger, and I haven't really left Cloud 9 since. 

For the first time in my life, I was quite literally speechless. For about 45 minutes, all I could do was grin from ear to ear, with absolutely nothing coherent to say. ;P A while later, as we sat together at the place where he'd proposed, he turned to me and said, "Well? Are we going to jump in?" Ha. Are we going to jump in, indeed. You all know me, adventure calls, I answer. ;D We went up the trail a little ways to an outcropping that hung over some of the bluest (and I soon found out, some of the coldest) water I'd ever seen. On the count of three, we jumped, and it turned out it was deeper than either of us expected...and WOW it was so cold! :D It was the most awesome spontaneous memory, though, I am SO glad we did it. It just made the day that much more spectacular. :) 

The next few days were some of the happiest in my life. I don't know why, but I didn't realize how much our relationship would shift after we were officially engaged. I always kind of assumed it would be pretty much the same as it was before (which was awesome). Not so. For one thing, we had waited until after we were engaged to exchange those incredibly amazing words, "I love you". I had thought those words about a billion times. ;) Being able to finally say them freely was the most wonderful thing EVER. :D I think I've said them approximately innumerable times since. ;) 

The wedding is set for October 12, just over 90 days from when he first asked me! :) We have a wedding website that you can find at this link. We were able to meet up with my sweet friend Kimberly before I left Missouri, and she took some lovely engagement pictures for us. :)

I can't even begin to express how grateful I am that God has blessed me with this relationship. Luke is so much more amazing than I ever could have imagined. Without getting too mushy, (haha! ;) I will say that he has loved me infinitely more than I ever thought anyone but The Lord could or would love me! He is incredibly strong, loyal, encouraging, hilarious, and downright crazy handsome. ;) Over this relationship, he has become my best friend, and I cannot wait to spend the rest of my life with him! <3 

May I offer the encouragement that the right man is so completely worth waiting for. If you are wondering why God is taking so long to bring someone into your life, please take heart...it seems long (believe me, I know!), but it is SO worthwhile! :) Keep up the good work in the meantime, you won't regret it!

Without further ado, I am giving the "floor" to Luke, who will close out this rather lengthy post. ;) Thanks for sticking it through! :D

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Well, this seems like a bad start to happily ever after - we aren't even married yet and she's already telling me, "You're on the floor."  ;P  But to the topic at hand: I'm no author, but I'll attempt to give the flip-side of the story Mykaela just told by giving a glimpse of things from my perspective.  I'll start from the point where Mrs. McDowell reestablished communication with my sister.  The first time I can remember ever hearing anything about Mykaela went something like this...

Beth (my sister): "Hey Luke, do you remember Mrs. McDowell, the missionary wife I used to email?"

Me: "Yeah, I think so..."

Beth: "Well, we started talking again on the Bible app, and she just asked me if you were still single."

Me: (cringes) "Oh. Great."

Yup.  That's about how it went.  But before you judge me too harshly, let me give some context to the situation.  1)  I was 24 at the time,  2) I was not married,  3) I had a number of friends who had been... shall we say, "zealously concerned" about eliminating point number 2 for a few years by then.  You get the idea.  In short, I was NOT particularly excited about what this development might imply.  Like MK said, I had fairly recently reached the point in my walk with God where I was perfectly happy to stay single for the rest of my life if He so desired (yes, it took me awhile to get there, unfortunately), and I didn't want to lose the simple peace that I had by getting caught up in the possibility of a relationship.  Honestly, I just wanted to ignore the entire thing.  The next day, her dad called.

Over the next few weeks, I prayed quite a lot, did a fair amount of internet stalking (how else was I supposed to find anything out about a girl who lived 2,000 miles away?), and Mykaela and I exchanged several emails and letters.  Eventually, though I was still hesitant to begin a relationship, I came to the belief that God was telling me that I needed to go up to WA for a visit.  So off I went, hesitant, but cautiously hopeful as well.

It didn't take long for me to realize just how awesome this girl was.  By the end of the visit, I was smitten.  After a couple of weeks spent in prayer, I was confident that a relationship was part of God's will.  I'll never forget making the call to Bro. McDowell to officially start things off!  I was grinning ear to ear!

