A Couple’s Journey – Getting Untangled

By Larry and Carol Smith. Posted July 19, 2016.

Hello Everyone. Welcome to blog number three. As always my comments are in black type and Carol’s are bold and in color. The photos are from our collection.

As I get further into remembering and making sense out of the journey into marriage and relationship that Carol and I are traveling into, I realize that our relationship is a continuing process that happens on many different levels; some are subtle and very deep. It is almost impossible to put our journey of self-discovery on a chronological time line because that’s not the way spiritual, mental and emotional growth takes place.

As events and feelings and our reactions to life take place, we try to connect the dots and make sense out of everything based on what we see, know and feel. We often try to get to the truth through logic, and so we look at all that happens within a period of time and assume that one thing, or a group of things, caused or contributed to something else.

We jumble our thoughts and feelings together, and when we begin to try and extract the truth about something related to us, or find the cause of a problem, we have to peel through the layers of inter-connected memories and feelings, woven together like strands of tangled roots in a forest,  until we find the right strand that will lead us to the root we are looking for.

Just a few months after we were married I found myself in the middle of a fierce entanglement of thoughts and feelings about myself and my role and purpose in life and marriage. The summer of our marriage year had gone by quickly. Carol and I still hit the trails as often as we were able, but the obligations of life and the need to be accountable made us realize that though we felt the most at peace when we were out in the woods, we could not just abandon everything else and stay gone all the time.

So we stayed at home a lot more and tried to work on things around the house in our spare time. All around us was a clutter of reminders that in the excitement and newness of our marriage we had been neglectful of day to day responsibilities.

One of them was the flower beds around our garage. When I bought the house several years before, the beds were already overtaken by weeds. I’m not good at gardening and had never even tried to get the weeds out. In spite of the weeds, the flowers grew every year and were beautiful. But I was worried that eventually the flowers would be choked out by the grass and weeds. For a novice like me, it seemed an impossible task to dig out the weeds without harming or killing the flowers.

My predicament with the flowers made me think of the parable of the sower in the bible (Matthew 13) and how it paralleled with our marriage. We had entered into marriage making every effort to put God first. God was blessing us in so many ways as a couple, and we were joyful and grateful for His presence. Yet in the short time we had been married, we could already see the weeds growing up around our beautiful partnership. The worries and distractions of everyday life affected how we lived and enjoyed life.

In those early days of our marriage there were many times that I felt like the weeds and roots of something beautiful were getting all tangled up.  I was scared to death that something might choke out the beauty of our love.

I had never been in a relationship that was so grounded with God’s truth. That often made me feel small and very unqualified for the task.

I knew God was calling us into a season of honoring Him with our marriage and all that we did. The problem was that I wasn’t at all the representative, lady of God, that I pictured myself to be. There were so many times in my life that I had failed. I had faked my way through situations when I should have stood and been real to myself, others and most importantly to God.

Even though I had battled with physical, mental and emotional traumas in the past, I had always gotten back up and kept going. Outwardly, I gave God the glory, but inwardly I kept a little bit of the credit for myself.

Larry and I tried our best to lay it all down and let the Lord take over. That was the most frightening step I ever took, because not only was I realizing my pride and selfishness for the first time, I also saw the self-brokenness that I could not fix. The only hope I had was allowing God to untangle the weeds around my heart.

That was the moment I first felt pure love and grace. God spoke to me through his word reminding me of His grace that was sufficient. Like Paul, the thorn that I had in my side would allow the Holy Spirit to get the glory in a way that I could never do on my own.

When we were out somewhere together, away from distractions, I felt at peace and at one with Carol. But within minutes after getting back I home, I would begin to anticipate work and bills and commitments, and the feeling of being stressed out would set in. The serenity we felt when we were off somewhere, alone together, easily gave way to a feeling of anxiety.

Shouldn’t the marvelous friendship and relationship we were developing while tramping through the woods follow us home and make us more, and not less, productive? As our marriage matured and developed into what God intended, shouldn’t it result in a life both creative and productive? To me, life didn’t seem to be going in that direction.

Carol and I are both creative by nature, yet we found it hard to be creative and expressive. Work dragged along, and productivity was severely hampered. Like the seed in Matthew 13 that was choked out by the cares of life, we were not bearing fruit.

I regularly expressed my distress to Carol. We talked at length and learned that we both had feelings of inadequacy. We searched to discover what we weren’t doing right.

We frequented the woods and fields to get a few hours of tranquility. But for me, it even seemed that getting out into nature wasn’t helping that much anymore. I enjoyed our outings and valued the time we spent together, but I no longer felt a deep sense of peace, and my mind was never clear of anxious thoughts about work and life at home.

Were we really in God’s will? The idea that we needed to “run away” from home to be at peace didn’t seem right. Even though we felt stressed out when we were at home, we were trying our best to do everything we needed to be doing. And we regularly spent daily time at home praying and studying the bible.

And what about motives? I began to question and doubt our reasons for doing what we did. If we weren’t sincere, that might explain why our lives sometimes still felt empty and out of control.

Was God even really speaking to us, guiding us, through the associations we made between the spiritual nature and the natural beauty of the earth? Or were we just imagining, trying to superimpose the beauty and deeply contemplative and mysterious calmness of nature upon our circumstances?

