Adventures in Love: Leah and Charles' Wedding

My mom reminded me that I never shared the rest of the pictures I took at my cousin Leah's wedding the other weekend, so here they are...

Outdoor ceremony in my Aunt and Uncles back yard

The bride and groom's bridge

The aisle was lined with vintage looking metal containers and baby's breath. So perfect! 

The 2 littlest flower girls being pushed by the oldest flower girl, 

so adorable!! 

Bridesmaids

The stunning bride (wearing her mother's wedding dress) being walked down the aisle by our Grandpa and her father. 

I just LOVE this pictures, have you ever seen a more excited/beautiful bride?!

First moments as husband and wife!!

The reception was held in a tent, just up the hill from the ceremony. 

And everything was perfect, down to the tiny details! 

The kids table was even perfect ~ a picnic table that was made by my Grandpa. 

Lace, pearls, old books, and peonies everywhere.

Even chandeliers and twinkle lights...

What was even more beautiful than all of the decorations and fanciness was the love the bride and groom have for each other and for Jesus. Their shared faith in Jesus Christ was so evident in the entire ceremony and it was just a wonderful time of worship and giving thanks for God bringing them together, despite their being born on different sides of the ocean (the groom is from England!). It was a beautiful wedding in ever aspect! 

Adventures in Love: What's Your Verse?

I have enjoyed so much these past 14 days of 

meditating on God's love and His directions about how we are to love each other....

Now it's your turn to share your favorite verse about God's love!

I can't wait to read what you all have been thinking on about the topic of LOVE! 

Did you miss a day in the Adventures in Love? 

Below are all the previous days in this 14 day series:

Day 1 * Day 2 * Day 3 * Day 4 * Day 5 * Day 6 * Day 7 *

Day 8 * Day 9 * Day 10 * Day 11 * Day 12 * Day 13

Adventures in Love: Day 14

1 John 4:10 

This is real love - not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as a sacrifice to take away our sins.

Happy Valentine's Day! As we celebrate a day of "LOVE", be reminded by this verse what real love truly is. That even when we were still sinners, God sent His one and only Son to take the punishment that we deserved for our sins, so that all who believed could be washed clean and live with Him in Heaven forever. 

Now that's real love! 

Did you miss a day in the Adventures in Love? Below are all the previous days in this 14 day series about God's love:

Day 1 * Day 2 * Day 3 * Day 4 * Day 5 * Day 6 * Day 7 * Day 8 * Day 9 * Day 10 * Day 11 * Day 12 * Day 13

** Do you have your own favorite verse about God's love? I would be thrilled if you would join the link party on Friday, February 15th (THAT'S TOMORROW!) and share the verse and some insights about it with us! For more details, click on the word "LOVE" on the grey strip on the top of the page. 

Aaaannnd, if you want to read a post today about MY Valentine, {HERE} is one from last year. 

Adventures in Love: Day 13

Ephesians 3:17-19 And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, 18 may have power, together with all the Lord’s holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, 19 and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.

29,035 feet tall is the highest mountain

(Mt. Everest photo source)

God's love is higher!

3,977 miles is the longest river

(Amazon River photo source)

God's love is longer!

180 degree wide view of the horizon

(ocean sunset photo source)

God's love is wider!

Billions of miles into deep space

(Hubble telescope photo source)

God's love is deeper!

Can you grasp how wide, long, high, deep God's love is?

Did you miss a day in the Adventures in Love? Below are all the previous days in this 14 day series:
Day 1 * Day 2 * Day 3 * Day 4 * Day 5 * Day 6 * Day 7 * Day 8 * Day 9 * Day 10 * Day 11 * Day 12

** Do you have your own favorite verse about God's love? I would be thrilled if you would join the link party on Friday, February 15th and share the verse and some insights about it with us! For more details, click on the word "LOVE" on the grey strip on the top of the page. 

I am sharing this post today at:
Whole Hearted Home Wednesday
and at

Adventures in Love: Day 12

1 John 3:18 Let us not love with words or speech, but with actions and in truth.

I have been thinking a lot about this verse. A few weeks ago I signed up with Jill @ Create Craft Love to participate in her Valentine Exchange. I decided to make my Valentines cards by hand and picked this verse about love to write on each one. You can imagine after writing 45 Valentines, I now have this verse memorized! 

