That's me on the left, with my husband Steve and our granddaughter on her blessing day. On the right is a picture of my mother and father. Admittedly, that picture dates me a little bit! The picture was taken in 1957, just before my brother was born. I came along a few years later.
I adore my husband, we've been married for 29 years. We've been blessed to raise 5 wonderful children, and are now blessed with 4 grandchildren. I honor my own parents, who gave so much of themselves to raise my brother and I. Marriage is worth the time and effort to make successful. I'm excited to create this blog about marriage, and raising families. Nothing means more to me then my husband and my family.
So, why is marriage so important? I believe it begins with the very foundation of who we are, children of a loving Father in Heaven. In the Bible the Lord told the prophet Jeremiah, "Before I formed thee in the belly I knew thee; and before thou camest forth out of the womb I sanctified thee, and I ordained thee a prophet unto the nations." For the Lord to have made Jeremiah a prophet before Jeremiah was born, Jeremiah had to have been with the Lord. He questions another prophet, Job, about his whereabouts when He created the earth, when "all the sons of God shouted for joy." We lived with God before we were born! We are His children. He created this earth for us, and created our bodies. One of the first things He did, after creating Adam, was give him a wife, Eve. Then, He commanded them to have children. He did not create them to live separately, He
To begin with, it's not good to be alone. Marriage creates a situation where men and women can weather the storms of life together, and also share the joys of life with each other. Also, men and women are different in very unique ways, with different strengths and weaknesses. In my own marriage I find that where I am weak, my husband in strong, and where I have strengths he has weaknesses. In this way we balance each other. This makes for some great strategy building when we are faced with a problem to solve! An example of this is a decision we made together to help children through Foster Care.
I had become involved in an orphan hosting program through some friends who had adopted a little girl. We enjoyed bringing some children into our home for a time, but each time we did we had to fundraise $3000 to bring them over. My husband recognized the toll it was taking on our home financially and emotionally. It was hard and stressful to raise the money. However, our hearts were in helping children. He suggested the possibility of helping children through foster care. I had not given it much thought in the past, but agreed to give it a try. After our first training meeting, we were very excited! I am more of an emotional person, so I was the person who initiated the idea of helping children. He is practical, and saw that for our family, foster care was a better fit.
In the book State of Our Unions pg. 6 we read, "Marriage is not merely a private arrangement; it is also a complex social institution. Marriage helps to unite the needs and desires of couples and the children their unions produce. Because marriage fosters small cooperative unions—otherwise known as stable families—it not only enables children to thrive, but also shores up communities, helping family members to succeed during good times and to weather the bad times."
From this we learn that not only is marriage good for man and woman, it is good for society. When we strengthen marriages, we strengthen society. It is in the home we learn to solve problems, share, and care for other people. The lessons we learn in the home we carry into our classrooms, then into our workplace.
In family, we have people who will be there when others may not be. Family is our support system. I believe this is the way God intended it to be. We are not meant to be alone, he provided families so that we would always have one another. Spouses, and children, are God's gift to us.
