it lovely um good to be with you guys we're in the zoom room so come jump on board with us in the
zoom room we're uh looking forward to sharing this adventure here we go
it's all happening well whether you are live or whether you're delayed it's a delight to be
sharing this moment um yeah we're looking forward to it hey looking forward to a beautiful journey
together and we'll just uh hang out here for a while um for a moment wait for some of you guys
to jump on board i know that everyone's crazy excited about joining this adventure
so in this
sorry there we go really i'm throwing this right
in this particular
um
episode episode do you call it we are going to be sharing our love story
setting the scene for marriage yeah totally um so yeah um it's gonna be it's gonna be a good
adventure we are going to do seven seven part series on the seven sacred pathways to intimacy
and then we uh um have got some other cool things in store which we're not going to break the
silence on all of that right now um but our book is coming out
next week there it is there it is yeah sweet so
um there we are see someone there um in facebook world hello hello feel free to jump in the zoom
guys um and join us here and i just sent that email so you gotta be just finding out now that
we're live so yeah um hit the hit the link come join us in the come join us in the zoom room for
a little bit more of a personal experience um if you're in facebook world definitely say hello
so we can see who's hanging out with us there um and hey lisa in the uk good to have you with us
michelle good morning great to have you there in the facebook world beautiful
so as we um as we start why don't you drop in the why don't you drop in the comments
what is your relationship status
what's your relationship status so let us know in the comments um where you're at what's your
relationship status are you single are you are you single and not eligible put us up with uh
some possible relationship statuses babe uh single and ready to mingle oh single and ready to mingle
yes or uh dating and ready to mingle how extreme do you want these to be
okay lisa says divorce okay so yeah um
so um
just yeah just let us know what your relationship status is and we are going to um jump into this
uh in a second so um
all right well uh let's here we go um married michelle's married so it's cool
for us just to kind of connect in on where people's relationship statuses are at um
as we go on to the journey so let's um let's share
that is all right i'm going to pray and then uh and then we will i'm just going to do one
tech thing before i pray um one second here
okay cool well papa i thank you so much for this beautiful journey into the seven sacred
pathways to intimacy i thank you for the beautiful journey into um into marriage and
the beautiful journey into the depths of the intimacy that you have for us i thank you for
every person's place in this journey i thank you for every um where everyone is at and i just
thank you for surrounding every person with your love and your comfort and your tenderness
right now as we talk about the deep things of the heart as we talk about our dreams and longings for
intimacy but i just thank you for your grace your kindness your love and your tenderness
wrapping around us as we go into the deep parts of the heart i just thank you lord for just your
your love your compassion your goodness your kindness filling into our hearts and filling
into the parts of brokenness into the places of longing and in every part of our hearts and lord
we thank you as well for the beauty of marriage we thank you for the wonderful gift of intimacy
and we thank you for uh breathing into our hearts and minds and helping us to dream
for intimacy like never before amen beautiful okay so um we're gonna start with
a little bit of backstory for you guys on where it all began for us so babe um
i i did lots of talking why don't we start with you
why don't we start with you and you know just kind of growing up what was home like what was
your just a little bit of your um your story yeah so um i grew up in a christian family pretty
conservative christian family um with parents who i think showed a really good example of what
marriage would look like um and yeah i don't really have much to say like i think i had a
pretty good sheltered childhood yeah totally no big events that stood out to me um yeah yeah so
um home life for both of us was pretty awesome in terms of mums and dads that had good marriages um
we had we had good families and we got um charlie jumping in here so um our lives were
you know pretty classic christian uh upbringing in the sense it wasn't really chaotic my parents
were pastors so some of you might know i was born um in indonesia in the jungle my parents
yeah my parents were missionaries in indonesia so i was born on the mission field they came
back to new zealand when i was two and they were pastors so we were a ministry family we're also
farming and we did all that so babe how about um boyfriends um i had a few blips on the horizon but
nothing that uh obviously went this far yeah so um hey jolly welcome good to have you uh
so in terms of boyfriends like yeah i had a couple um before benji but
yeah physical stuff with them what was your not really not really what i'm getting at is that um
before me you'd never been kissed right no so for me um i don't really have that much going on
um in terms of girlfriends i wasn't really friends at school and we were pretty stoked
just hanging out just being the boys to be honest yeah you had a pretty wild uh teenage years
compared to me yeah um i had a couple of moments of you know parties and things like that and
um kissing a few girls nah like nothing too extravagant a little bit of you know drunkenness
at the surf club and a few kind of kissing moments and things like that um there but um
when it came to girlfriends, my most serious girlfriend was a Christian girl
and the most like full-on physical stuff that we ever did was
you know a hug, a peck on the cheek and holding hands so it was pretty
intense on that side of things so we were
you could say we were really like we were good kids in that sense like we
really behaved ourselves sexually there was nothing you know like
going on before marriage we we thought we're doing all the right
stuff in terms of in terms of what you do to set yourself up
marriage we're working really hard to do that
and this one particular so a lot of them didn't have any big
rejection words or anything like that because she just didn't really have much
going in terms of real and serious relationships the most serious
guy like how many people did you have like
that were chasing you then? A few. You had a few. A few long letters.
