Marriage

Jess: So I just read a really depressing article about how a company called Wedlock has created "divorce insurance" offers to give you money for expenses if you and your spouse decide to get divorced. Although I have many friends whose parents have divorced and am the product of a broken marriage myself, I think that this is so completely ridiculous. Why and how has our society moved so far from the sanctity of marriage? We're so concerned about who can marry whom, when they can get married, how they can get married, etc, that we have completely lost our view of what marriage is meant to be.

I know Wes and I have been married for less than a year, but we entered into marriage as a lifetime commitment, not as just another relationship. Marriage is not the same as dating someone--marriage is saying that you are willing to be with the same person for the rest of your life, even when times get tough. If you are not willing to share your life with someone, to overcome the temptation that other people will provide, to commit (if you want) to having and raising children with that person, growing old with them, etc., then marriage is not for you. There are many people today that do not marry for whatever reason, and I think this is a perfectly good solution...some people simply do not want to get married. Times have changed, and this is an option not previously available.

That said, I believe that divorce is a possible solution to some marriage problems. I think that there are definitely some situations when people should not be married: abusive households being just one example. There are also some people who simply were never meant to be married in the first place, made a mistake, etc. But divorce should not be the solution to every problem in every marriage. This is how we have such a high divorce rate in the United States, where people believe that divorce is as simple as breaking up. It is also why people get divorced, remarried, divorced, and remarried yet again, which is a major factor in the divorce rate. People who enter marriage with the right mindset to begin with may in fact get divorced, but they are not the ones who cause this statistic to skyrocket.

Alright, I'm getting off my soapbox. I was just so extremely disappointed by this new development that I had to put my thoughts out there. I hope no one is upset by this- I just wanted to share my views.

Wes: My best friend and brother, Tomas, was the best man at our wedding. In his speech at our wedding, Tomas said that he knew that Jess and I would last for "several years." We've joked about this ever since January, that he, at our wedding reception, decided that we would only be married for "several years." But the truth is, Tomas has told us multiple times that he knows that we'll be one of the ones that last.

Thinking about it, a lot of my friends are getting/have gotten married of late. I cannot think of any of them who are not the type of couple that will last. Chris and Melendy. Amanda and Jeremy. Jon and Lauren. Justin and Sarah. Andrew and Brandy. I know that we are a small group of couples in the midst of a large world full of them, but I am proud to say that I firmly believe that God has blessed me in letting me be a part of a fellowship of believers that are all "ones that will last." We're like a bunch of little puzzles with only two pieces each. It's easy to see we fit with one another, and there's no use trying to match us with any other piece (the pieces signify people for those of you who could not follow the metaphor. Sorry. I've been watching big bang theory and have gotten used to people explaining jokes and comparisons to Sheldon).

I am a firm believer that God made us to be creatures of company. We were created to be around others. I am blessed to have Jess, someone with whom I can share every aspect of my life. I do not hold that everyone is made to enjoy the same type of relationship that I have with Jess, but I do hold that all of us are made to be in fellowship and be in community.

On a very different note, Jess and I bought a pack of the Ghirardelli peppermint and dark chocolate squares the other day, and they are delicious.

That is all for now. Thus ends the reading. You stay classy, World Wide Web!


-Wes and Jess

Mommy!

Jess: This weekend, I had the wonderful opportunity to go to the Rejoice (my home church) Women’s Retreat in New York. It was great to be able to see some of the women I’ve known for so long, and I really appreciated the chance to spend time with them as an adult. It was an amazingly uplifting experience, and I hope to get the chance to go again in the future. Not only did I have a great time hearing about some powerful, influential women in the Bible, but I was spiritually renewed, as well. Plus, all the women who have known me since I was a kid gave me wonderful support as I pursue my call to ministry. I was really impressed at their ability to treat me like an adult. I know it’s tough to do that when you’ve known someone since they were a kid. It was definitely something I needed, since I am at a pretty interesting point of my journey.

