She's Unbelievable!

Today my wonderful wife Susan and I have been married 10 months. It has been an incredibly full 10 months. My conclusion thus far...She's Unbelievable! It is indeed a rare thing to have a wife who is so supportive of radical visionary leadership for the sake of the Kingdom of God. I'll share just a few highlights with you to let you in on why she is so unbelievable. Susan is a champ in the hospitality/housewife realm as so many are - she cooks delicious meals, decorates our home so warmly, keeps clothes clean and stocked, not to mention scratches my back every night. While I know all of this is sometimes is a challenge for Susan in addition to her full time job nannying a 20 month year old who has never slept in her own crib/bed, Susan seems to make it look like a piece of cake. It is the extra-mile stuff that causes observers to see that she is supernaturally enabled by our strong God. To honor her today,

10 Amazing Things In the Life of my Wife in our First 10 Months of Marriage:

10) Susan facilitated our move to Louisville, while I was away preaching for a retreat. Our family helped a ton - we are so indebted to them. I know this may seem like it ought to be on a list of 10 most embarrassing things of a husband during our first 10 months...Nevertheless, When I got home from the retreat, it was amazing all the hard work she and the family had done! Thanks again Family! My buddies still dog me out pretty good for this one.

9) For two weeks this Spring Susan worked as a sort of telemarketer from 6pm-11pm in addition to her substitute teaching during the day...Because we needed her to. She also spent also spent 2 weeks tying ribbons around lolli-pops for a temp job during spring break while no substituting was available.

8) Before we got married, Susan always bought people birthday/special occasion cards. I shared with her I thought she could make cards and save $ from our gift budget(considering we had 4 weddings 4 weekends in a row) to go to. While she does not think of herself as creative and struggled with this request at first, she triumphantly, supercreatively made cards to send people for special occasions. She used cool pastel oil paints...and her sewing machine. They were so cool, she made a bunch and gave stationary as graduation gifts to some of our good friends.

7) Susan comes tired, straight from work every Wednesday this summer to hear me preach for the college ministry here, and then fills me up and sends me out on Friday nights to preach here, even though she hasn't gotten to make the trip most Friday's because of her nannying. I usually do not make it home until 1:30ish am, nevertheless, she is excited I have the opportunity to preach God's word for people we so dearly love.

6) Susan suffered through weeks of nannying a sweet little screaming, crying 20 month-year-old...It was so bad it caused her teeth to hurt. She persevered through this because of her hardcore commitment to our marriage and my seminary education. Sidney has gotten much more enjoyable in recent weeks. No more screaming and crying. The kid literally screamed for 3 straight hours one day.

5) Susan hosted 20 family members for an overnight cookout here in Louisville. Seven of them stayed with us...1 BATHROOM! It went so well, we're considering making it an annual event - wherever we may be living.

4) Susan has prepared and opened our home almost every Thursday night this year for a small group from our church to meet. This summer we have hosted all of the small groups together on 2 occasions (about 30 folks.)

3) Susan gladly took in an 18 year old "homeless" girl, Candi Roe into our one bedroom apartment in New Brunswick during our first 3 months of marriage. This required us to transform our small den into a den/bedroom. Susan befriended Candi, helped her get a job, and invested much into young broken girl. There is so much to share about this, perhaps more later on another post.

2) Susan fearlessly and joyfully agreed for Kerry Bell to stay in our extra bedroom at our place in Louisville as we ventured to help Kerry with his cocaine addiction. He is a 40 year old African American, 10 year cocaine addict that we met with Brett Vaden and Brent Moore in our neighborhood. Brett stayed with us that evening, staying up half the night swapping with me at 4am. He then rode with us to Bloomington, IN two days later to take Kerry to an intense spiritual boot camp rehab called Hebron. We couldn't have done it without Brett. Susan unhesitatingly supported my leadership despite some opposition from loved ones. This is worthy of another post too.

1) Susan has sweetly and strongly loved me in ways I did not even know I needed. This is by far the number one most amazing thing in the life of my wife thus far! It is a great a challenging task to love such an ogre, but she does it valiantly.

I hope this encourages you and challenges you in the Lord and in your relationships. Susan is amazing! Her God is her secret!