God's goodness on our lives....

Sundays are always special to me. I get to sit next to the man that the Lord has graciously gifted me with. I consider to be blessed to have a man that while he prays he is humbled by the God of our salvation that tears fall from his face.

His mercy on our lives becomes more apparent the more we get to recall all that He has done already. The thoughts that keep me humbled to think this is the fact that we are not entitled to tomorrow, to good health, to a long life with the one I am committing to serve and love until the Lord departs us from this world. At church today praying for our lead pastor and feeling the hurt that his wife and kids must be feeling. The confusing tension that God is good and joy but yet there is still pain in this life. It is such a great tension and to me it magnifies His goodness and grace.

Psalm 86:5,6

"For you, O Lord, are good and forgiving, abounding in steadfast love to all who call upon you. Give ear, O Lord, to my prayer; listen to my plea for grace."

My hope and desire for this blog is that we will always meditate on His goodness and share with others of His faithfulness and mercy.

"Called Beauty" are lyrics by this couple from Memphis called Jenny & Tyler. These lyrics have recently overwhelmed my spirit for more of the Lord.

"do not spare the rod how i long for faithfulness

tell me once again of Your grace and woo me in

let not these lovers be more attractive than You God"

As I listen to this song I picture myself walking down the isle to my groom and to remember God's faithfulness in allowing me to do so. I love you Lord and we desire more of you!

The blog, the ring and the proposal.

[The blog.]

Here's the idea: Kelsey and I post bits and pieces of what God's doing, bits and pieces of our story so far and occasionally photographs, since I'm a photographer (supposedly.)

Begin entry number one.

[The ring.]

Kelsey wanted to look at rings, which is great. Phenomenal. Men should be held to high (biblical?) standards when it comes to many decisions, big and small, all of their lives. I am pretty sure very few of them are actually qualified to decide on an engagement ring, however.

We went to a pretty fancy store, looked at pretty fancy rings and got talked down to by a pretty fancy saleswoman. I think we were both fairly discouraged. We were talking later and Kelsey said, somewhat out of the blue,

"All those rings were ugly."

We decided that something super simple would be smart for a lot of reasons, including our plans to be overseas.

The next morning I got an email from Mrs. Vicki Haley (Kelsey's mentor and friend) that said she and Wayne had store credit at a jewelry store they'd like us to put towards a ring. Vicki inherited Wayne's mother's ring, traded it in, had rings made for the ladies in their family and still had some left over.

The very first ring Kelsey tried on at this jeweler was the style she was interested in, fit her without being sized, and was $45 LESS than our store credit. I think we smiled for about the next hour straight on our way home.

[The proposal.]

I packed pretty light: the ring, a bible, a camera and a quilt my great grandmother made.

We ate at our favorite Thai place for lunch and began the journey down I-35W. We stopped for coffee, sat for a bit, talked for a bit and drove for a bit. Our destination was the Botanic Gardens in Fort Worth, but I seriously had no idea if there would be a chance for solitude. I hadn't been since I was a kid.

We explored for a while. We saw a lot of people (like, 30 or so) dressed in blue jeans and white dress shirts attempting to be a happy family while being photographed. Oh man, whose idea was that?

So we wandered. And occasionally stopped and looked around.

Me: "Have we found it yet?"

Kelsey: "I don't know. What are we looking for?"

Me: "I don't know. I think we'll know when we find it."

So we kept wandering.

We found a somewhat secluded spot and I'm pretty sure we were both thinking,

"OMG let's do this, already."

We spread the quilt and we sat. I read Kelsey Proverbs 31 and she wept. (I'm surprised I made it all the way through it.) I closed the bible, I got on my knee and I said,

"I've intentionally waited until now to say this: I love you. Will you please marry me?"

I'm pretty sure she said yes. Neither of us can really remember...

And we took a self portrait with my camera on a rock on a timer. It was a really, really long timer for some reason, so the laughter in that one was not faked. We held our pose for about 30 seconds, started laughing and then the shutter clicked.

You can click to scroll through all the photos.

JT