Dear Friends and Family,
Last weekend we celebrated our one year wedding anniversary! What a great year it has been for both of us! A mere 365 days has opened our eyes in many new ways and we would like to take just a moment to share a few things we’ve learned over the past year.
1.) Marriage isn’t going to make us happy.
Before we got married, we both thought that we were pretty much the perfect spouse and that our marriage was just going to be fantastic all the time. Now of course we had read dozens of books and had months of pre-marital counseling that told us otherwise, but to some degree we still believed that lie. It didn’t take long, however, to realize that we were definitely fallen humans, and that our sin was a major factor in our marriage. We’re both very sinful, very selfish, and very prideful. God has graciously shown us through our marriage that we ourselves are incredibly sinful, and our spouse is as well. We have learned that our marriage cannot be the source of our happiness.
2.) Marriage is a lot of fun!
So, our marriage will not be the root of our happiness; however we certainly have been happy in our marriage! It seems as if many of our peers have a very negative view of marriage, which is not a shock when you hear many older couples (if they’re still married) complaining about their spouse/marriage. (Husband calling the wife the ball and chain; wife calling the husband incompetent; both complaining about being stuck together). We have come to find out that marriage is indeed a lot of fun. It’s not easy, but this last year has been some of the best times of our lives. We have become even closer friends and realized what a blessing it is to share life with one another.
3.) Marriage teaches us about the gospel.
Over the last year our understanding of the gospel has grown immensely. The Holy Spirit has used our marriage to reveal to us who God is, what he’s done, who we are, and what we’ve done. God created marriage before sin entered the world. He created it to be good because he is good. However, we sinned; we rebelled. So marriage is no longer what it was originally created to be. But with the gospel there is hope. And through the gospel there is hope even for our marriage. The gospel teaches us that we don’t have to make our spouse pay for hurting us, because Christ paid for both of our sins. We don’t have to expect our spouse to fulfill all our wants and desires because Christ fulfills us. As we learn to believe the gospel and understand how it affects our marriage, we find that the Holy Spirit is making us more like Christ every day.
Overall it has been an absolutely wonderful year full of fun, (some pain), laughter, and growth. We know that we have a lot more to learn. In fact at times it feels like we know less than when we began. But we are confident that the Holy Spirit will continue to work in and through us until we meet Jesus face to face.
In Christ,
Jordan and Hannah