Here are my thoughts on this little, yet powerful verse: Speaking words (or typing them) can be so easy. Saying that you will be praying for someone is simple, and loving. But how much more loving is actually following through with those words and taking action to pray for that person. Or hearing about someone in need of a little extra help, and actually showing them love by taking a little time to help out. Speaking words of love can be wonderfully helpful, and sometimes the only thing that you can actually do in a situation to show love. But I think this is a reminder to not take the easy way out and only use our words. A reminder to roll up our sleeves when we can and show love by our actions. Valentine's Day is only 2 days away, what are some actions you can do to show love to someone in your life?


Did you miss a day in the Adventures in Love? Below are all the previous days in this 14 day series:
Day 1 * Day 2 * Day 3 * Day 4 * Day 5 * Day 6 * Day 7 * Day 8 * Day 9 * Day 10 * Day 11

** Do you have your own favorite verse about God's love? I would be thrilled if you would join the link party on Friday, February 15th and share the verse and some insights about it with us! For more details, click on the word "LOVE" on the grey strip on the top of the page. 

Adventures in Love: Day 11

1 Peter 4:8
Most important of all, continue to show deep love for each other, for love covers a multitude of sins.

Whenever I am upset with someone or something, I tend to show it in ways that are...well, less than loving. I might yell, or give the silent treatment. I might try to ignore the problem or confront the source of the frustration and anger. Really the last thing on my mind is showing love. But I think that is exactly what this verse tells us to do! (Funny how God's way is opposite of what our natural human reaction is!) Showing deep love for one another, even when there is a multitude of sin. Sin that makes you angry, and sin that frustrates you. God shows love in the face of sin. He gave us the ultimate example of showing love in the face of sin by sending His Son to die on the cross while we were still sinners. What a display of love! With God's love working in my heart, I will be able to react to sin with love. 

Lord, teach me to smother sin with love. For your word tells us that love covers a multitude of sins. 

Did you miss a day in the Adventures in Love? Below are all the previous days in this 14 day series:
Day 1 * Day 2 * Day 3 * Day 4 * Day 5 * Day 6 * Day 7 * Day 8 * Day 9 * Day 10

** Do you have your own favorite verse about God's love? I would be thrilled if you would join the link party on Friday, February 15th and share the verse and some insights about it with us! For more details, click on the word "LOVE" on the grey strip on the top of the page. 

Adventures in Love: Day 10

 Matthew 5:43-44 

“You have heard that it was said,

 ‘Love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ 

44 But I tell you, 

love your enemies and

 pray for those who persecute you."

Jesus said some very powerful and specific things about love. Things that He knew we would need to hear, and things that He knew we would not want to listen to! (Come on, you know I am right!) Who REALLY wants to love their enemy? I don't want to. It is HARD! I believe it is so hard that humans can not do it without God's love working in us and through us. 

The only way I could ever love my enemy with God's help and God's love. 

The last part of that verse "pray for those who persecute you" is a great place to start loving my enemies. Pray for them. Start with the internal thing = prayer, and then the external things = love, will follow. 

Lord, help me to remember each day to pray for my enemies. Show me how to love them, not just with my love, but with YOUR love. 

Did you miss a day in the Adventures in Love? Below are all the previous days in this 14 day series of meditations on God's love:

Day 1 * Day 2 * Day 3 * Day 4 * Day 5 * Day 6 * Day 7 * Day 8 * Day 9

** Do you have your own favorite verse about God's love? I would be thrilled if you would join the link party on Friday, February 15th and share the verse and some insights about it with us! For more details, click on the word "LOVE" on the grey strip on the top of the page. 

Sharing these thoughts today at:

Adventures in Love: Day 9

Psalm 136: 23-26
23 He remembered us in our low estate
His love endures forever.
24 and freed us from our enemies.
His love endures forever.
25 He gives food to every creature.
His love endures forever.
26 Give thanks to the God of heaven.
His love endures forever

I picked just a few of the verses from this Psalm. The phrase "His love endures forever" is in each of the 26 verses, and even translated into English this song is beautiful - I wish I knew Hebrew so I could read it how the Psalmist wrote it! These verses cover so much of God's love. From saving us from our sins and enemies, to providing us with the food we eat, it is because of God's love that we are alive! Just a few of the countless reasons to give thanks to God. 