A few long letters kind of you know almost marriage proposal type.
Yeah they would have if I'd gone down that path they would have definitely
ended in marriage but I gave them the same treatment as I gave
you. Okay so basically Lana just turned
everyone down. Yeah pretty much. Yeah so she did the
same to me so I had a relationship with a lovely
young lady but she was really not 100% sure if
that's what she actually wanted she was like oh yeah I'm like I'm keen
I'm not keen one day we'd be talking about wedding dresses and then the next
day she'd be like you can't really see this working out and
I was like huh? I was quite confused about it and it
kind of dragged you know it went on for like 18
months or longer and I realized it's like man if there's not a really strong
yes then you know if there's no strong yes from her then it has to be a no
from me because it was just this kind of awkward space
but it was still pretty painful for me and I had I didn't want to waste
my time or anyone else's time so I'd spend a lot of time really seeking God
praying fasting trying to make sure that this was the
exact will of God I didn't want to you know mess with anyone or myself I
was just like yeah if this is going to happen we're going to get
married and it's just got to be it's just got to be the way it is so I
prayed I fasted I felt God said yes this is the one
well then I you know initiated and we started a journey and we kind of wasted
the best part of a couple of years and then ultimately nothing happened
from it except I came away just totally like
what God did you honestly thought you were going to marry her?
Yeah I was convinced we were going to marry her and
it was kind of one of those moments as well where I was like
I was so keen on the girl that I was like you know I'll do you know I'll do
whatever it takes to kind of get that mindset I'll do whatever it takes to
make this happen so
I was doing whatever I thought it would take and then it still wasn't working
and I was like wow this is actually really dumb you know like this is not
cool I'm doing I was like I basically got
worn down really I was like wow this is this is actually yeah it's not
it's not worth it you know like if this because I realized that you there's
something you can do a lot but if it's not mutual then it's like oh at some
point you know like it has to be mutual sooner or later because this was
was not getting to that yeah it just wasn't getting into that place of being
a mutual relationship so I realized man if this
is not mutual then um I've gotta I've gotta say
goodbye so we ended I ended that and moved on with my life but like one
thing that was an issue for me is I couldn't trust myself
for a while there that I actually heard God
accurately I was like man I must be stuffing this up
big time um if you know that so that was my thoughts my thought was that I was um
I just stuffed it up big time in terms of hearing from God
so um so if I was stuffing it up that bad
that I couldn't get it right when I put so much effort into trying to hear from
God I was like man what else have I got wrong
so cause like when I came away from that relationship it caused me to doubt
my own myself not necessarily God but definitely myself and so anyway
God really sorted that out but the important part of that is that I
put a bit of a rejection word in there for me and it set the story for
the next part of our journey which is I um I was definitely a hundred percent
going forward made this decision that I am not interested in any type of
relationship unless it's absolutely mutual from the
start so that was kind of like my
big, that was my big decision, that was my big take away from that whole relationship. I was
like it's got to be mutual, if it's not mutual then stuff it, I don't want it. So yeah, so babe
what had you been praying, oh actually why don't you share like when we met, like how old were we
when we met? Well I was 12. My little sister's friend. And the first time I met Benji was at
his house and he was hanging out with his friends and they jumped on me because I was probably an
annoying little sister's friend and put chips and tomato sauce in my back pockets and water over my
and had a good old laugh at that. Hi Michelle, good to see you, good to hang out with us.