Although the spiritual side of the retreat was absolutely fantastic, it was also a great time to see my mommy. We haven’t really had a lot of time to just hang out since I started college, so I really enjoyed having a couple of days to just talk with her about our lives. It reminded me that actually seeing people is so important and makes such a difference. Sometimes I just need a hug from my mom, and it was nice to get a few extra this weekend to last me through till Christmas. Despite the lack of sleep throughout the weekend, the laughter and stories were fantastic!

Well, that was the big highlight of my life this last week. Now I have to rewrite my sermon for Sunday (Wes decided he’s working too hard :-P) because I realized that I wasn’t going to preach the message God wants me to. I’m not quite sure what I’m going to say, but I know I wasn’t going in the right direction. And I think Wes survived the weekend pretty well without me; he even managed to clean the house! It was great to come home and not have to worry about that. Everyone who has ever been on a retreat knows that the return to “real life” is a pretty difficult one. Between the eight hour drive and not having to cook, clean or do laundry when I got home, I think I had a pretty nice transition between retreat and life, and I’m ready to share my excitement with others!

Wes:

So, my friends, I've been really impacted by all of the suicides that have been happening throughout the nation. It is horrible that we as a church are not standing up and showing love to those who feel so alone that they feel the only way to escape the oppression is to kill themselves. I preached on this on Sunday, sharing with my congregations the story of one of the victims, Tyler Clementi, who was a student at Rutgers, not 45 minutes away from us. I was very impressed by both church's response to this. Everyone that came up to me afterward was very moved by it and wanted to know how we can better minister to the people around us who need to know that the church is a place of love and safety. I told them in my sermon something that Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. said in one of his sermons: if we passively allow evils to happen, we are cooperating with that evil and we might as well be a participant in it (this is paraphrased). The churches said they didn't want to passively sit back and let it happen, so in the future, we will be having conversations about what we as a church can be doing. I am very impressed with them and their willingness to love, not judge, those who need it the most.

I didn't get to go to any special retreat this last weekend. Instead, I had to chill at the house by myself. I got loads of stuff done, though, and I battled against aliens on Halo:Reach. I also had time to think about one of my papers this semester. Two of my classes' grades are solely based on one paper (per each of course). For my class on Reinhold Niebuhr and MLK, I am seriously considering writing my paper on their work (mainly MLK's) that corresponds with the Theology of the Cross. I am excited about this, and I need to get to work on it because I don't want to end the semester with two enormous papers and no time to do either. I have no idea what I'm doing for the other one, though...

I also started a Twitter account. Yeah, I know, lame. But I did it for a class. One of my professors assigned it as a way to work on writing more concisely. My name is pstrwes, and I've been using it to share different things that I have learned in my classes or while working on sermons, and I am hoping that it will lead to some neat bits of wisdom for myself and those that might stumble across the page.

Well, that's all that I can think of to write. So... that's all for now!

You stay classy, World Wide Web!

News, News, and More News. Also Some Random Ramblings by Wes.

Jess: So we've been terribly bad at updating our blog, and this is clearly an important time in our lives. I'll let Wes tell you the best news of all, and I'll do a little updating on how things are going in general.

We've finally gotten what I would call "settled" into the parsonage, most of the dirty things are now clean, most of the unpainted things are now painted, etc. We know where to shop, where to go to get local produce, how to avoid traffic jams, etc. I have to say that I'm so excited to have our own house (and it's wonderful to not have the actual responsibilities of owning a house). I have thoroughly enjoyed making the house home, and I think Wes has, as well. It's great to have some pride in the place we live, instead of just moving our furniture and other junk into it and knowing it's a temporary thing, as we have for the last 4 years of college and the time I took off/we were living at the seminary. It's truly home and we feel truly blessed to have it.

