Why Get Married at All: The Question I Couldn’t Shake.

Why Marriage On a Site About Retreats?

Of all the things I write about, marriage is probably the last thing you'd expect from me. Soulfull Life is a retreat experience for Christian women. It is not a marriage blog. So writing about my own marriage feels, on the surface, a little off brand. But I want to explain why it isn't, because I think it actually belongs here more than you'd guess.

Recently I have been hosting a small group of women at my home for a faith-based yoga class. We move not only through poses but we sit with questions together, and we reflect and share. And what keeps coming up, over and over, is that many of the women in that room are divorced. 

I relate to that. I am divorced myself. And my divorce is, in a lot of ways, what brought me to Jesus. It is part of the genesis story of Soulfull Life. So even though this brand was never meant to be about marriage, marriage keeps circling back into the conversation. I’ll fill you in on some of the story…

The Divorce That Became My Genesis Story

I was an atheist for about twenty years. I converted to Christianity when I was thirty, but if I am honest, I was a lukewarm Christian for the decade that followed. I did not do much to grow my faith. I did not know Jesus. I had not yielded my life to Him. I would read a book here, watch a documentary there, perhaps a sermon, but I almost never opened the Bible. Maybe once or twice in ten years. It felt overwhelming, and I did not know what to do with it, so I just did not invest time in the Bible.

My ex-husband had never struggled with his faith the way I did. He had always been a Christian, and he knew far more than I did about God, about Jesus, about the history of Scripture. He would try to share it with me. But honestly, I never put together the fuller picture, not while we were married.

When we got divorced, it sent me into a full spiral. I had always been an independent, do-it-myself career woman. I had never lived with a man (actually, I had never lived with another person - not even a roommate in college) and not for religious reasons since I was still an atheist at the time. I just genuinely liked being self-sufficient. But that self-sufficiency came back to bite me, because I had no idea how hard it would be to come out the other side of that divorce.

I resorted to a lot of what I had leaned on when I was younger. Drinking too much. Staying busy with parties and going out, trying to outrun the quiet. I was forty years old at the time of my divorce, and it just felt like my life was spiraling. Over the course of almost a year, that compounded, and it finally broke me. I came home from a booze cruise weekend in December of 2018 and woke up the next morning and said, out loud, “enough”. I could not do it anymore. I was depressed, isolated, in a genuinely dark place. And the only thing I knew how to do was beg God: “Please, please, please help me. I am desperate.”

The Slow Burn Back to God

My turn to God did not happen the way it does in some other people's stories, where someone dramatically shows up and everything shifts overnight. For me it was a slow burn. I dove into my second yoga certification and became almost fully reclusive. I practiced yoga six days a week, close to two hours a day. Every morning I sat in deep meditation, and every single night I walked. Those walks became my time with God.

Going through that season taught me something I could not yet put into words. Self-sufficiency is not actually an option. I knew it in my body before I could articulate it, but slowly I started coming out of the funk.

A Few More Wildernesses

In the summer of 2019, I decided to go live in Cape Town, South Africa, for a couple of months. I had been working remotely for years by then, long before it was common, and I used that time in Africa to focus on being well. It was genuinely life changing, and when my time in South Africa was up and it was time for me to come back to the States, I swore I was never returning to the state of Florida. I left the state three times over the years. I ended up back in Florida every single time. I always joke that Florida is the state where I love to live and love to leave. 

Not long after I got home, I hit another low. The company I was working for was not hitting their revenue goals, and there was a frank discussion that they’d have to downsize. I had ended my lease to travel abroad so I was in an Airbnb with no fixed address, working as an independent contractor. I just felt so uncertain about my future. It was a hard, disorienting stretch of time. And then, in a way I could not have engineered myself, that same company pivoted into a new line of business and brought me on in a leadership role instead of letting me go. Shortly after, I found a beautiful home, one of my favorite places I have ever lived.

When I moved into that new house and was unpacking boxes, I found a Bible that a pastor had given me years earlier, back when I was still an atheist. It was super thick and heavy. An NIV two-year sturdy version. I had carried it around for years without ever opening it. Something that day moved me. October 10th, 2019. That’s when I started reading the Bible daily. I have not stopped reading daily since.

Praying to Date Differently

Somewhere around a year into that two-year Bible reading plan - I genuinely felt I was getting to know Jesus more - I started praying that I was ready to date again. But I told God I wanted to do it differently this time. I wanted Him at the center of it. I did not want another relationship without a real spiritual foundation, and I wanted whoever I was with to be a Christian too. But how would I find this man?

I’m a private person, so I didn’t want to use eHarmony or Match or anything like that. I did not want to create a profile so someone could “rack and stack” me against a mix of other women. I wasn’t sure how to even start dating again. Eventually I found a company called Tawkify, a concierge matchmaking service. They vet everyone who signs up through a real conversation, ask an extensive set of questions about who you are and who you're looking for, and then set people up on genuine blind dates. I signed up for the most basic membership, just agreeing to be part of their available pool. I figured I would take my chances and let God lead the way. 

