The Love Dare

I wanted to write a little bit about the gift I gave Dale for Christmas this year.  Starting back in October,  I began quietly working on this project   I was inspired by some conversations I had with a couple of my women friends, to commit myself to this 40 day journey. My goal was to consciously work harder at demonstrating my love for Dale.  ..."let us not love with words or speech but with actions and in truth." (1 John 3:18)   I recorded each day's love dare, my successes, failures and honest thoughts for Dale to read in a journal that I presented him for Christmas.


This was an exercise in self-improvement.  Taking time each day to think focused thoughts about my relationship with Dale was so worth it.

I don’t think that I’m always the best at showing you how much I love Dale; I know that I often respond out of the stress in my life, and I know that I could work on being more Christ-like in the way that I demonstrate my love, and as such, this project turned out to be a lot harder than I ever expected it to be.  In fact, it was one of the hardest things I‘ve done all year.  It wasn’t hard because of Dale; it was hard because of Me.  It was challenging to stay motivated and disciplined to keep going for 40 days.  I didn’t always succeed each day, and some weeks, life just got in the way.  But, those setbacks only made me more determined to finish this project because I saw clearly how our lives as pastors and parents so easily overtakes the most important priority in my life—my marriage.  More than anything else, over the past three months, I was confronted with my own  flaws and foibles.  Working on this project was humbling and eye-opening and also, encouraging at some points, and I'm so glad I completed it!    And the continuing challenge... now I have a long list of New Year's "goals" to put into action.