And we obviously being friends with his sister, I was at his house and saw him quite a bit
and then after school, he'd long finished school by then, I was working in Christian
camping running holiday programs and that kind of thing and I used to bring Benji in to come and
help me with that and we did missions trips and so we had had a lot to do with each other over
the years. Yeah especially like. So I knew him pretty well and I knew that I didn't want to marry
him. But like you pray something specific that's just, who prays this? Who even does that? God
please don't let me marry anyone like Benji. They should actually pray that you know like.
Because also I grew up in a really conservative
household. Dutch reformed church. Strongly Dutch reformed. And then there's Benji and he's like
off the other end of the scale and I just didn't know how they would mesh. Clash you mean.
Yeah. So that was a big.
Yeah just seeing Selena's comments on Facebook. Yeah I went for my sister's friend.
Yeah so all you Facebook people who are watching on Facebook as well, feel free to get chatty
so we know you're there. If you've got questions, drop them because we'll try and make sure we're
watching the Facebook comments and chats as well as being present here in the Zoom. So
Alana and I had done a bunch of stuff. We're both from the same town obviously.
I moved away so I hadn't seen her for ages. I went down south. I did my outdoor rec training
and some things like that and a bunch of missions and kind of ended up back in town. We're in our
old town and she was like she said running Christian camping and so she was doing that.
I was running missions. We kind of did a bunch of stuff together where she was coming on our
mission trips and we went to Thailand and saw this crazy outpouring over there which was awesome.
Hi Bridget. So and then we were seeing it was actually really really exciting time actually
because when we're doing the Christian camping time it was a time where we were really starting
to get some of the initial break frees in the supernatural. So we would have at the camps
the kids would go together. We'd say right we'll put the kids that needed prayer healing in the
middle of the circle. Everyone else would stand around the outside of the circle. Yeah well we
put them on one side of the room then we'd pray and whoever did once you know once they got healed
they came onto this side and then everyone got prayed again and we would just like like keep
doing that until pretty much everyone got healed. So we were seeing these like epic outpourings of
the camps, epic outpourings of missions. Like crazy supernatural stuff was going down. It was
wild. We were like in a real epic outpouring time and then I moved away down south again to Te Anau
where I had felt God just calling me since I was 17. So when I did go down to Te Anau I was at 25
and I went down there and I'd just broken it off with this girl as well. So we so I went down there
I was had like a little bit of that broken kind of like a little bit of that rejection vibe going on
in my heart. Not super strong like and I think you guys kind of get a picture of us. We're both
really really fun people. We were both key leaders like Alana was probably you know one of the main
key leaders in the Christian ministry there. She brought you know all these people together.
Hundreds of kids led to Jesus. So Alana is a really strong leader in that space as well and
in training awesome leaders and I was a leader and so we always had a real fun dynamic.
big dreams kind of just fun energy and um good adventures we always like doing adventures so
let's kind of just look a little bit about us so i went down to teano started um the kind of
the church plant down there and um then we um hey hey tyler my man good to see you um
um then alana came down to the church uh she would why don't you say a little bit about
you don't have to go too in depth because we'll cover that story coming up so i've been working
in christian camping and just through a series of things that happened while i was there i got
really burnt out um and i was pretty much at the bottom of every barrel and um i was also living
at home with my parents so there was expectations about the church i would attend um the activities
that i would do that kind of thing and so i just really felt like i had to get out of that
um and that was probably the most intense arguments i've ever had well probably almost
the only arguments i've ever had with my dad um but anyway long story short i ended up going down
to tiana where i felt like god was sending me i had these really clear um things that god was
saying go to tiana um tell us one of those stories that was a cool one so one day i was
clearing our resource room at camp and i was just picking up stacks of paper and throwing them in
the bin or sorting them out or whatever it was and out fell this little piece of card about that
big with um a cutout of a piece of map which was tiana and then it had um for i know the plans i
have for you um above verse on it and that card just fell out and in that moment i was praying
like and i really need to go to tiana and then that so i was having real obvious stuff like that
that you couldn't deny um and then on the other hand i'm like trying to battle my dad to let me
go because i know that's where i'm meant to be and then he doesn't believe that god could be
telling me so clearly um so anyway i end up down in tiana about six months after bg um just i i