In interest of keeping this as short as I can, I'll skip ahead to July 6th.  I WAS SO NERVOUS!!!  I mean, I was pretty sure she would say, "Yes," but there was still a little voice in my head saying, "What if she doesn't?"  But she did! :D  Best.  Day.  Ever!  (Shortly to be superseded by October 12th)  ;)  There are no words to describe a blessing like Mykaela.  I do NOT deserve the attention, much less love, of this amazing girl!  (No, MK, you can't delete that because it is true - you said I could write whatever I wanted).  God has been so good!  And let me reiterate what Mykaela said earlier: wait on God.  It will be worth it - far more than you can possibly imagine!

Things I Wish I’d Done Differently Before I Got Married: Guest Post!

Hello everyone!!

Happy Valentine's Day to those of you who are excited about it...for those of us who aren't so much, I wish you a very happy Day-before-sale-candy day. ;P Whether you are in a relationship or not, you could be at some point in your life, depending on what God has for you. Today I have a really awesome guest post from my good friend, Katie! She has been such a blessing to me during the time that I've known her. We even had our wisdom teeth out around the same time, so were able to commiserate with each other on our unfortunate aftermath. :'D Ahem. Anyway, here are some do's and dont's that she put together, and this list was a really convicting one for me at least! I hope you enjoy!

Things I Wish I’d Done Differently Before I Got Married

First of all, let me say that I’m by no means an expert on this! I’ve only been married 3 ½ years, and it doesn’t seem like even that long. I feel like I should have learned a whole lot more by now. But most of it, I wish I’d learned before I even got married! To be quite honest, if someone I knew back then who had been married a few years had tried to give me advice, I don’t know if I would have taken it. Because people like that were so old and weird ;) And who know more about how to live my life than myself, right? So, if you read through this thinking, “Oh brother, who does she think she is?” I completely understand your sentiment! The answer is: I’m someone who absolutely LOVES being married, and I hope that’s part of God’s plan for your life, and if I can say anything that will help you, I’m going to try! I truly don’t feel like I’m on a different level than you, so please let me speak to you as if we were close friends. :)

Don’t:

•  Get caught up in daydreams

Crushes are dangerous things. You’re dreaming about a young man who is not yours and possibly never will be. Would you want to do that after you are married? I hope not! Then why do it now, when God already has someone picked out for you whose attention you don’t need to worry about getting?

Romantic books and movies sure don’t help you a whole lot. (And yes… I’m talking about Janette Oke, Anne of Green Gables, and The Sound of Music!) I have a younger friend who decided when she was 16 or so to stop reading any romantic fiction whatsoever, because she realized that she really had no reason to think so much about romance until God put it in her life. After a struggle, I followed her example, for the most part anyway! I’m so glad I did! I’m not saying that these things are bad, but first of all, ask yourself before God WHY it is you are reading them, and if there’s something else He wants you to spend your time on. Develop your skills and increase your knowledge so that when you are married, you will be more of a blessing to your husband!

•  Obsess over your body

I’m going to be blunt here. Guys are not that picky. Take care of your body, obviously, as in maintain a healthy weight (which will be different for everyone). But do not stress over it, because a good man is not going to love you for your body, and you’ll probably be surprised by how beautiful the crazy guy actually thinks you are. A cheerful attitude, by the way, changes the way other people view you entirely!

• Be selfish

The closer you get to someone, the more selfishness shows. You already know that, because most likely, you tend to be less generous and forgiving with your siblings than with your friends. Well, you’re going to be in a lot closer proximity to your husband, so ask God to enable you to curb that selfishness NOW.

• Take your family for granted

I’m occasionally surprised when I remember times that I was just sick of my family before I got married, because now I think they’re awesome! I compare them with other people and think, wow, other people are weird! Or boring! I’m sure glad MY family’s not… HA, HA, HA. I now treasure each time I have the chance to be with my parents and siblings. If only I had done that before!

As I write this, my grandpa is in ICU, struggling for each breath. He probably doesn’t have long to live. Treasure your family. I don’t know for sure that he is saved. Make sure you are showing Christ to your family all the time with your life, and when you can, with your words. Remember when Jesus called Andrew to “follow me”? Andrew immediately went and shared the good news with his brother (John 1:41). I think that is a good principle to follow.

