Writing this wedding website and planning our big day has been a revealing project! Both making this site and planning a wedding turns out to be really hard work. There are a lot of details and decisions that impact everyone attending. It’s scary to think about and it feels like it’s approaching so fast.
I feel like I’m learning lot about Ann through this process. She has been dreaming about her wedding since she was a little girl. In some ways I understand why most guys just show up on the day and stay out of the wedding planning. Planning a wedding is hard, very hard. Ann and I have had our share of arguments and our share of apologies already. The process has revealed to me how selfish I can be at times. I can be a real pecker head about trying to make everything unique and exciting. Planning our wedding has been great marriage preparation. I am learning how to communicate with Ann, how to understand her perspective, and how to listen to her needs and desires. There is such pressure to go passive and let her do everything while I work on my own projects instead. I am so inclined to act as a passive man. This passivity in me is a poison to our love story. I must battle it. When I give into passivity while planning the wedding, I can tell that a lovely part of Ann starts to die. When I stand my ground and fight to stay the course and be a part of the planning I feel like I am getting stronger.
Going passive is every man’s battle. Most men give into it and let its poison run through their family. Passivity is the root of the original sin of Adam in the Garden. Follow my logic. Don’t you think that God made Adam to be able to take care of the situation with the serpent? Of course God did! I Timothy 2:14 claims that Eve was deceived in the garden but Adam willfully took from the tree. Many scholars believe that Eve believed the serpent’s lies and Adam was choosing death with Eve over life with God. And if Adam wasn’t deceived then why didn’t he do anything before Eve ate the fruit? We assume Adam was not near Eve but Genesis 3:6 says that Adam was standing right there. Gosh… how pathetic! I imagine Adam being powerful beyond belief considering he was the perfect man, he should have killed the serpent right there. Adam could have handled that serpent the way most men handle a poisonous snake in the house. The natural thing is to cut it’s head off and skin it. God set his warrior nature into Adam and into every man for a reason and when we go limp we loose any chance at paradise. Because of Adam’s passivity we all must live in a broken world. However, every day we still must make a choice. We must choose whether we will build the kingdom with our strength or let it decay with our absence.
Ever since the fall of Adam finding the life that we were made for is brutally hard. I am realizing that if Ann is ever going to have the wedding that she desires I am going to have to play the man through the process. Even if it means that Ann and I have hour long conversations about complimentary colors, bridesmaid dresses, or wedding invitations I must not check out. Even if I don’t care, I must engage. It’s not about the colors or the flowers, it’s about being present. It’s about making a decision to be the man that I want to be. It’s about Ann knowing that her heart matters to me.
Please pray for me. Please pray for our marriage. Please pray specifically that God would give me the strength to live with honor, intentionality, and sacrifice as a fiance and then a husband to Ann. Pray that God would help me to lead by His example in my home. Don’t just say that you will pray, please really pray. I need it, because I so often don’t have it when it comes to my relationship with Ann. I desire to be a powerful husband with a radiant bride; your prayers might be the determing factor on June 11th.