literally needed to go somewhere i could sit on the couch and watch birds out the window like where
i couldn't get a job where there was no expectation placed on me to do certain things or um that kind
of thing so i did and and the church actually was amazing allowing me to like giving me the space
and we when i went down our pastor john said to me we know you've been running this amazing
ministry but we don't want you to do anything like we're not going to ask you to do anything
when you're ready you you will choose what you want to do um so that was really freeing for me
but yeah i went down there just because one i couldn't get a job to uh to escape expectations
and things like that and just to have a bit of a break to try and recuperate yeah so this year's um
and
where were we i guess what happened right here's what happened here's what happened that was really
really got me upset i think maybe maybe before i tell you about what got me really upset um
i'll just share with you we always had really good fun together so alana something i just enjoyed
about alana is that we could have fun doing what we were doing so it was really easy to have fun
with her so when i was having a day off or something like that we would connect sometimes
not all the time but we connect sometimes and um i there was a lot of stuff that i just liked about
it just because she'd been a friend for years i've known her since she was 12 years old we
know each other forever and she's down in this town we didn't have heaps of mates down there
we had a handful but i was like yeah she's cool fun hanging around with but i knew she wasn't
interested in me and that was just fine that was totally fine with me and i would have been happy
if that just carried on um just being like that forever i would not have minded but then this
thing that i did mind this thing that started happening started happening which i was really
got me actually quite like tipped off and i was hoping it would just fade but i started getting
this crush on alana which i just wish i didn't have it and there was a couple of reasons why i
was awkward it was awkward because i was the pastor and i didn't didn't know how you were
supposed to behave if you're the pastor and you've got a crush on one of the people in the church
now awkward things happen sometimes as a pastor between the pastor and the congregation like just
you know sometimes there's awkward things let me tell you this is just funny like this is a funny
thing about an awkward moment as a pastor right so here's an awkward moment as a pastor i used to
play rugby as well so play rugby you do your rugby game after that everyone has naked showers so
there's like 40
naked dudes in the showers at, you know,
you know, in the, in the rugby club.
So you've got like 40 naked dudes,
you know, both teams,
all of this kind of like industrial style,
massive shower that's, you know,
like 30, 40 meters long.
It's just,
so you've got this,
but it's kind of awkward, right?
Because sometimes people from church play rugby too.
So on Saturday, you're hanging out naked in the shower,
and then on Sunday, you're preaching.
It's like,
whoa, there we are, there we are,
I'll see you tomorrow, maybe I'll help you up to the other,
you know, I've got a really good sermon coming along.
So that's like, that's an awkward moment as a pastor,
right, that's an awkward moment.
Like one day you're hanging out naked,
the next day you're in church preaching.
Well, even more,
so even more awkward than that, right?
Even more awkward than that is if you get a crush
on someone in,
a crush on someone in the congregation, okay?
Naked showers with the boys is less awkward
than having a crush on one of the girls in your church.
So,
but there it was,
I started getting this crush on Lana,
and I knew she didn't like me, right?
I knew she didn't like me,
and so that really frustrated me
because my whole idea going forward
after my last relationship didn't work out,
my whole idea was, okay, going forward,
it has to be mutual.
That was the one requirement,
I was like, ah!
So here I was in this place where I was like,
no, this is so dumb,
I've got a crush that I never asked for.
Like, I wasn't trying to get this crush,
I wasn't like, you know, I was just like,
no, I had this crush and I hated it.
But then there was one thing that was worse
than just having this crush,
is that it started getting so intense that I couldn't sleep.
Like, I was up in the night losing sleep over this crush,
and because I got up early in the morning to pray,
like, my sleep was so sacred
because I was always getting up so early to pray,
I was like, no, like, ah, this is,
like, it was starting to mess with my life,
and I didn't want to deal with it,
but then it was like,
it starts getting consuming, this crush on the inside,
and I was like, ah, what am I gonna do?
Like, I have to deal with myself.
I was like, oh, man, so I'm just gonna talk with her
or something, just,
and I was like, ah, she's just gonna shoot me down,
so I can, like, I guess,
and I guess what I was thinking to myself is,
okay, fine, I'll talk,
I'll talk with Alana, and then she can shoot me down,
and then I can lick my wounds
and just pick up the pieces and deal with the mess
and the awkwardness of having been shot down
and the awkwardness of having a crush on someone,
the awkwardness of getting rejected,
all of this dumb stuff, I was like,
oh, right, we'll just deal with it.
