A Special Thanksgiving

I have so much to be thankful for and I am intentional about cultivating a spirit of gratitude throughout the year.

But Thanksgiving prompts us to focus even more on our blessings.

This year Thanksgiving falls on November 24, which happens to be my 33rd anniversary. So, its a special Thanksgiving because in addition to giving thanks for all of my blessings, I get to celebrate 33 years of marriage with the love of my life!

Thank you Lord for bringing her into my life!

Thank you Laura for being in my life!

I don’t love you much do I?
Just more than human tongue can tell and that's all

I don’t love you much do I?
Remember how I kissed you in the hall

See how it sparkles in my eyes
I couldn’t hide it if I tried- that’s right

I don’t love you much do I?
Just more than anything else in this whole world

I don’t love you much do I?
Just more than all the stars in the sky

I don’t love you much do I?
I think you hung the moon and that’s alright

I don’t love you much do I?
You can feel it all the way across the room

I don’t love you much do I?
Like the spring doesn’t make the flowers bloom

I don’t love you much do I?

I'd follow you to hell and back again

I don’t love you much do I?
Just watch me light up when you walk in

My Legacy Marriage

32 years with my Proverbs 31 W0man!

Today we celebrate 32 years of marriage ... and it just keeps getting better!

Throughout this fall season, Laura and I have been teaching the Legacy Marriage material to a group of younger couples.

You may remember my definition of Legacy Marriage:

A Legacy Marriage is a marriage that is a blessing to us now,

and that will be a blessing to others for generations to come.

Our marriage has certainly been a blessing to us. And we sincerely hope that it is a blessing to others!

We will wrap up this session of Legacy Marriage next week. As I was reflecting on our marriage this morning and thinking about what we hope to be teaching and modeling, it occurred to me to ask and answer this question:

What have we learned in 32 years?

1. Marriage is not about me.

2. The main thing is to make your mate the main thing. Focus on meeting her needs. I call this the principle of reciprocity. If I focus on meeting Laura's needs, her response is to meet my needs. And she meets my needs in greater abundance than they would have been met if I had just been focusing on myself. I would like to take credit for this idea, but I can't. It is actually a biblical principle based on Philippians 2: 3-4:

Do nothing from selfishness or empty conceit, but with humility of mind regard one another as more important than yourselves; do not merely look out for your own personal interests, but also for the interests of others.

3. Its not my job to change my spouse. That's God's job. My job is to be the husband I am supposed to be - regardless of what she does or doesn't do.

4. The greatest inheritance a father can give his children is to love their mother.


Today we celebrate 32 years of Legacy Marriage.

I am looking forward to at least 32 more years!

Legacy Marriage

One of the big ideas I have learned over the last several years is that God blesses us so that we can be a blessing to others.

Too often we see only the material blessings. But one area where I have experienced tremendous blessing is in my relationships.

And the greatest relationship I have is with my Proverbs 31 woman! For 31+ years now I have been blessed to have a great marriage. And it just keeps getting better all the time.

Because we have been blessed in our marriage, we have a passion to bless others with the principles that have guided us and the lessons we have learned. For over 20 years, we have sought opportunities to invest intentionally in the lives of younger couples. This has been fleshed out in a variety of venues: Sunday school classes, classes taught at our church, small group settings in homes, and retreats we facilitated for couples. But perhaps the greatest venue in which we have done this is simply doing life with our couple friends.

Late last fall, I began to explore a vision of intentionally investing in other couples who would then invest in other couples. Those of you familiar with my Legacy Logic concept will recognize this pattern. But its not original with me. Paul gave similar instructions to Timothy (2 Timothy 2:2):

"The things which you have heard from me in the presence of many witnesses, entrust these to faithful men who will be able to teach others also."

As this vision developed, I began to think about this in terms of Legacy. I know … that doesn’t surprise anybody. But, Legacy Marriage really seemed to be a good name for this ministry.

So let me give you my definition of Legacy Marriage:

A Legacy Marriage is a marriage that is a blessing to us now, and that will be a blessing to others for generations to come.

I shared my emerging vision with The Sunday Men and they enthusiastically affirmed the idea. So, this spring The Sunday Men became the Sunday Couples for a season and we worked our way through some key scriptures that provide a solid foundation for building the kind of marriage that blesses us as a couple, blesses our children, our grandchildren, blesses those around us, and that will be a blessing for generations to come.

The first eight installments of Legacy Marriage are:

God’s Blueprint for Marriage (Genesis 2:18-25)

Preparing the Soil, Laying the Foundation (Psalm 127:1; Proverbs 24:3-4; Genesis 2:24-25)

Framing the Relationships: Roles and Responses (Ephesians 5:21-33; Mark 10:35-45; Titus 2:1-5)

What Every Marriage Needs to Succeed

The Principle of Reciprocity (Ephesians 5:21-33; Philippians 2:3-4)

Love Languages

How to Have a Good Fight (Ephesians 4:25-32)

Bricks That Build a Marriage (1 Peter 3: 1- 9 )

As we worked our way through these lessons, I prepared two sets of documents. Set one is the discussion guide for the participants. The second set is the teaching notes for the facilitator. Its my prayer than some of these couples will now take this material and teach it to other couples. Over the summer I plan to develop at least four more lessons in this series.

And, I hope to invest in another set of couples soon, who will then apply the Legacy Marriage principles in their home and then pass it on to others.

Date Week TRUMPED!

Just when I think I have done a great thing with the Valentine Tree and Date Week. I get trumped!

And to make it worse, I was trumped by my own son!

On Saturday night, Justin asked Shannon to marry him. And she said YES!

We were actually in on the surprise. We lined the halls of our house with purple rose peddles and lit candles to light the path to the dining room. Justin’s sister made a sign asking the question, there was a bouquet of purple flowers, (Shannon’s favorite color is purple) and the engagement ring was on a pedestal.

While we were at church on Saturday night, Justin came by the house to “pick up some mail.”

We are so excited! I have never seen Justin smiling so brightly. In fact, he even said his cheeks were hurting from smiling so much. We’re all smiling too!

I always wanted four daughters. It took a while, but I am getting my wish.

Date Week

Over the last several years Laura and I have started a tradition of sorts. We like to get away during the week between Christmas and New Year’s. The intensity and chaos of multiple Christmases is behind us and the decorations have been taken down and stored.

Yes – you read that correctly! The decorations have been up since a week or two before Thanksgiving, and they usually come down the day after Christmas.

This is actually part of the get away strategy. Laura enjoys the get away much more if she is not dreading the process of taking down the decorations when she comes home.

This year, as we were taking down the decorations, I noticed we had several gold hearts on the tree. I suggested that we take those and put them on the little Christmas tree we have in our bedroom and leave it up for a while as a Valentine Tree. In spite of the fact that our children gagged at the idea, we did it anyway!

In previous years we have gone to NYC, Fredricksburg, and the Hyatt Lost Pines resort during our get away week.

This year we stayed home. But, we turned it into a date week.

We went to three movies together The Blind Side, Its Complicated and Up in the Air.

By the way, as a former left tackle myself, and a charter member of the elite "Former Left Tackles Association," I highly recommend The Blind Side.

For New Year’s Eve, we did something random: We went to Priceline.com and said we wanted a 5 star hotel and that we were willing to pay $ 49. We got a great room at the Marriott near the Texas Motor Speedway. We also ate at Vidalia’s Southern Cuisine – outstanding shrimp and cheddar grits!

It was a great start to the new year.

I am always encouraging couples to be diligent in maintaining a date night routine. We set the bar for everyone by having a date week!