10/17/2026
This is a picture from Thursday night at the Pregnancy and infant loss memorial at Brandon Regional Hospital. Ashley Jupp and I had the opportunity to have a different role this year. She was asked to be the photographer and I was asked to speak as the Dad that has lost a child (Aaron). It caused me to reflect this week on how blessed I am to have her as my wife.
When you meet the person you’re going to spend your life with, you really have no idea what you’re saying yes to.
You don’t know all the mountains you’ll climb, the valleys you’ll walk through, the victories you’ll celebrate, or the tragedies you’ll have to endure. You don’t know the dreams that will come true or the ones you’ll have to surrender. You don’t know how much life will change you both.
But there is something incredibly powerful and precious about finding someone you get to face it all with.
When I married Ashley, I knew I loved her. What I couldn’t have known was just how much deeper that love could grow. I couldn’t have imagined all the versions of life we would experience together, or all the ways I would come to admire, appreciate, and fall in love with her again and again.
We’ve experienced moments of overwhelming joy and moments of unimaginable heartbreak. We’ve celebrated victories, carried burdens, chased dreams, and walked through seasons we never would have chosen. And through it all, one of God’s greatest gifts to me has been the woman walking beside me.
Proverbs 18:22 says, “Whoso findeth a wife findeth a good thing, and obtaineth favour of the LORD.”
I understand that verse more deeply today than I ever could have on our wedding day.
And Proverbs 31:10 asks, “Who can find a virtuous woman? for her price is far above rubies.”
The longer I’m married, the more I realize that the value of a wonderful wife isn’t simply found in who she was when you married her, but in the incredible woman you continue to discover through every season of life.
That’s what overwhelms me about Ashley.
She’s a gift that somehow keeps becoming more beautiful with time. Not simply in appearance, but in her strength, her tenderness, her faith, her resilience, her compassion, and the countless little things that make her who she is.
Just when I think I understand how blessed I am, another season of life reveals something even more beautiful about her.
I loved the woman I married. But I am absolutely overwhelmed by the woman she has become.
And perhaps one of the sweetest surprises of marriage is discovering that the person you fell in love with years ago can become someone you love even more deeply today.
“I am my beloved’s, and my beloved is mine.” — Song of Solomon 6:3
If I could go back and tell that younger version of myself what life would hold, I don’t think I would tell him all the details. I would simply tell him, “You have no idea what you’re going to face. But you have no idea how precious the woman standing beside you is going to become.”
Ashley, I wouldn’t choose every chapter of our story, but I would choose you to walk through every single one of them.
A thousand times over.
And if God gives us many more years together, I think one of the greatest joys will be continuing to discover just how beautiful His gift to me really is.
“Her children arise up, and call her blessed; her husband also, and he praiseth her.” — Proverbs 31:28
Today, I’m that husband. Thank you Lord!
