I sat yesterday with a couple I married not even two years ago. I love both of them deeply. We were there to witness them talking through their impending divorce. It was heart breaking. I kept thinking back to their wedding and how they had 7 couples on stage surrounding them as witnesses who would hold them accountable. Did we? Have we gone the extra mile to really walk with them through difficulties? Have we said the hard things that needed to be said? I think the answer is mostly yes. But it gave me great sadness to sit at that table and think back on their beautiful wedding night. I've married 6-7 couples and this was the first time I had experienced this.
Last night went well. We talked about honoring your parents and spouse--even in times when they aren't acting honorable. Some great stuff there. Julie Woodroof spoke about her father and how difficult it was to read those passages in Ephesians when here father didn't seem like an honorable man. He is now a Christian and loves the Lord, but it was good to hear that from Julie. I know many people are in that place.
I am busily preparing for Birmingham this weekend. ZOE is going out to sing at The National Shepherd's Conference. Not the sheep kind. :) I am looking forward to worshiping with them and everyone else from the Birmingham area. I'm also looking forward to the van trip. Those are always hilarious.
I got the finished mastered copy of the CD yesterday. I am mostly pleased. There are some things that are really bugging me, but it's always that way. I love jamming out to Blessed Be the Name of the Lord. Sheryl sounds absolutely incredible on the East Mountain South song--gracious, am I married to her??!! I have a lot to do in regards to folio and getting that ready. Whew--seems like the deadlines never end.
The replies on the cell phone posting were great! Jon--you cracked me up! Stay tuned, for one day I plan to write another post about email forwards. Basically, if your email tells me at some point that my spiritual health will be endangered unless I pass it on to 350 of my closest friends... "delete"!!! Or...as one I got yesterday stated,
For those that prefer to think that God is not watching over us....go ahead and delete this. For the rest of us.....pass this on.Need I say more? Please! We all live with enough guilt trips as it is! Have a nice day. And if you really want to have a nice day, you'll tell 139 people about this blog and ZOE. Otherwise, good luck.
6 comments:
It's true! One day I only got to tell 123 people, and my house was attacked by a bunch of midget sasquatch ninjas with halitosis, pelting us with three tons of brussels sprouts!
Oh, wait... no, that's not true. It was broccoli.
Interestingly, I had this same conversation about accountability to 3 others guys who I meet with regularly. Are we truly an accountability group? Or just a few guys who meet and say "yeah, everything's good between us and our wives except we should pray more together". I'm guilty of hiding some true concerns and sins that I should be sharing with these men who can then pray for me and keep me focused. We MUST do this for each other. Satan loves to get us all concerned about topics like gay marriage when some of our straight ones need just as much concern or more.
By the way, nice plug for ZOE at the end !! That was sneaky... :)
Lots of stuff that hit home in this post -
I agree with Donny - accountability is CRITICAL to the Christian life. Why do we resist the natural need we all have to rely on each other? I believe my church had some struggles with too much "discipleship" a while back and we've been on the other end of the spectrum ever since. Instead of holding each other up and calling each other out, we just smile and nod and say "How's it going?"
As long as we Christians are convinced that we're alone, isolated and "the only ones that feel this way", Satan can have his way with us. But if we band together, lean on one another and even open up with one another (the HORROR!), I think we can do anything. Aren't there some verses in the Bible about "the Body of Christ" and it's many parts? I thought so. :-)
OK...end of rant. But let me cap with this zinger -
My wife and I have been struggling with our marriage for quite some time now (some days are better than others, thank God!). I know that we're the only ones who can make it work, but I also know deep down that if my wife and I had opened up and shared some of our struggles with close friends BEFORE things got bad, things might never have gone bad at all.
OK, I'll close on a lighter note, sort of - my friends and I have been experiencing the joys of FWD'd emails lately, and I always send this link in response:
http://hoaxbusters.ciac.org/Thsi site has a great database of email hoaxes, Internet scams and the like. If you or someone you love gets an important email that they MUST forward, please check this site first. Email servers around the world will thank you, and my DELETE key will be less worn out too. :-)
You know what has been so hard for me through my friends divorce is this... They are divorcing because life was too hard together and they feel that they just can't live another minute under the same roof, but they want their kids to love both parents and adjust to this every other week here and there thing. They both say they still love eachother but that isn't enough.
From what I have seen divorce is no picnic. Being a single parent stinks! How can they ask their kids to love what they can not? Will being apart make it better? Some people live their whole lives trying to find someone to love who loves them back, to have kids and to be finacially comfortable. These people have all that and they are throwing it away becuse it is too hard??
I'm with God, I hate divorce! It just seems to hurt everyone involved and kills hope.
I will pray for your friends Brandon, as I pray for mine.
PS. The best thing I saw on FWDs is a fun flash at Smile Pop called the Internet Soapbox. Talk about LOL ;-{}
http://www.smilepop.com/index.cfm?action=viewcard&type=1&content_id=8407&page_id=8407
That's a good one, Steph! The threat at the end doesn't bother me much... I've already lost my hair!
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