So I invited her for an adventure,
and I was like, well,
I've got to at least kind of try a little bit,
so, you know, like, I'm probably gonna get shut down,
but I may as well make, you know,
have a good, let's have a good little adventure,
and she can shoot me down,
and I'll sort my life out after that.
So I was not confident, I was not expecting,
all I was really thinking was gonna happen is
I'm about to make a fool of myself,
but the benefit is gonna be
that after this, I'll be able to sleep.
So that, to me, was gonna be the prize,
and worst case scenario was
I'm gonna be able to sleep again.
So I took Alana for an adventure, it was quite cool,
quite a cool adventure, we went hunting.
So I got a gun, I got a four-wheel drive,
where we lived was Fiordland, right?
So where we lived, like, that was,
it was a tiny little town in the mountains,
so you couldn't really go out.
And I'd been out hunting with the boys before.
Yeah, she'd been out hunting with me.
It was kind of a thing, you know, like,
as friends, that was something that we would do,
because the hunting was pretty cool,
because, like, the mountains are stunning,
just, like, so insanely beautiful down there.
So you're basically going for a walk
with a gun somewhere amazing.
So that's-
People often have a gun and I have a camera.
Yeah, so, you know, we've done that before.
So we go for this cool adventure,
we get up onto the mountaintop, stunning,
bit of snow, amazing scenery.
The place is just spectacular.
Hi, Sakani!
Welcome, good to have you jumping in here.
Hey, Kat, good to have you.
So there we are, we go on our date,
and it's not really supposed to be
too much of a date, right?
Because we're not, like, we're not going out.
So it's not supposed to be too datey.
It was just supposed to be something that
we were going to have, you know,
like, just have a little bit of a-
Opportunity for a chat.
Yeah, time to hang out.
And honestly, where we-
were like fjordland you couldn't go bowling you couldn't go out you know somewhere fancy
you couldn't go well you could go to the movies if they were open really it was surrounded by
mountains 1.2 million hectares of basically walking with a guy walking without a gun
yeah so which one are you gonna have so ah welcome my friend good to have you with us
um so hey hey um so i'm just uh
yeah so there we were we went on our uh we went on our walk it was so beautiful the the evening
was amazing um we got back down to the car park and like where we parked the car as well was in a
you know it's kind of a remote area there's like a little hut there for people to stay at um so
um yeah that's right i just see selena's comments yeah she couldn't escape i had you know i had the
keys to the truck um we're out in the wilderness yeah there's no real escape plan for her so
um we've taken some food out there i had some steaks and i cooked up some steaks we're out in
this nice little hut and then um the steak was really oh my gosh it was the worst steak of my
life i couldn't believe it the meal was terrible it was horrendous i don't think i was like we
didn't eat it i don't think we ate i was so bad i was like oh my gosh this was like the worst it
was one of the worst things i've ever cooked i was like how can someone how can the state be
so bad but the state was terrible so anyway we kind of ate you know like our broccoli
we was like uh we had some broccoli uh we had a couple of other things but um
i see rachel saying dream date yeah it was not really a dream date it wasn't
like it wasn't supposed to be too too romantic that was kind of like it wasn't supposed to be
so like too romantic it's kind of supposed to be like we're hanging out like normal and then
i'm going to have a chat to her so it was pretty much like that it was pretty much like the normal
type of thing we would do if we were hanging out and then um at the same time i like my heart's
racing because i'm like okay i've got to talk to her about this like it's getting awkward now
we you know like the steak was supposed to help like warm things up but it was terrible the steak
didn't help at all um so yeah so it hadn't been awkward it had just been kind of like a normal
hangout it would be fun it'd be a cool adventure and then i kind of get to the moment where i'm
like okay right i've now i've got to actually make it awkward so i'm gonna sit in there hmm
wow wasn't that steak terrible yeah kind of looking at her nicely and then i'm like oh i've
just got to talk to her it's like i what i said to her is like it's okay alana how would you feel
if i was to pursue you romantically i'm not interested
stone cold shutdown like stone cold killer i like you as a friend like it was an assertive no
right it was a it was a seriously assertive no and it went exactly according to what i expected
exactly what i expected right i put it out there nicely gently and even you know kind of even
i thought kind of nice like it's not like it's not a terrible um this is not like ladies for
example ladies are out there um you know just like asking her hey how would you feel if i was
to pursue you romantically not a terrible question to be asked right if you're a single lady who's
definitely uh ready to mingle but you know he's definitely keen to get married um who's definitely
like i want i want relationship you know that's me and then to get asked that it's not a terrible
question to be asked right no but anyway for alana boom like stone cold killer and aggressive