Speaking of home, we had the churches' potluck at our house this last weekend. Twenty-seven people crowded into our living room, and we had some of the greatest food. Everyone from the churches mixed well together and we had some pretty amazing conversations. It was wonderful to have the opportunity to do that, and hilarious to see people try to get in and out of the seating! We ended up passing all the desserts around because we weren't sure we would get everyone back in the seats after all of that eating!

In other news, I've been taking an online class through Luther Seminary on the Pentateuch (first 5 books of the Bible). It's been a wonderful experience and not as scary as I originally thought it would be to go back to school after almost a year and a half off. I've learned a lot and it's great to be able to talk about my academic life with Wes again. It also means I'm going to be able to accelerate my time when I actually attend seminary full-time, so we'll hopefully be back in Texas working a year earlier than we originally anticipated. Not that I don't love NJ, but I sure love Texas...

Speaking of NJ, it's been raining cats and dogs for almost a week now, with no end in sight. We finally slipped below the 60 degree mark and had to turn the heat on. I'm so excited to see a fall and winter here, and I hope NJ doesn't disappoint. We only have so many northern falls/winters to go through before we head out of here!

Wes:

So there is good news, and there is bad news. As always, the bad news first, so we leave remembering the good (thank you, standardized testing, for teaching me how to write a cookie-cutter essay). The bad news: I've lost my rain coat, and that makes me sad.

The good news: I met with my candidacy committee--formerly known as the San Antonio District's District Committee on Ministry--a couple weeks ago and was unanimously voted to continue on in the candidacy process to become an ordained elder in the United Methodist Church. Golf clap, please. AAAAAnnnnnddddd, they also voted to recommend me for local pastorship, which means that in the next few months, I will be able to administer the sacraments of Holy Communion and Baptism at Ellisdale and Crosswicks UMC (those are the churches that I am pastoring if you didn't know). That deserves a standing ovation. Not for me, not for the committee, but for God, and all of the wonderful things that God is doing in and through Jessica's and my ministry. We are truly blessed to be a part of it.

In other news, I have started my second semester at Princeton Seminary. I thought it was weird being a new student in the Spring term... It is even weirder being the only second-semester first-year student at the seminary! I feel the need to explain to everyone that I am not just a junior, but a second semester junior, which is why I know where all of my classrooms are and don't have that look of foreboding on my face as do the other wide-eyed first years. Not that I'm much better--I still don't know the names of all of the buildings, or where everything is. Pretty much, I know where my classrooms are, where the computer lab is, and where I eat.

My classes are going well so far. I am taking a speech class, which is kind of redundant after extensive theatre work and working in churches for so long, but it is a one hour required course, and so far it's been nice to have a class that I don't have to prepare for at all. My class on the Apostle Paul and Karl Barth is very interesting. We are going through the book of Romans, looking in-depth into Barth's commentary on the epistle, but also bringing in a lot of other commentaries and popular interpetations of the text. I'm not gonna lie, a lot of it goes over my head, but I love the book of Romans, so I'm not complaining. I am also taking a class on Rienhold Niebuhr and Martin Luther King Jr., which is by far my favorite class. It is very practically driven and looks at the theological aspects of the Civil Rights Movement. Cool stuff. Finally, I am taking a history class that is all about early and Mideival Christian artifacts, very interesting, but most of the readings are absolutely BORING. And it's a three hour block class, so today I had to bite the side of my mouth to stay awake through the whole thing.

So, when you move past church stuff and school work, I don't have much going on in my life. I have re-acquainted myself with that glorious concoction known as coffee, and we have picked up our relationship right where we left off last semester. This leads to me being very awake in the morning, and slightly droopy around mid-day, but hey, it wakes me up, and it tastes oh-so good.

Well, my friends, that is all for now. Jess and I have promised each other and God (that's called a covenant) that we will write on here more often, so come back often and read up on the exciting roller-coaster ride that is our life. For now, though:

You stay classy, World Wide Web!