Real Marriage By: Mark and Grace Driscoll

My Husband Jonathan and I decided to read the Driscoll's new book "Real Marriage". I am super excited about it. I really enjoy Mark's teachings. Jonathan each week will post his thoughts on the chapter of the week and then I will comment on it and like wise I will do my best to share my thought on this blog and he in return will comment on my thoughts. Okay so here I go.


Week 1 Chapter 1: Who ever said marriage was easy was a liar. Being married has been the hardest thing I have done thus far in my wee 26 years of life. While I was reading the first chapter my eyes and heart were open to so many things that I do to hurt Jonathan and for some reason I keep him at a distance. Reading the Driscoll's story really hit home in many ways. I was raised in a christian home with parent that love Jesus and were zealous to do ministry, better yet live ministry in more ways then one. My dad was a full time student at Multnoma Bible College in Portland Oregon and my mom worked odd jobs as well as running her own store. That was their day life. Their night life was lived as a Christian Rock Band named "True Faith". I remember as a small child going to their concerts and being so proud that my parents were "Rocking the Universe for Jesus" (which btw was a title of one of their songs. Cool Right?) I myself quickly went to work convincing myself that I needed to save my friends and family and the only way to do that is share the gospel. I lived most of my life believing that I could save people. When I was 8 years old I brought my best friend Young, who was this beautiful, frail little Vietnamese girl, to Christ. I remember believing with all my heart that if she didn't know Jesus as her Lord and Savior that she would die and go to hell. It was my mission to "save her". So I sat down with her and led her in the sinners prayer and we cried and hugged for a long time. Since that day I lived my life believing that God created me for the mission field. As the years passed I found myself alone caught up in a life full of secret sin that I could not shake, all the while trying to be the good little Christian girl my mom and dad taught me to be. Through out middle and high school I believed lies that in many ways destroyed who I thought I was. I did all I could to busy myself so that I would no long be ruled by sin. It was a struggle. I am grateful I had the knowledge of Christ that I did other wise I'm not sure I would be alive today. By the time I hit my Sophomore year my parents were falling apart. They were my world and I didn't know what to do. I became very depressed to the point of not wanting to live anymore. I clung to what I believed because there was no one beside me. All I had was Jesus. He seen me through. When I graduated I worked for a few years then I went off to YWAM. In YWAM I learned so many things about myself and about who God is. I learned that I couldn't save people, that only Christ could working in and through people such as myself. It was totally life changing. When I finally made it back home after 6 months of learning and missions, I fell apart all over again. I expected for life to be easy now that I had the tools to bring the gospel to the world, I was sadly mistaken. I came home to a broken and hurting family, my church was torn in two, and my friends were checked out. I did what I could helping my dads church out, but it wasn't enough. We ended up moving back to Bend and I found a job at the local Bible Book Store. I was doing good for the most part. I started my own ministry and I felt like I was making a difference. That quickly changed when my ministry fell apart and my family was struggling. A year or so passed by like a blink of an eye. One night I was working at the Bible Book Store when Jonathan walked in. I was excited to see him. I knew him from high school, he was totally different. At that time in my life I wanted nothing more then to be swept off my feet by the man of my dreams lol. Sadly he was taken. He had a beautiful fun-loving son that I grew to adore. Jonathan came in time to time and I was intrigued by his knowledge and passion of and for Christ. I would spend time asking him questions and debating controversial things with him. The funny thing was that he was married to a girl I went to school with in another town. I didn't know things were not working out for them until one sad night when Jonathan came in to the store with his son and told me that she had left them. He was hurting and it broke my heart. Some weeks passed and I started going to his bible study. I knew all that he was going through so I tried to help him and his son all that I could. At that time we were taking classes from the same school and I was struggling and Jonathan mentioned that he could help me out if I wanted. I was unsure how his soon to ex-wife would take it so I asked him to get her permission before I agreed. Soon after we were study buddy's. We did our best to push the emotions aside but the more we spent together the more I fell for him. One night we met up and he told me he had a vision and asked me to pray about it. He refused to tell me detail he just asked me to pray and ask God to reveal to me who was in the vision. So I did for two weeks I prayed about who was in this vision. When I finally got my answer I was terrified. I for two days went back and forth telling myself that I was making it up, until Jonathan asked if God revealed anything to me. I didn't want to tell him. It took all my strength to answer him and I finally said "It was me that was in your vision." When he said yes, I wanted to cry. I didn't know what it meant, I didn't know what to do. We decided to pursue a relationship after his divorce was finalized although it didn't work out that way. The first several months we just spent a lot of time together getting to know each other, then as time passed one thing led to another, which led to another, you get the picture. I was shame ridden. I didn't know how to breath living with the knowledge of what I had done. I the good girl of the family ruined my whole reputation, not to mention my relationship with Christ. I did what I could and the truth finally came out. I became pregnant and didn't know what to do other than move in with Jonathan. We did our best to live with our choices. He received word that his divorce was finalized and we jump out of bed and rushed to the court house. The courts granted us permission to marry and so we had a sort of shot gun wedding. The next day 2.0 was born. Now here we are. It hasn't been easy. Jonathan has gone through some hard times in his relationship with God and with his use to be friends. I as well have had to cut ties with many of my friends that I still love and care about, however I am working on my relationship with God and I am blessed every day. We as a couple are still trying to figure this whole marriage thing out and how it balances with the rest of our lives as parents, workers, son, daughter, and as friends. I can honestly say that no I don't always like Jonathan and no I don't always understand him or agree with him, however I do always love him and he is my best friend and lover. I think my favorite part about being married to Jonathan is that he truly is my best friend and I get to spend every day with him.


I know this post was long but I hope that even part of my story that I shared might help you or give you hope.


If you would like to share your thoughts I would love to hear them or if you need any prayer let me know. Thanks for taking the time to read my blog.