Who would’ve thought…

If you know anything about our story, you know that when Bruce and I met, neither of us were in a place in our lives where we had any business getting married.

Me being 21 and lost to the ways of the world.

Him, 30 and recovering from a heart wrenching divorce.

Within the midst of our broken hearts, somehow, God brought us together. And from the very beginning, we both committed to keeping God at the center of our marriage and our family.

We decided we were going to be a family that loved God first, prayed, worshiped, and honored Him through our words and actions. We went to church, we served the body, we read the Bible to our kids, did Bible study, and vacation Bible school. We did all the things.

But that didn’t mean our married life was easy.

Oh no!

In fact, our marriage came hurling with waves of trials, tribulations, and emotions to work through from the very beginning with:

• trust issues after the affair in Bruce’s prior marriage,

• learning each other’s parenting style and navigating the role of a step-parent in a blended family,

• going to court in a custody battle to keep our children,

• being injured at work and navigating a 2-year workers comp journey,

• losing our home and having to live with our parents,

• having children in the midst of all of that,

• moving out of state, completely on our own, to start over,

• facing depression and anxiety,

• struggling with alcoholism,

• searching for our purpose,

• trying to focus on one step at a time…

And by the grace of God, somehow, not only did we survive all of that, but we came out of the other side thriving.

We chose to keep God at the center, intentionally seeking Him, committing to one another, committing to our family, and continuing to press on through every situation life threw at us.

Throughout our marriage, we have seen Him provide when we didn’t think there was a way.

We have watched mountains move as prayers were answered.

We have experienced peace when everyone else said we shouldn’t.

We had strength when the weight of our circumstances seemed unbearable.

We have seen His hand of protection surround us and our children when the world tried to crush us, both physically and emotionally.

And then, through the midst of all the hard, God started to show us our purpose. He showed us how our marriage had grown, the seeds we had watered which had turned into a blossom, and how He was going to use us, our family, and our story to reach many.

He wants to use our “growing Paynes” to help you through yours.

The road is hard, but we can do it, together.