Six months ago, we gathered with those we dearly love to celebrate this new thing God was doing, establishing a covenant between & with us.
We danced, we sang, we celebrated, and received the blessings spoken over us by our community.
As witnesses of the covenant, we asked them to stand with us not just on that beautiful August day, but to walk with us, pray with us, and support us in every season, helping us to uphold our covenant to one another.
In the swept-off-our-feet enchantment of that weekend, we didn’t imagine that just three weeks later we would tumble into a season of sickness and unknowns.
It wasn’t anything we expected in our first six months of marriage, but we have certainly gotten to practice & rely on God’s sustaining power to help us fulfill these words we promised one another:
In sickness and in health, I vow to tenderly care for you and to receive your care for me without fearing that I am a burden. On the best days and in the hardest seasons, I vow to be your joy-mate and meet you with compassion.
I’ve already broken the “without fearing that I’m a burden” part multiple times. But as he promised, Austin (and the Lord) continually meet me in my shame of needing to be cared for with deep compassion. Oh, it is freeing (but hard!) learning to be cared for!
And oh, are we ever learning. We’re learning to feel emotions we don’t want to feel, and to share in them together. We’re learning to carry both sorrow and joy hand in hand. We’re learning to experience the compassionate presence of Jesus with us each moment. And we’re learning to be cared for by the incredible people God has surrounded us with.
Yes, in this season we have relied more than ever on our community in ways neither of us would have been ok with before. And perhaps that’s the beauty of it…learning to live more and more how God designed us to live.
In the breaking, our way of living is becoming more whole.
In the unknowing, we are learning what it means to truly surrender and trust.
In the losing, we are finding a deeper, more abiding joy.
These past six months have been some of the strangest of my life. But I wouldn’t trade them for the world. Not just because they are radically changing me in beautiful ways, but because I have gotten to live them with my love, all the while surrounded by Love Himself.
We are so deeply grateful for each of you who have been walking with us through this! I continue to be grateful each time I hear someone is taking time to pray for us. While it’s been a struggle, we’re so thankful for the many scary things doctors have been able to rule out! They believe many symptoms could be explained by autoimmune issues, and we continue to look for answers as a team. We would ask for your continued prayers as we seek wisdom, answers and solutions with our (awesome!) medical team.