The Blind Date That Changed Everything

I had only been signed up on their platform for about a week when I got the call. It happened to be the same day I was baptized, April 4th, 2021. They told me they had found someone for me, confirmed a few basics, and asked if I wanted to move forward. I said yes.

That blind date changed the course of my life. I met Shane, and it was an instant match. We were both fully committed to a serious relationship from the start. No games, no wondering where we stood. He knocked me off my feet.

There was one small glitch. The matchmaker lived in New York City and wasn’t so familiar with Central Florida. She had set us up even though we lived an hour apart, so for the first three years of our relationship, Shane and I were in a commuter relationship. He lived in a coastal beach town, and I lived just outside of Orlando, and we went back and forth every weekend.

From our second and third date, we jumped straight into the hard conversations: the role of faith in our lives. The fact that I do not have children and he has an adult daughter, and what role kids should play going forward. Money. Values. Our dreams, our goals, how we wanted to live. We both knew almost immediately that marriage was an absolute yes for us. But we went out of order. After three years of dating, we bought a home together. And then Shane proposed about a year and a half after that.

The Question I Couldn't Stop Thinking About

Somewhere in the two or three years before Shane and I got engaged, a question started rolling around in my head that I could not shake. I have a friend who has been in very long term relationships her whole life and, yet, has never felt the need to get married. Marriage is not something she is against. It just is not for her, partly because she does not see marriage from a religious lens and does not want to share finances or cohabitate.

One day, during a girl’s weekend, someone asked this friend why she never wanted to get married. And her response was “what’s the point?”. 

That conversation happened in a group of five of us, all women, and every one of us had been divorced except the one who had simply never married. I left that conversation asking myself something sincere. I know I want to get married. I have always known that. But why? What’s the point?

This was before I started seminary, before I was active in church. And part of the question underneath it was harder than it sounds. Does Christ love me less if I don't get married? Does He love a couple less if they don't get married? I did not think the answer was yes. Plenty of people never end up in a relationship, or they date and it does not work out, or they divorce, and we know Jesus does not love us based on our conditions or our acts. He loved us enough to lay His life down for us. But that question kept circling. In the same way we are told to always be ready to explain what we believe and why (1 Peter 3:15), I felt like I needed to be able to answer - honestly - why get married at all, especially given our situation. I was 43 when I met Shane. He was 45. He had already raised his daughter. I never had any children, and I was not going to. We were both established in our careers, both already had our own places. We were monogamous, actively involved in each other’s lives, very happy - even sharing financial responsibilities. So what was the actual reason?

What Changed When I Read The Bible Again

It did not click the first time I read the Bible cover to cover. I think it was my third or fourth time through when I really started to understand some of what Scripture says about a husband and wife's responsibilities to each other, and the unique role marriage plays for two Christians specifically.

Part of what shifted for me is the picture of God's covenant love for His people, a relationship marred by spiritual unfaithfulness, and the greatest expression of that love: God sending His Son into the world and Jesus laying His life down for us. In ancient Jewish culture, betrothal functioned much like an engagement, except the betrothed couple was already considered married in every way, even though the wedding celebration and the marriage itself had not yet taken place. The bride and groom would drink a cup of wine together as a picture of a new covenant, and exchange rings.

That betrothal picture is the same language Scripture uses for Jesus and His church. He is preparing a place for His bride in His Father's house (John 14:2-3). In a mysterious way, His bride is united to Him, one flesh (Ephesians 5:31-32). She waits for His return at an hour she does not know (Matthew 25:1-13). She will be dressed in fine linen, clean and white, without spot or wrinkle, holy and blameless (Ephesians 5:27 & Revelation 19:8). His return will be announced with a great shout (Matthew 25:6 & 1 Thessalonians 4:16). And His bride will be with Him, celebrating at the wedding banquet (Revelation 19:9).

Something shifted in me as all of that started to land. Marriage is a unique and profoundly weighty decision. Jesus is the true bridegroom, the one Shane and I are each called to love above one another. Our vows became something entirely different to me once I understood that. Marriage is not just a legal contract or a nice tradition. It is a supernatural event, built on a mutual exchange of holy pledges, and those pledges are among the only true vows most people will ever make in their lives. I want to give credit here to my mentor, Dr. Scott Olson, the pastor who eventually married us. He has been mentoring me in my Bible studies program for the last year, and his teaching has shaped so much of how I understand marriage now.

