=>leave a note in the online guestbook

Hello, and welcome to our website!

Considering how few acquaintances we have in common, and how few people know us as a couple instead of two individuals, we decided to make this site in hopes of giving our families and friends a chance to "meet" the other online, and to read about the whys and wherefores of our relationship. Even more important to us, however, was the desire that visitors to this site might catch a glimpse of the "vision" behind our wedding plans -- because the focus on July 31st shouldn't be Seth or myself, but rather our Lord and Savior, and that fact should be unavoidably clear, both in the ceremony and in our preparation for it.

We "met" on June 28th, 2003, and officially embarked on our dating-relationship the same day. We had first corresponded in January, although it wasn't until late April or early May that we started thinking of romantic possibilities. Anyway, we met online. Not in the more regular venues of chat rooms or singles sites; we just both wrote regularly in our online journals (yes -- people keep diary-like journals online, where anyone can read them -- it's an interesting and sometimes vulnerable experience). One day I did a search for journalers who had listed "John Piper" (a popular theologian) as an interest. Rather few names popped up; most of them were journals that I already read regularly. But there was another journal listed -- one that turned out to be Seth.

Seth had a habit of writing very thoughtful things in his journal. Like... articles, almost, about God and current events and other interesting topics. His journal was fairly impersonal, but I'm a long-term fan of thought-provoking articles, so I decided to read his journal regularly. He visited my journal, where, ironically, I had just written a long entry about romantic relationships (for more irony -- my mother made a comment at the time about how any single Christian guy would have to be out of his mind to not be interested in me after reading it), and, for reasons unknown to me, started reading my journal.

One day he emailed me and asked if I'd like to "correspond." I thought, okay, why not... I had corresponded with other people online in the past (with no ideas of "romance"), and have found it to be a valuable experience. Not that I wasn't interested in Seth; I just didn't really even consider that he might be interested in me, and learned long ago not to get my hopes up for no reason. Seth was not only considerably older than me, but he seemed so mature and "spiritual" -- and so I wasn't really expecting him to be interested in anything other than friendship.

But God is gracious, and our relationship is indeed a very deep friendship -- with a very wonderful and gooey and romantic theme. We met on June 28th as "friends," although Seth was quite clear beforehand that he'd be opening the doors and paying for everything. ;-) We went to this deli-like place, and then to this really neat marshland/swamp/zoo thing, where we spent hours walking and talking about everything we could think of. I remember being very nervous -- Seth was an important entity in my life at that point, and I didn't want to mess up and lose him, plus I'd never been on a "date" before and had no idea how I was supposed to act. Retrospectively, I suppose it was rather hilarious. He shook my hand in farewell.

Thus began our relationship. The next six months or so was a flurry of visits, with painfully long intervals in between. Finally, on New Year's Eve, 2003, he proposed. I said yes, and the rest, as they say, is history. :-)

I'm very excited about what God is doing in our lives, individually and corporately. I can't wait to see how His plans for our marriage unfold.

by His grace,
Julie