Did you miss a day in the Adventures in Love? Below are all the previous days in this 14 day series of meditations on God's Love:
Day 1 * Day 2 * Day 3 * Day 4 * Day 5 * Day 6 * Day 7 * Day 8

** Do you have your own favorite verse about God's love? I would be thrilled if you would join the link party on Friday, February 15th and share the verse and some insights about it with us! For more details, click on the word "LOVE" on the grey strip on the top of the page. 

Adventures in Love: Day 8

Psalm 36:5 Your love, Lord, reaches to the heavens,

your faithfulness to the skies.

When you read this verse, do you hear this song... 

(video here, If you can't see it you may have to click to the page to view)

I get it stuck in my head for hours, and I love it!

I love looking up at the sky. At the clouds in the day, a beautiful sunset, the stars in the night sky. The sky has always been a picture of God's love to me!

He makes a new and different picture in each sunrise and sunset,

yet the stars look the same as they did when Jesus looked up at them.

Just like God's love,

new every day,

yet never changing. 

Did you miss a day in the Adventures in Love? Below are all the previous days in this 14 day series on meditations of God's love:

Day 1 * Day 2 * Day 3 * Day 4 * Day 5 * Day 6 * Day 7

** Do you have your own favorite verse about God's love? I would be thrilled if you would join the link party on Friday, February 15th and share the verse and some insights about it with us! For more details, click on the word "LOVE" on the grey strip on the top of the page. 

Sharing these thoughts today at

Adventures in Love: Day 7

1 Peter 5:6-7 Humble yourselves, therefore, under the mighty hand of God so that at the proper time he may exalt you, casting all your anxieties on him, because he cares for you.

This verse is a challenge for me. I realize it does not have the word "love" in it, but I am going with "cares" as a synonym. Humbeling myself, kinda hard, casting my anxieties on Him, super hard (for me). I am a worrier. I can say with words that I will give all my anxieties to God, but actually DOING that in my heart is a different story. God loves us so much that He wants us to bring Him our burdens. He does not want me (or you!) to worry, because He has what's best for us all planned out. He loves each of his children so much that He wants to lift our burdens off our shoulders and carrie them for us. Lord, help me to bring my burdens to you, and help me to let you take them from me. I don't want to hold them anymore. 

Did you miss a day in the Adventures in Love? Below are all the previous days in this 14 day series of reflections on God's love:
Day 1 * Day 2 * Day 3 * Day 4 * Day 5 * Day 6

** Do you have your own favorite verse about God's love? I would be thrilled if you would join the link party on Friday, February 15th and share the verse and some insights about it with us! For more details, click on the word "LOVE" on the grey strip on the top of the page. 

Adventures in Love: Day 6

Zephaniah 3:17 The LORD your God is in your midst, a mighty one who will save; he will rejoice over you with gladness; he will quiet you by his love; he will exult over you with loud singing.

God delights in showing His love to His people. He loves to love me. He loves to love you! It makes Him happy to show His love to me. He is in the midst of everyday. In the quiet times, and the joy filled times, and especially in the difficult times. When our heart is filled with fear, grief, doubt, and other "noise", God will quiet all those things with His great love. And when our heart is filled with rejoicing and singing, He is right there rejoicing and singing (loudly) with you! What a great love that is!


Did you miss a day in the Adventures in Love? Below are all the previous days in this 14 day series of meditating about God's love:
Day 1 * Day 2 * Day 3 * Day 4 * Day 5

** Do you have your own favorite verse about God's love? I would be thrilled if you would join the link party on Friday, February 15th and share the verse and some insights about it with us! For more details, click on the word "LOVE" on the grey strip on the top of the page. 


I am sharing this post today at:
Whole Hearted Home Wednesday
and at

Adventures in Love: Day 5

1 Chronicles 16:34 Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good;his love endures forever. 

When I read this verse, my mind immediately starts playing the Chris Tomlin song Forever. I thought I would just post a video of the song and lyrics because it is just so good. The word "forever" seems to be overused and not used correctly in our culture. I know I use it incorrectly. "The traffic was so bad! It took me forever to get to work." or "The laundry pile is so huge, it is going to take me forever to wash it all." But really, our human minds can not comprehend FOREVER (OK, anyone else love the movie SANDLOT. Remember when Squints holds up the flashlight under his face when telling the story of the Beast? Fooooor-eeeev-er! Ha!) God's love for use will endure forever. Think of as many years as you can and multiply them by a million, billion, and His love will still last LONGER than that! Now that is a reason to sing praise!

