What a Weekend This Has Been! God, Your Timing is Perfect.

In what seemed to be the quickest decisions we have ever made, life changed even quicker for us when we received some heart breaking news this past Thursday night. I didn't have time to call anyone, so I sent out emails between my 2 hours of sleep and packing my bag and loading the car and heading to the airport... These are the emails to show you what's happened.

1:08 AM, Friday, August 10th - Needing Prayers of Our Friends


Friends and Family,

As you may or may not know, my husband, Brian's grandfather has been ill for quite some time, but the Lord chose to ease his pain and take him home this evening. This is a wonderful thing because as the illness had overtaken Granddaddy's fragile body, he was unable to walk the way he once could, but we can now rejoice, as he is walking the streets of Heaven tonight.

I write you not because we are saddened but because we need the Lord's help in times like these. Brian left today for a mission trip to Alaska, knowing it was the Lord's will. Brian loved this man who encouraged him and taught him the Word of God, and at this moment in time (12:25 a.m. on Friday, August 10) Brian has not received word of Granddaddy's passing. Pray for comfort at the time of his hearing.

Also, arrangements have not yet been made. Brian wanted dearly to preach his grandfather's funeral, as to Brian, it would be and is a celebration. However, with Brian in Alaska, things may be difficult in planning. Please pray for the Lord's hand in the arrangements, in getting Brian home if HE wills it, and in safe travels.

Nonetheless, my greatest joy in writing each of you is knowing that one day I will see both Granddaddy and my Nana again. When we visited Granddaddy just a few weeks ago in the hospital on July 25 and after Brian had read Romans 8 and Granddaddy quoted almost every scripture, I heard him say one of the most wonderful things I've ever heard. As we got ready to leave, Brian leaned over and said, "I don't know if I'll get to see you again, but if I don't, I'll see you on the other side." Granddaddy grinned and replied, "We have a great hope, don't we, son?!" I pray that you have that same hope today.

Please pray for our family in the upcoming days...

"Weeping may last through the night, but joy comes with the morning." Psalm 30:5

In His Love,
Jenna





11:38 AM, Friday, August 10th - Update on Brian and Our Family


Friends and Family,

Please continue to keep us in your prayers.

Brian received word in Alaska last night around 1 a.m. Central Time. He then was able to change his flight for next Tuesday to this morning at approximately 2 a.m. Brian will be arriving in Nashville today at noon after having had no sleep since Wednesday night. Please pray for his being able to catch up on sleep considering the weekend he is about to have.

We will be heading to West Tennessee when I pick him up at the airport in just a few minutes. As of now, the arrangements for Brian's grandfather are as follows:

Dr. Bennie L. Johnson
Chase Funeral Home
Highway 70
Huntingdon, TNSaturday Visitation 2:00 - 8:00
Sunday Funeral 3:00

Off I-40 W, take exit 108. Turn right until you see exit sign towards Camden, veer right.
Get to first 4 way stop, turn left on Buena Vista Road. Funeral Home is on the right, but you are behind the funeral home in the parking lot.

Thank you for your calls, emails, and prayers. If you have any trouble finding us, call me at 615-300-7055.

Love and Blessings,
Jenna Johnson





I will let you know how blessed I feel and about God's timing tomorrow, rest is in order for now. We are home. Thank you for your prayers, and Lord, you are SO good.

I Probably Wouldn't Be This Way...

It seems like an eternity ago that I was walking down the aisle saying "I do" to the rest of my life, and not one moment goes by that I don't think about that day and the commitment we made. It's strange how life now gets in the way and tries to distort your views and get into the center of your marriage where God should be. I've learned that things are always easier when you stay in His will, and we've found that the first year is much more of a blessing when you leave Him do His work.

But, times get hard. It's not always easy. It feels like ages ago that I held him. I remember about three weeks ago when he told me the burden that he had. I really didn't think it would hit me the way it has. Being as independent as I always have been, it couldn't be that big of deal if God had given him the burden to go on a mission trip. Besides, in February, right after we were engaged, he had gone on a 10-day mission trip to Jamaica, and though it was hard being away from him, it wasn't that difficult. God lightened the load.