From studying the bible, I was sure that God revealed Himself through everything that existed. Nature was a reflection of the reality of His existence. And it seemed that He expected us to be able to know through nature that He was powerful and omnipresent (Romans 1:20).

And the bible was full of examples using nature to teach about the character of men, our spiritual state and our relationship with God.

Psalm 1:3 came to mind where the psalmist talked about the blessing that comes to the person who stays away from bad company and is obedient to God’s laws: “That person is like a tree planted by streams of water, which yields its fruit in season and whose leaf does not wither— whatever they do prospers.”

Another good one was Proverbs 30:24-28 where the activities of insects are used to illustrate productive characteristics that are desirable for men : ” Four things are small on the earth, But they are exceedingly wise: The ants are not a strong folk, but they prepare their food in the summer; The badgers are not mighty folk, yet they make their houses in the rocks; The locusts have no king, yet all of them go out in ranks; The lizard you may grasp with the hands, yet it is in kings’ palaces.

If God intended for us to learn lessons from nature and move into a closer relationship with Him and each other, shouldn’t we be able to bring it home with us and apply it?

The trails have been a sanctuary to us, but they have also been a time of testing of mind and spirit. When walking on the paths I think about the past, the present and our future with each other. I am drawn to nature and it reveals much to me of God’s character. Every time we watch a sunset together, God whispers “be still and know that I am…”(psalm 46:10) 

In late September, about six month after we were married, we  found ourselves back on the road again, this time heading to the beach instead of the woods. I was on a work trip Gulf Shores, and Carol went with me.

We had some free time on our first evening and decided to take a sunset walk on the beach. The beach had a different feel to it, a different voice than that of the woods. It spoke of openness and of the big picture and not just a section at a time like we saw in the woods.

While I am not a beach person, Carol is every bit a beach bum, and as we walked I could see her taking it all in. The stress flowed right out of her and was replaced by a peaceful serenity.

Her serenity was contagious, and I found myself mellowing out more and more. We were barefoot, and the salt water was cool and refreshing as it splashed onto our feet and ankles. There was a cool breeze, and the sound of the waves lapping against the shore was hypnotic, drawing us into its eternal rhythm.

I couldn’t help but think about Matthew 11:28-30. I especially like the way the Message bible says it. Jesus said: “Are you tired? Worn out? Burned out on religion? Come to me. Get away with me and you’ll recover your life. I’ll show you how to take a real rest. Walk with me and work with me—watch how I do it. Learn the unforced rhythms of grace. I won’t lay anything heavy or ill-fitting on you. Keep company with me and you’ll learn to live freely and lightly.”

I remember that day on the beach Larry is talking about. It’s funny because I saw the serenity in his face! There was a peace that came over him that made joy flow through me, and I guess that was the moment I realized we were actually becoming one in God’s eyes. Our journey was only beginning, but it felt like we had already been kindred spirits for our whole lives.

At that moment I realized that I had been missing the whole point. I could never free myself from the cares and distractions of the world. Only Jesus could do that.

The magnificent peacefulness that was contained in nature was only a sign-post pointing to Him. That was exactly what God meant in Romans 1:20. All the magnificent aspects of the woods and the trails and the gulf waves lapping on the shore were ways God was using to draw us to Him.

And if, in embracing the feeling nature gave us, we acknowledged God as the source of its beauty and power, it would continue to lead us toward the Truth, who was none other than Jesus Himself.

God’s love for us was etched into every particle of creation.Every grain of sand that I felt between my toes was created so that His love and glory might be made manifest. If we would just pay attention, perhaps we would even hear nature cry out in praise to His name (Luke 19:40).

Tired from walking, but not ready to go back to the hotel yet, we climbed onto some rocks near the pier where we sat and watched dolphins as they playfully jumped in the distance.

Carol leaned against me, and I looked into her eyes. For the first time, I realized something that I had missed before. God put us into each other’s lives to remind us of Him and keep us on track. The reality of God and His love and power and glory was right in front of us all the time. All we ever had to do was look at each other and think of His work in us. All we ever had to do was remember what the bible said about the holiness of our covenant and how it symbolized God’s covenant with us through Christ. All we ever had to do was look deep inside, and in the stillness we would find Him and His love abiding in us, making a home there forever (John 14:23). That’s what nature had been trying to tell us all along.

A deep sense of purpose was birthed inside of us that day. We didn’t know how or what it all meant, but we did know was God was the head and we would do our best to be the body.

One thing God has made plain to me is that He can use us to inspire others even when we don’t feel very inspiring. That is proof that it is not our works but His that actually makes a difference. As long as my eyes are on Jesus He will lead me home and that is what I trust in this moment.

I give Him all the glory for I finally saw that I am nothing without Jesus living and abiding in me. That doesn’t mean it has been smooth sailing and no problems ever blew in. It does mean that I am learning each day to surrender my will to a loving God that has my best interest at heart. 

“Then Christ will make his home in your hearts as you trust in him. Your roots will grow down into God’s love and keep you strong. And may you have the power to understand, as all God’s people should, how wide, how long, how high, and how deep his love is. May you experience the love of Christ, though it is too great to understand fully. Then you will be made complete with all the fullness of life and power that comes from God.” (Ephesians 3:17-19 NLT) 

© 2016 by Larry and Carol Smith