• Make marriage your end goal 

Marriage should never be your end goal. (Think of how obsessed Mrs. Bennett is with it… hee hee.) Seriously though, if you do get married, you’re still just beginning. If you don’t, or if your husband dies before you, do you want to feel like a failure? Like you’re not a person because you aren’t married? Living for Christ should be your goal throughout your entire life. See next point…

Do:

• Let Jesus be your all-in-all 

Living for Christ is the only way to be a true success in life. The way you do that is going to be different during different stages of your life. You will never know what God expects of you for the rest of your life all at once. He gives us basic principles to follow, of course, but you may not always know what He wants you to do an hour from now until He shows you. Be flexible. Pray without ceasing, and thank Him in and for everything. Never forget that He is the one who makes you complete… not your husband or anyone or anything else. 

•  Be modest. Always. 

I think it’s safe to say that if men commit adultery in God’s eyes by lusting after a woman, women commit adultery in God’s eyes if they deliberately dress in a way meant to get any man’s attention (even if it’s just by being “cute”... be careful with that, too. Things we think are “cute” may be immodest without us knowing it). I happen to be married to a very honest man who says that even a brief accidental glance at a woman in a tank top can be a stumbling block to men. And as my dad says, “Even a good dog will bite if you pull his tail enough.” If you’re not sure whether your attire is modest, ask your dad, or if you’re not comfortable asking him, ask a married lady you trust to give you an honest answer based on what she knows about her husband. It’s probably best not to ask your unmarried girl friends like I did before I was married… only to have my very honest future husband ask me not to wear a certain shirt. (Hint: If your brother ever says “I can see what you had for breakfast through that shirt”… um, find something else to wear before you head out in public.)

• Enjoy homemaking 

Even if you don’t end up getting married, you’re still probably going to be a homemaker! And most likely, you’ll still end up watching and teaching little kids, too (“train up a child” is not just for parents; all of us train children by our example). Learn to enjoy it and do it “as to the Lord, and not unto men” (Col. 3:23)

•    Practice patience now- not later! 

Don’t procrastinate on being patient ;) It’s like anything else… if you don’t make a habit of it, it won’t come automatically. I find it interesting that in I Corinthians 13, the first way that Paul defines love is “Charity suffereth long.” Oh, boy. Sometimes I get impatient with people for being “too patient” with other people! Fail.

•  Expect to be surprised! 

Like… you’re even going to be surprised by what you’re surprised by! The man you marry will not be exactly who you expected to marry. He will have different expectations of you than you thought you knew he would! No matter how well you know your fiancé, you’re going to quickly find out things about each other that you never thought to discuss before you got married J Make sure you agree on the big things. Make sure you are seeking God together and individually on ALL things. But there’s still going to be silly little things that completely baffle you about each other!

For those of you who are married- isn’t it great? :) I pray your love “never grows old”! My husband and I occasionally have people tell us, “Oh, you’re still in the honeymoon stage. Sooner or later you’ll want to take a break from each other.” Thank goodness, we haven’t had that happen yet! You’ve all heard people talk about the “ups and downs” of marriage. Maybe that is the way it is for most couples, but I completely, 100%, without a doubt believe that that’s not how it’s supposed to be! Yes, you’re going to go through the struggles of life together. You’re not going to agree on everything. That’s why God made a chain of command for us- God is your husband’s authority, and your husband is yours (unless your husband is asking you to sin, of course.) There is a verse I have to remind myself of all the time- “Only by pride cometh contention” (Proverbs 13:10). So, if you’re having “communication problems”, ask yourself if you are being prideful in not submitting to God or your husband in an area of your life. He’ll usually show you something!! (This goes for all of you!)

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Thank you so much to Katie for sharing these thoughts! By the way, Katie's sister is Jenny, who leaves great comments all the time on this blog...I have yet to ask her for a guest post, but it's coming! ;) Even if I have to resort to unsavory measures. ;) I hope you all have a lovely day and week! Keep your heart focused on the things of God! <3

Mykaela