When I only wrote to my husband

I have never been so inconsistent in keeping up with my blog, but I'll attribute the deserted posts to the fact that we haven't had Internet in our home since we moved in. Blogging takes a back seat when precious Internet time is spent checking oh-so-important emails at the closest coffee shop. And it's annoying.

It seems like I have spent a lot of the past year wanting and waiting for a lot of things. In the middle of Dahl Wedding chaos, my heart held desires for so many things that I could do nothing but wait for. And even now, as a married couple we wait for more.

Financial security.

A teaching job, come January.

Elimination of massive loans.

Travel across the ocean to reach lost hearts.

Direction.

With every family, couple, or individual who passes by and gains the things we so long to have, my heart can't help but plant seeds of jealousy and want. But, as He usually does, the Lord calls my yearning heart toward something better. He reminds me that He is teaching us something through the wants and the waits.

This morning I found a box that held hundreds of pages of wanting and waiting. I called it my "Forever Box," and it came to me a long time ago when my grandparents bought a coat from Forever21 and gave it to me in the box. Rather than throwing the sturdy box away, I used it to begin storing letters and momentos for my future husband... the man who is now my husband.

I wrote the first letter to my future husband when I was just 15. It was innocent, pure, and now extremely embarrassing (apparently text-talk was cool to write on paper in 2005), but it promised my husband that I was committed to waiting for him. For 7 more years, I wrote pages and pages of letters sharing with my husband and with Jesus just how excited or anxious I was about meeting my husband and staying disciplined enough to be committed to purity. Somehow, these letters and journals helped give my longing heart something to cling to because I knew that the Lord would one day provide what I wanted so badly. And if He did not provide a husband, I knew that I could be content because He had been with me through the whole waiting process and I needed no one else. When my heart gravitated toward other boys, and even when I dated D, I tried to keep my heart fixed on the man the Lord had planned for me through the contents of that little box. My waiting and wanting became subject to the Lord's plans, timing, and ultimate will. Only His.

On our wedding day, D opened the box I had reserved for him. I wish so much that I had been able to see him open it, but I think the box encouraged and lifted MY heart more than  his because of the journey I traveled to get that box into his hands! Because I was willing to wait and put all my wants in Christ, He showed me how joyful life can be if we are completely satisfied in Him. He showed me that I don't need a husband in order to be satisfied. As D read the letters from a 15- and 17-year-old Emily in the Dallas airport on the way to our honeymoon, I covered my face with my hands in embarrassment and cried in thankfulness. The Lord listened to my yearning heart and, in wisdom, waited until I had learned the lessons He had in store for me. And I am thankful.

God has always, always, always known what is best for us. He knows the right time, the right person, the best situations, and the perfect place for every.single.one.of.us. He knew that D would be the husband I wrote to for years, and He knew that our lives would look nothing like we had ever planned. He knows why we are in Louisville, looking for jobs that we never thought we'd want to do and budgeting tighter than we ever thought we'd need. He knows, and He wants us to wait to understand why on Earth we are just now finding these interesting changes of events. And He reminds me that He is sovereign over all of it by showing me journals that I wrote while waiting for my future husband.

So the only waiting that I'll keep complaining about is waiting for my hair to dry- it takes 4 hours, people.