It’s always seemed ironic to me that the things in life that are the most trying are always and without fail the most rewarding. Hopefully Casey doesn’t get too ruffled with me since that’s the first sentence of my blog about marriage and the race. I have to say that being married on the race is definitely a monumental blessing. The opportunity to grow together is one that I feel few people have the opportunity to experience. I feel we’ve grown together in ways that would take a decade to do living our “normal” lives back home. No matter what happens on the race, I always have my best friend and companion to share my thoughts and feelings with. I have a safe place every day and night where I know I can go to and be completely open and vulnerable. I have had someone to keep me honest and devoted in my walk with Christ. I have had a constant reminder of why we came on the race and why we are trying to build a life centered on God and devoted to serving Him. If I start hopping onto my soap box too much she’ll remind to step down and take things to God before I get my panties in a knot.
In Casey, I have someone that I know I can talk to about what happened throughout the entire 11 months and understand where I’m coming from. When we get home I won’t have to struggle with trying to explain my experiences and there being no one that I can relate. The other side to that coin is though we have been with each other for the same countries and contacts we have had two very different experiences. Because of our different experiences I have the benefit of a very different perspective than my own. I feel this is one of the greatest advantages of being married and moving on in life with one another. I’ll always have Casey’s point of view to combine with my own. I’ll always be able to see a fuller picture of any shared experience because I get to see it with another set of eyes and one of the purest hearts known to mankind.
Throughout the race I have had Casey to speak life into me. Whether I doubted my ability to share the message the Lord had put on my heart or the effectiveness of my efforts to serve, I have my wife to encourage and challenge me. I have the Love of my life to push me when I need to be pushed and support me when I need to stand firm. I have seen God’s hand at work as much in our marriage and my relationship with my wife as I have in any other ministry on the race. I have also been more challenged by what God has shown me through our marriage and through Casey’s heart than anything I’ve experienced in my life.
When Casey and I were married, like any couple we were still trying to learn about one another. We hung out in the same group of friends for about 6 months before we started dating. We dated only about 1 month before we decided we were going to get married and ended up being engaged about 5 months. So we knew each other about 1 year before we were married. We were married about 1 ½ years before we came on the race. This isn’t very much time for anyone to get to know someone else. Factor into that also that Casey worked full time, I went to school full time and worked from 30-40 hours per week and also was in the Army Reserves at the time. Casey and I only had a few hours together a night and maybe one or two full days a month to spend with each other. Not much time at all to really grow to know your spouse in the first year or so of marriage.
So we went from very little time together to living in a 3 person tent together and being basically in one another’s face 24/7. Needless to say there were some growing pains. The best thing about always being in each other’s space is that you are forced to work at your issues and fight your way through them. You can’t just avoid one another and decide to not talk about things, there’s nowhere to run off to. You can’t hide yourself in work or xbox or reading, or whatever it is that you do to find distraction. A lot of the distractions we love so much go out the window when there is no electricity or internet and live with a team of 5 other people. In times like these, many aspects of our character that we are either not aware of or not very proud of come to light. Your patience is tested, the ability to show grace for one another often proves to be wanting. Pride shines brighter than a lighthouse on a stormy night. Most of us are not eager to bring our character flaws to light. We’d rather bury them with all the other painful scars and memories we’ve become so efficient at covering up. This isn’t gonna happen if you’re truly trying to serve the Lord and honor your spouse as the bible calls us to do. If I am to love my wife as Christ loves the Church I can’t continue to live in a way that puts my pride before humbling myself before my wife, let alone before my God. I need to show grace and take a bite of humble pie when I believe my way is the right way, but it is not the only way. Casey shows me every day what it means to prefer someone else over yourself. She shows me the power of living a life in the Fruits of the Spirit. She shows me more about myself than I often see when I look in the mirror, the things that the Lord is continuing to blossom within me and the buds that he’s trying to cut off. Through Casey, the Lord is showing me how to be a better man of God, a man that God will hopefully be able to say “Well done good and faithful servant.”
What it comes down to is this; the race is not a honeymoon. You’ll quickly wakeup from the honeymoon faze if you do the race in the sense that much of what we’re told to believe marriage is, just isn’t correct. You’ll wakeup from the false reality of what movies, TV and pop culture tell you marriage is supposed to be. You’ll wakeup from your own false pretenses and expectations about what you think marriage is. Isn’t that what we all want? To live the truth that God has for us, the one and only truth given to us by the Word as a gift from our Maker. Marriage is a gift and a blessing and we need to thank God for it by honoring and serving Him in all we do. Don’t do the race because you want to have a cool experience with your spouse, something to tell the kids about when mom and dad did wild and crazy things. Don’t do it because you think it’s only about you growing as an individual. If there’s anything I’ve learned about the race it’s that it’s not about me and it’s not about Casey, it’s not about appreciating all that we have in the states. It’s not about your journey; it’s about God and what you can do for God to make an impact in a broken world. It’s about realizing that when you give all that you are to God, everything else will fall into place. God will give you the opportunity to build patience and grace into your life. He will give you the ability to overcome the pain of having the chains and walls of pride broken off. God will bless your marriage and you will prosper in it through Him. So plan to be stretched, expect to be challenged and find strength in pain. God will be with you every second of everyday to pick you back up, dust your shoulders off, pat you on the butt and tell you to get right back in there to keep fighting the good fight. Then your spouse can give you a pat on the butt and you get to learn all about finding creative ways to make time for one another while living in community and embarrassing the rest of your team because your lovely wife has no shame telling everyone everything about the joys of the more intimate details of marriage.