The Elopement We Didn't Wait For

Shane proposed on November 1st, 2025. Our first plan was a big, fun elopement in Italy, maybe even flying friends out for a party, sometime in the summer of 2027. But within a few months of getting engaged, it hit me that I did not want to wait a year and a half to make this vow. I knew I was ready. So we changed course and went to Colorado instead, a place that already held a lot of meaning for us, and also where Dr. Olson lives. He agreed to marry us there. That is a story for another day, but it mattered to us that the person who married us was someone we had a relationship with. 

What a Christian Marriage Actually Asks of Us

This part is really tied to the growth pillar of Soulfull Life, because so much of this has been about learning what a husband and wife's responsibilities actually are, biblically speaking. A husband is called to love sacrificially, to nourish and cherish his wife, to honor and respect her, and to help her grow spiritually. A wife is called to respect her husband and to submit to his leadership.

I know that word - submission - makes a lot of people uncomfortable, inside the church and especially outside of it, as though it means being a servant or being lesser or that it speaks to women’s greater role in society. It is not that at all. It describes a role two people share together. A wife shows love and respect, acts as her husband's helper and companion, and in our case, since we do not have children, I also run a great deal of our household day to day. A husband carries a heavy responsibility too. He is called to lead and to love, to help his wife grow spiritually mature and holy, to make God's Word central, to honor her, praise her, nourish her, cherish her. It mirrors how Christ loved His church. There are real sacrifices required on both ends of that.

What Was Missing the First Time

I want to be honest about my first marriage, because I think it matters to the story. On our wedding day, I accomplished exactly what I set out to accomplish: the greatest, most fun party anyone could imagine. And I succeeded. For years afterward, people told us it was the best wedding they had ever been to.

But we forgot one guest. God. We did not bring Him into our marriage. We did not prioritize Him. We did not go to church together or read Scripture together. My ex-husband tried to help grow my faith. He was incredibly smart and well-read. One of his gifts was the ability to help anyone understand challenging topics and he did open my eyes to the importance of faith. And there was a lot he nurtured in me early on. But we rarely practiced our faith jointly, and we did not prioritize the things that could have carried us through the challenging times of marriage. Our marriage paid the price for that and, ultimately, we divorced. I do not believe God ever encouraged our divorce. But I know He forgives us, and I know He always loves us. 

Why This One Is Different

God gave me Shane, and he is my best and truest gift. It is the best relationship I have ever been in, and so much of that comes down to one decision we keep making together: to put God at the center of it.

About two years ago, when we moved into this house together, we doubled down on that value. We found a church, and it has become a genuinely beautiful home for us. We have grown separately in our own walks with Christ, and we have grown together. I lead our household in a lot of practical ways. Shane's has been amazing about nurturing my spiritual life, and there is no bigger supporter or cheerleader of Soulfull Life than him. Any time I start to doubt whether this ministry has a future, whether it will ever grow into something sustaining, he is the one telling me to keep going. Keep doing the work. Keep being obedient. To me, this whole story, start to finish, is really a spiritual growth story.

My Non-Advice Advice

I do not think I am in any position to hand out advice. But if I could say one thing to another woman walking through this, it would be to bring your requests to God honestly and completely, and then hold the outcome loosely. Sometimes God’s answer is yes, sometimes the answer is not right now. Sometimes it is “I have something or someone better in mind”. There are so many people in this world who never marry and are deeply fulfilled and happy, and I want to be really clear about that, because marriage was never the measure of a whole life.

Before I met Shane, I prayed for the person who was out there - my future husband - even though I had no idea who he was. I asked God to help keep me accountable to being a genuinely good partner, not just to find one. Communication has been the single biggest thing that has carried Shane and me. We had the hard conversations early and often, because when you meet someone later in life, you are both bringing baggage into it. You just do not know yet whether it is a small duffel bag or the giant rolling suitcase that takes up half your trunk.

One thing our pastor pointed out has stuck with me. Our culture makes it seem like marriage is meant to complete each other: as in, Shane exists to fulfill all of my needs, and I exist to fulfill all of his. That is not how it works. Jesus fulfills our needs. When a marriage loses sight of that center, it falls into the same pattern so many marriages fall into, Christian or not: “outgrowing” each other and feeling disappointed with things that person does or does not do. That was genuinely how I thought back when I got divorced, putting myself and my own discomfort first.

This time, I understood marriage as an oath. God is present to hear those words, and if I am making that vow, I need to mean every part of it, through whatever our life looks like. Joy is not the hard part for people. It is preparing for the hard seasons that is difficult - the loss, the illness, the brokenness. So we talked through all of that early, foundationally, before we ever stood in front of anyone to say our vows.

We like to tell people the fun version, that we met on a blind date. And we did. But we both know the truer version is that God orchestrated the whole thing, and we were simply obedient enough to let the story unfold. I am not saying any of this from a place of having it figured out or being better than anyone. I am not perfect and not suggesting anyone “take my advice”. But deciding that Christ is the center of this marriage has been, without question, the truest measure of success in it.

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