If you haven't seen the movie Fireproof yet, you're missing out on the best movie ever made about marital strife and reconciliation. In the movie, there is a song by Casting Crowns called Slow Fade. The song is about how people typically end up making a series of choices, not a single choice, that end up destroying their relationships and lives. The video for the song is powerful, please take a few minutes to watch it. Additionally, the second video is of Mark Hall, lead singer of Casting Crowns and youth pastor, doing a quick devotional on the concepts behind Slow Fade. I hope these … [Read more...]
Do You Like Your Boyfriend/Girlfriend?
Why would I be dating, and considering marrying, someone I don't like? We date people we like… right? It seems like the answer to this question would be an obvious "yes," but more often than we realize, relationships can form based on other factors. Factors like what? When we find someone incredibly attractive to us, we can find ourselves trying to like them for who they are, while the driving force behind the relationship is really their incredible good looks. In other cases, we can be so enamored with their high moral character that we ignore the other aspects of their personality that we … [Read more...]
Marriage as a Way to Grow Closer to God (Gary Thomas)
One of the books we encourage our clients to read is Sacred Marriage by Gary Thomas. I love the sub-title of the book as well: "What if God designed marriage to make us holy more than to make us happy?" It's a striking question that really is worth our time to ponder. In the book, he relates many different aspects of marriage and how each ties to an aspect of our relationship with God. Here are just a few of some of the chapter subjects: How Marriage Teaches Us to Love How Marriage Exposes Our Sin How Marriage Teaches Us to Forgive How Marriage Can Make Us More Aware of God's … [Read more...]
Expectations, Negativism, and Complaining
Like many typical women, I love romantic comedies. There is something so exciting about boy meeting girl, boy and girl "falling" in love, boy and girl fighting, and then boy and girl getting back together again. Movies of this sort repeatedly have the same plot with different characters. It is not uncommon to get to the end of a romantic comedy, or a romantic drama, and hear the main characters tell each other things like, "You're all that I need," or "You are my everything!" In the moment, it can seem like such a wonderfully romantic phrase, but in a real life relationship, phrases like those … [Read more...]
Jumping Off a Cliff into Culinary Delight
Recently, Eric and I celebrated an anniversary and, as is custom, Eric chose for us a special place to eat. He usually takes me to a fun, new place for special occasions; and while he plans to keep the place a secret, he usually asks me at the last minute if I want to know where we are going... and I almost always do. When it comes to food (and life), my natural inclination is to prepare. I don't want to be craving steak only to end up at the world's greatest pizza restaurant (although I can almost always shift my taste buds for pizza). So, where did he take me? Eric took me to a tapas bar. … [Read more...]
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