weekender retreat

Last weekend Jeff & I went on a pre marital retreat with Legacy Family Ministries - it was GREAT! I really wasn't initially looking forward to it - I'm one of those people that always hated retreats, especially ones with a bunch of random people I've never met and will probably never see again. Fortunately, Anna Beth & Keith went with us and that was WONDERFUL! It was really good for us to get to spend time with them. I'm so proud of them for the ways they have chosen to respond to everything that has happened recently and not that my stamp means anything, but I TOTALLY approve them for marriage =o) So - back to why this weekend was great:
I've known (and probably the watching world has too) for a while that I have some pride, selfishness, and overall filth in my life that does not contribute to my future spouse's wholeness. I've finally repented over that. It is one thing to acknowledge, to confess even, but to really feel the weight of that and what it does to our relationship was good for me. I think that 80% of the conflict we have could be alleviated if not totally eliminated if I would choose humility and love instead of pride and selfishness. Byron gave a great talk about this - he had this great black and white picture of Carla in her wedding dress and talked about how as she walked down the isle he thought to himself 'this is going to be easy!'. He had no idea how their son would battle cancer as a toddler for 2 years and all of the hardship they would face together and as a family. As he shared about ideals and how we all go into marriage with this idea about who our spouse should be, what marriage should be like, the expectations we've been building for a lifetime.... it really is necessary to tear those things down in order to hold on to the person. As he shared this he ripped up the picture of Carla on their wedding day and talked about how he could choose to hold on to the ideal and be unhappy that they haven't reached it or he could rip it up and hold on to Carla the person. I mean after all isn't that what God did for us? He could have held us to the unreachable ideal and punished us all for not being who He created us to be, but instead he ripped up that ideal in Jesus Christ so that He could hold on to us as we are. And I have the same choice in front of me for the rest of my life. I can tear apart Jeff for his 'failures' to meet my expectations, or I can rip up the ideal to hold on to Jeff just as he is, even when it isn't what I expected. I'm so excited about that and so necessarily humbled. Jeff has graciously forgiven me and I think we love each other even more coming out of this weekend. I can't wait to get married!!! Only 6.5 more weeks! =o)