Old thoughts with a new name

By Mary

Here's an assortment of my thoughts from the past several weeks. Please excuse the long absence--we were both quite busy with a wedding and and vacations...=)

The last month was a whirlwind of last minute wedding details, of out of town guests, last chance get togethers with friends and the strange feeling that it couldn't possibly be all for my own wedding. Even in my veil and the most beautiful dress I'll ever wear, standing next to my dad watching my dearest friends in the world walk down the aisle ahead of me, it felt unreal.

Even after the fact it feels that way sometimes. I asked my husband yesterday if it ever felt weird to him that we're really married. I think he thought I was a little crazy. But I hope I never lose that little bit of awe at the gift of being married to the man of my dreams.

Life is starting to take on a pattern again--and it's so completely different from the one it had before. Where there was one, now there's two. A new name, new state, new church and a whole new set of things to get used to as the wife of a Marine.

So much is foreign right now--even my own last name. And despite knowing previously that marriage wasn't all a piece of cake, I guess I never really thought about how it would shine a spotlight on my sin. How clearly selfishness and pride show up when all the normal comforts and confort zones are taken away and you're left to get along with each other day in and day out.

God has blessed me so much already, to give me a godly man to submit to and love, to forgive and be forgiven.

It's rained every day since we've been back in North Carolina. I love a good rainstorm. I generally take rain as God's own personal little gift to me. It came down hard all day once at the end of our honeymoon. We were able to sit outside on our hotel room balcony and watch the slate gray clouds roll down across the sky and blend in with the stormy ocean. I've never seen a storm like that over the ocean--little pitchforks of lightning shooting down into the waters that swelled and broke in violent white crested waves. And all the while a thick curtain of rain poured down, obscuring the horizon.

How glorious God is, mighty and powerful. Remember to look for Him everywhere--a stranger's smile, an old friend's hug, the long awaited blessing and the unexpected challenge. In every grain of sand and every drop of rain...