mystery.

My last post was about not being consumed with all the details of preparing for a wedding. However, I'm a little consumed with attempting to prepare my heart for marriage. Get ready for an overload of marriage and love posts...

My wonderful friends, Aaron and Sarah Harris gave Austin and me a book called, "the mystery of marriage." I have only read the first 40 pages, but am about to transition into reading some books alongside our premarital counseling so I wanted to get my thoughts out before I totally forgot about it. Books like this have grown on me. I used to read them and be extremely cynical. However, I have grown to accept that even if I don't necessarily agree with everything, I am at least forced to think about it.

This first section struck a cord with me. Per usual when I write about a book, I'll quote the expert to get my points across. The author immediately dives into "the conflict between a yearning for solitude and a yearning for companionship." Well, shit. Welcome to 90% of Austin and my arguments. He is so much better at it than I am... That might be the worst part about it. I am so dead-set on being an "independent woman," but at the same time continually needing him. I handle it VERY poorly sometimes. "One of the hardest things in marriage is the feeling of being watched."

This quote has two stars around it in my book (literally): "There is a constant temptation to pull back from the full intensity of the relationship, to get along on only the basic requirements. But set against this is the constant challenge to give more and more of oneself, at deeper and deeper levels, and to see in one's partner a most abundant and perfect channel for the outpouring of the grace of God into one's life." Absolutely beautiful. I want to strive for this. The author also uses the metaphor of how a woman was created "bone of bone, flesh of flesh" and the Lord was "revealed in the incarnation as bone of our bone, flesh of our flesh." That is extremely powerful if you really think about it.

I'll end this random, scattered post with another encouraging quote...
"No worship could be more pleasing or acceptable to God than the worship of marital love, of two lives being played out against one another in a covenant of loving cooperation."