This time is different... As the day of his departure approached, the heaviness inside of me grew, and I could tell it wasn't going to be easy this time. The separation was going to be harder than I could imagine. I read "The two shall be as one..." over and over in the Bible, and each time I read it, it cut even deeper. I have a deeper understanding and appreciation for my marriage now and for what God has put together. It is nothing good in me; it's what He has done in us.

Having him leave this morning changed something in me... Something about him not being here hurts more than I can put into words. The tears come without discussing it, the pain overcomes me at any given moment, and the emptiness I feel is so overwhelming. I know the Lord has called him to be in Alaska, telling the people of that beautiful state about his calling to do the Lord's work, and I firmly believe that should anything happen to him that I know I will see him again one day because he and I have a great hope in Jesus Christ as we both have a time and a place where we met Him. However, what I'm going through now is something I can't explain... I'm not certain if the Lord has something for me to do, other than pray, or if He is telling me something, or if this is just the heart of a woman...

My prayer is that I learn to be dependent on the Lord for strength, because though I am, this feeling of loss or emptiness is what the devil does to make me doubt what my Lord can do. Jesus is all I need. He is my everything, and though He has blessed me with an amazing husband, my thoughts should remain upward. Please help me pray for strength this week, until next Tuesday the 14th when Brian comes home. Also pray for Brian, for a safe and blessed trip, for the Lord's will to be done, and for his divine purpose in all of our lives to be fulfilled.

It's Time to Take Time...

I've honestly learned that time is something I don't have much of.

I have taken time forgranted all of these years, and it has so vividly proven itself to me in the past few months and weeks. God has graciously given me this awesome gift of time. I see the many places and situations He has allowed me to go through and to, whether they be as outstanding and humbling as the mission trip to Jamaica where I met my now husband or as disgusting and humiliating as my college years in which I drug His holy name through the streets of Bowling Green. Time is the one thing God has granted me. It's an amazing thing to look back on it now, to see where He's lead me, and to realize the decisions I made for myself without once calling on His name. Those are the times that I greatly struggled, and I find myself now going through times that appear as if I'm on mountain tops. All the same, the time itself is what I have taken thought of today.

As I was given the opportunity to visit an assisted living home for Alzheimer's patients last week, I walked up and down the halls noticing how vicariously I was living my life... I live so task-oriently. I must get one thing done and move right on to the next. I frustrate easily. I forget to love whole-heartedly and show the joy and peace that a child of God should be illuminating each day, but as my husband and I spoke with a preacher of God's word who now is stricken with this terrible illness, I realized how God is longing for my time. This man of God lived and is still living his life, though he might not understand it, for the Lord. He seemed confused or distraught as he walked the halls with us, but as we started to leave, Brian asked him to pray for us, and just like I'm sure he did all those years past as he lived for God, he bowed his head, and prayed the most simple yet elegant prayer I've ever heard. The time it took for him to say those childlike words was maybe 30 seconds, but it impacted me to take the time to start living and longing to spend my time with God.

I've always heard to live everyday as if it is my last,
but seeing that old man live like that;
hearing my husband tell me he is going to love me like everyday is his last and then see him actually DO it;
and then witnessing my nana sick with Alzheimer's, knowing she is declining, and leaving her home thinking as if it may be my last time with her...
All of these things are enough to make one STOP and take time with God. I've learned to be thankful for the time I've had not just for my own sake but with others. I'm so blessed.


ECCLESIASTES 3
TO EVERYTHING there is a season, and a time for every matter or purpose under heaven:
A time to be born and a time to die, a time to plant and a time to pluck up what is planted,
A time to kill and a time to heal, a time to break down and a time to build up,
A time to weep and a time to laugh, a time to mourn and a time to dance,
A time to cast away stones and a time to gather stones together, a time to embrace and a time to refrain from embracing,
A time to get and a time to lose, a time to keep and a time to cast away,
A time to rend and a time to sew, a time to keep silence and a time to speak,
A time to love and a time to hate, a time for war and a time for peace.