Did you miss a day in the Adventures in Love? Below are all the previous days in this 14 day series of meditating on verses about God's love:

Day 1 * Day 2 * Day 3 * Day 4

** Do you have your own favorite verse about God's love? I would be thrilled if you would join the link party on Friday, February 15th and share the verse and some insights about it with us! For more details, click on the word "LOVE" on the grey strip on the top of the page. 

Adventures in Love: Day 4

Exodus 15: 12-13 “You stretch out your right hand,and the earth swallows your enemies.13 In your unfailing love you will lead the people you have redeemed. In your strength you will guide them to your holy dwelling.

Because of God's love for us He leads us. He has been leading His people since the beginning of time. Like the Israelites in the wilderness, we do not always know exactly where we are going, or where God's path will bring us. However God in His unfailing love will lead us, if we are willing to follow. 

Did you miss a day in the Adventures in Love? Below are all the previous days in this 14 day series:
Day 1 * Day 2 * Day 3


** Do you have your own favorite verse about God's love? I would be thrilled if you would join the link party on Friday, February 15th and share the verse and some insights about it with us! More details to come...

Adventures in Love: Day 3

Psalm 103:8 The Lord is compassionate and merciful, slow to get angry and filled with unfailing love.

Unfailing love. I can think of many things that I have failed at in my life. I fail to keep my temper when I really need to. I fail to drive the speed limit. I fail to have enough self control to not polish off the sleeve of Thin Mints. I have had other things fail on me. Like my car failing to start. But there is one thing in my life that I know will NEVER fail. God's Love. It is unfailing. He is patient with me, slow to get angry. Thank the Lord for His unfailing love! 





Did you miss a day in the Adventures in Love? Below are all the previous days in this 14 day series:

Day 1 * Day 2

Adventures in Love: Day 2

Romans 8:37-39 "But in all these things we overwhelmingly conquer through Him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

That is a pretty extensive and through list of things that Paul describes is not able to separate us from God's love. Think of the tallest mountain, or the deepest ocean, or the largest distance, and it is still not big enough to separate us from God's love. Pretty big love, right?! 

Did you miss a day in the Adventures in Love? Below are all the previous days in this 14 day series:

Day 1

Adventures in Love: Day 1

From today until Valentine's Day, you pretty much can't go more than 10 steps (or clicks when you are on the computer) without seeing something about flowers, hearts, little cupid babies with a bow and arrows, chocolate candies, candy hearts (yum!), and in general LOVE. 

You can't get away from it! Even here! 

This is the first ever series on ADV!

Everyday until Valentine's day, I am going to be posting about LOVE. But it is not the love that you will see on commercials or flower shop windows. Nope. It's a bigger, better Love. It's God's love! I thought it would be a good way to keep my focus on Him, when the world wants me to focus on long stem roses and little candy hearts (not that those are bad, but the don't last very long compared to God's love!...well, those candy hearts might last almost as long...those little things last forever!) So, every day until V-Day, I am going to post a Bible verse about God's love, or what the Bible says about love in general, and a short reflection on what that verse means to me.

Let's start the

John 3:16 “For God so loved the world,that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life."

Perhaps one of the most quoted verses in the whole Bible, you can even see it on huge signs at football games. I am sure it is one of the first verses I ever memorized. I could probably even say it in my sleep. It is so familiar, that sometimes I forget how foundational and important it is! God's love for me (and you!) is so great that He sent His only Son (Jesus) to take the punishment for my sins, by dying on the cross, so that I could spend eternity in Heaven with Him! And I am so thankful that He did! The greatest display of love, ever! 

I can't wait to meditate on God's love for these next 2 weeks! 

I just had an idea! Would anyone be interested in sharing their own post on a verse about God's love and do a link party on Valentine's Day? Or maybe the day after, on Friday, Feb. 15th? What do you think? Would you like to join the adventure in love?