In reflection over the first 6 months of marriage, I have realized how little I know about being a wife. All my life I’ve witnessed wifehood all around me, but I wish I’d paid more attention, taken more notes. As I’ve grown older, I’ve become more keen on watching the interaction between husbands and wives including my parents, friends’ parents, and more recently- my own friends. It seems no two couples go at it the same, so how am I to know how to do this. The idea of abandoning all my naturally self seeking instincts and adopting a selfless attitude of servitude seems... well, it seems foreign.

Why were we so anxious to give up our singleness and individualism again?

Don’t get me wrong, I haven’t been questioning the institution of marriage, or mine and Ian’s decision to tie the knot! I love him more than I can muster up the words and blog about. I am blessed beyond what I deserve and hope I never forget that. It’s just, as I learn what is really being requested- no required, of me, as a wife, the less qualified I find myself. Maybe that’s a good thing, I have to realize my own weakness, and claim it, boast in it even (2 Corinthians 12:10) before I can depend on God to strengthen and able me.

I am self serving, self absorbed, self focused- I am pretty sure those are not the things Ian signed up for when he told me and 200 of our closest friends and family that he’d love me for the rest of our lives.

My prayer for myself is that I’d be God-serving, God absorbed and God focused.... and in those things, love, service and sacrifice towards Ian will come. May my wife-ness be a reflection of Jesus’ sacrifice for me rather than a reflection of my emotions or feelings towards Ian on any given day- because let’s be honest, those emotions are sure to  flip flop, spin around, hit all time highs and all time lows throughout my life, but Jesus’ love remains stable.

I am confident I have more studying and observing and learning and growing and breaking and forming to do as a wife... The wedding may have been ‘our day’, but our marriage is His.