What profit remains for the worker from his toil?
I have seen the painful labor and exertion and miserable business which God has given to the sons of men with which to exercise and busy themselves.

He has made everything beautiful in its time. He also has planted eternity in men's hearts and minds [a divinely implanted sense of a purpose working through the ages which nothing under the sun but God alone can satisfy], yet so that men cannot find out what God has done from the beginning to the end.

I know that there is nothing better for them than to be glad and to get and do good as long as they live;

And also that every man should eat and drink and enjoy the good of all his labor--it is the gift of God.

I know that whatever God does, it endures forever; nothing can be added to it nor anything taken from it. And God does it so that men will [reverently] fear Him [revere and worship Him, knowing that He is].

Everything and In Between...

I guess it's been a month or two since I blogged last, actually it could have been days, weeks, or years, and I wouldn't have noticed. There's this little thing called marriage I've been engulfed in recently, and my life has been tossed to and fro. I don't say that to sound as if it's a bad thing; I say that because God has been in complete control of us every single step of the way. In just three short months, my newlywed husband and I experienced more than most people do in lifetimes. From becoming an item on January 23, to getting engaged just 8 days later on the 31st, having our first kiss that very night, getting married a mere 2 months after that on March 31st, traveling to the Grand Canyon and experiencing God's GLORY in a HUGE way, going to Texas for a best friend's A-mazing wedding, coming home to have one of our biggest trials yet... Not to mention the little things we've learned along the way... like how to tell the other no, when to leave the room, how to end a movie, when it's time for "bed," managing time and money, making room for friends, learning to cook and clean and everything in between...

Life is good, though. It's hard at times. It's oftentimes overwhelming, but at those times when I think it is, he's right there beside me, holding my hand. And even when he's not, my Lord is, which is even better. I've learned that writing my experiences is too difficult. They are something I'm taking in and completely loving every second of. Wait on the Lord, for His grace is sufficient and His plans are too great to not wait for. I'm living proof of that.

When God Made You...

He must have been thinking about me...

It's unreal to me that the next to last time I wrote, I was single and completely okay with that. I had just told my friends not 5 days before on my birthday that though I was content with being single, I was ready to meet "him." I wanted to know who he was, what he was doing, and had he prayed for me the way I had for him. Only 2 months ago was I in this frame of mind...

Little did I know but that someone I was ready to meet was thinking the same things. He had been praying for his future wife for years... It wasn't until January 14th of this year that the Lord showed him who he should be praying for. It came as quite a surprise to him, as he already knew who she was; he knew her better than most anyone. They were close friends, and they had been pushed by others to try to be something more... But it wasn't time for God had such a bigger plan. On January 22nd, he knew that he needed to call her and tell her how he felt, but when he called, he knew she had had an overwhelming day, so he was silent and waited...

Until the following day... Because the day before had been her birthday, and it wasn't in God's time to reveal that the two would become one in only two months. We met that afternoon at Starbucks and talked for hours about nothing, until his elbows were both on the table and his hands folded together, I didn't realize that this conversation was anything more than just two friends being just that. Then I heard, "What is going on with us? Is there an us?" At that very moment, as I looked into his eyes, the Holy Spirit filled me, and I knew that this was the one that I had been asking and praying for... He was the one that had been made for me. Perfectly and divinely designed for me. But how do you tell someone that when you're not certain they feel that same way?! I replied, "I don't know, is there?!" I soon realized there was in fact an "us." Not just the "us-es" I have had before, this was the one God had intended for me to be with all along. This is the one I was to expect...

In four days, I will walk down the aisle to meet my best friend and pledge our life to the Lord as one. I know, it sounds strange, not saying that I'm pledging my life to him, but the way I see it, I'm not. I'm giving my life, my marriage, and everything I have to the Lord. If it's in my Maker's hands, it can never be harmed, destroyed, or hurt. There will be hard times, but I know that if he and I will take it to the Lord in prayer, He will see them and us through. I am asking now for your prayers... Please pray for my marriage, that it will be one that uplifts and glorifies God in every way possible. It means so much to me. Remember us this Saturday, March 31st, at 2:00, as we start our life together...