So, as it is not yet March, you might be wondering what all this marriage talk is about. Well, we were just recently blessed in a mighty way to turn this 13-year old marriage into an extraordinary marriage that will grow continually deeper and better as the years tick on. We just attended our Josiah Venture Marriage Retreat. Where do we even begin to tell you how those 5 days have put us on a course toward marriage extraordinare???
We went into the conference in Krakow, Poland, knowing that we love each other, and truly love our marriage. But throughout those 5 days, we experienced just how much better it could be when we dig deeper into marriage oneness as God intends...unselfishly, openly, humbly, and in one spirit. Our JV President, Dave Patty, brought the teaching...humbly and honestly sharing with us what he and his wife, Connie, have learned through the years in their marriage, and especially as it relates to ministry.
We were truly blessed to attend this conference in a beautiful hotel with date-night-every-night...FREE OF CHARGE to all of us, thanks to some very generous donor-friends of JV. We were given very specific conversation assignments every day, which alone took our marriage to much deeper levels, as we found ourselves talking about so much more than kids and schedules and the urgent.
We feel extremely refreshed as we are now back to life as normal...again talking about kids, schedules and anything urgent, yet basking in the growth that we've experienced and the depth of love for each other, and for our Savior who alone brings oneness like this.
Have we ever mentioned how much we love being a part of Josiah Venture? We know that we are cared for by JV in our families, our marriages and our lives. We so appreciate being in this group of people, knowing that as we are all serving in different countries throughout Central and Eastern Europe, we are being both prayed for and ministered to by our team of leaders. This team is called the Bteam...stands for Barnabas team...and their role in JV is to provide for the JV family care, support and resources. Thank you, Bteam, for an excellent job of care by providing this conference for us! We know that a lot of hard work and diligent planning go into these conferences, and we are grateful.
And the biggest plus of this whole Conference, in a Mom's opinion, was the fact that Grandpa and Grandma came to take amazing care of the kids while we were away. Babysitting five kids for five days was not an easy job to fill, so when Ed's parents willingly agreed to come and fill that role, we were elated! And they filled that role with flying colors...see previous post. To know that the kids were with Grandparents was such a relief to us, that we were able to completely focus on the conference and our marriage, because we believe that the best gift you can give to your children after leading them to know Jesus Christ as their Savior is to give them parents who are in love with each other. What a blessing we've just experienced!
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