A little over than a year ago, I was a few months shy of getting married. I was becoming a bride. In the middle of the planning, I was inspired to write words about the journey to get there. Now this month, a year later, I share.
Continued from Chronicles of a Bride to Be: God Moments
And so, our journey as a couple began. It was exciting, as any new relationship is. We were in a season that brought satisfaction and hope. A season that also came with many choices to make; the first being what type of relationship we wanted. Very quickly, we had to ask ourselves if we were just testing each other out, or if our relationship was to lead to a long term commitment. What exactly did we want? Our answer was marriage.
I know that such an audacious a decision made at the start of a relationship shocks at least one person that is reading this. I can hear the voices now. “You barely even knew him!” “I can’t do that!” “Did you even know his credit score?” To be clear, our decision wasn’t a one and done contract. It was our way of setting the standard for how we would treat our relationship. If we both wanted a fling, we could hang around each other just for the benefits. But if we wanted marriage, the rules were totally different.
Our hearts set, we began to walk the path of getting intimate with each other. But for us, intimacy had nothing to do with taking our clothes off. Instead, it was an invitation we gave each other to see and experience what was within; an open door to go to a place that no one else could go. Read intimacy as “into me see…”
While we got to know each other, our goal was to see if we could commit long term to the person we found in each other. In the process, we allowed ourselves to see how our God given purposes collide to create something beautiful. We revealed our God given gifts; the beauty of our talents, our past achievements, and our dreams. And in the same vein, we unveiled our not-so-pretty areas. Bruises left behind by past mistakes, and stretch marks borne from our past struggles; misshapen areas of our character that still needed work. After all was said and done, we still dared to asked each other, “do you still want to take this walk into forever with me?”
I have written earlier that our relationship has been very Christ centered. It’s not so much about having rules on what to do and what not to do. It’s about a heart to heart relationship with Christ – both people in the relationship deciding the Christ alone would be the center of it all. We depended on Jesus in every way, committing to praying with each other on the phone daily about our relationship. Out of our prayers came the mysteries of our future, our dreams, and even our inside jokes. Can you imagine that?
Exposing your flaws and revealing your dreams can be risky. It takes walking on water. After all, you never know how your love interest will respond to what they see beneath the surface. And honestly, we’ve both had moments after seeing each other’s flaws where we had to lean on Jesus to keep walking forward. There are challenges, of course. But these moments, and our prayers, created a deeper bond between us while we were dating than sex ever could.
On our wedding day, we stood before each other never having been physical with each other; not even having a moment when we leaned in for a kiss. But if anyone asked us if we’d ever been intimate with each other, we would eagerly answer ‘yes;’ because our path has revealed more depths and more pleasure than steamy nights with a stranger, or a friend with benefits, or even a boyfriend ever could. Selah.
Photo by Olu Jr. (www.olujr.com)
Rotimi Kehinde 
Essy Rodriguez