no it wasn't like mild i was like benji let me really help you out with this absolutely not like
it was firm it was clear there was no way that i could be confused at all about what she was saying
it was like whoa okay but at the same time that's kind of what i expected the whole way
anyway so i was like okay now i can like this is what we're this is this has gone exactly to what
i thought was going to go and now i can just start picking up the pieces licking my wounds
and patch my life up then like while i was right at the bottom i just felt the holy spirit say
just ask her this one question which wasn't supposed to be it wasn't supposed to be a comeback
right it wasn't supposed
to do anything it was just supposed to give me some a little bit of feedback right you know like
do I have BO you know like do I have bad manners like am I just like you know I'm a single guy it's
probably not a bad moment to get some input from the female world on what's wrong with me you know
like what do I need to sort out for you know going forward and so I was like okay you know so um so
this is the question that I said to ask me he said ask her what would be the main reasons why
you wouldn't want a relationship with me so I just asked her that okay and I wasn't trying to
I wasn't trying to change her no to a yes I was just trying to get some
honest feedback that I can take away do some personal development sort my life out
I can't remember what I said
I don't remember the whole conversation that followed it was about two hours long
it was about a two hour long conversation actually and she brought up um clear objections reasons
why talk about your family how that wasn't a go talk a little bit about how I was like a crazy
revivalist like way out the gate um supernatural type vibes bear in mind though that Lana has
grown up with a seer gift so supernatural she's more naturally engaged with the supernatural than
I than I am um so she's used to seeing angels demons that type of thing in the spirit whereas
for me um like I've never seen like she sees so um so even though I'm like crazy kind of revivalist
guy and doing lots of speaking and things like that and she's you know she's still well acquainted
with the supernatural just kind of from a very conservative family so anyway we talked about
that we talked about the issues of family and like a cultural dynamics a few other things
anyway went on for a couple of hours which is longer than I anticipated right so um
uh then what happened at the end of that two hours it went from a slight a complete
no toward the end of that two hours we knew we were getting married and did we talk about dates
the next day we we talked to the date and we came up with a date that would be a good date
for the following year and we got married on that date may 29th straight after the next day
we did it was the next day I it was the next day and I booked the um I booked the church out
that's like way before we got engaged or anything just so that the church was free
um so yeah so we went from like a straight no way not interested to within two hours it was
we're getting married and it wasn't just like I think it was like the veils were lifted
it was all of a sudden we saw clearly it was literally there was this crazy supernatural
dynamic to our conversation as well right where yeah like a lot of things as we were chatting
um we fell actually did but as we were chatting over that two hours
we this actually happened that at the it was like a veil got taken off our eyes and we saw
each other like we'd never seen each other before and it was a hundred percent mutual and
it was it was wild we were like we were just both staring each other like what is happening
um it was so for us that it was just crazy that's where um that's where it was it was like
we were mind we were mind blown we were in like gobsmacked in all like well and
I went from like a crush that I didn't want and getting ready to just kind of let my wounds to
and Alana went from this guy is such a like well not interested to both of us just giggly in love
um so and we waited six months till we got married out of respect for my parents because
Dan had always said you need to date at least a year so you see each other in every circumstance
And yeah, it was after six months we got engaged
and then 10 weeks later we were married.
Yeah.
Yeah, so.
So that was cool.
Any questions from you guys from there?
Let me just, I see a bunch of comments here.
The Facebook world.
Yeah, that was a fast turnaround.
What changed Alana's mind?
I think I brought up all the issues that I had
or the things that were kind of maybe not interested.
And in that conversation,
he was able to sort of appease those worries, fears,
whatever you want to call them.
But I can't actually remember what my issues were
and what he said.
I honestly, that whole conversation,
I just have no memory of.
I drugged her.
It was a mistake.
Yeah, there was something going on with the state.
There was something in the state.
So that was,
I think it was a combination, right?
I think it was a combination of the,
like the natural side of things,
but then it was also like God pranked us.
We've been laughing at maybe you.
Yeah.
So we still joke about this,
how when Alana tells people,
I pray that God,
pray God don't let me ever marry anyone like Benji.
So instead of marrying anyone like Benji,
she got the original.
So, yeah.
So that was how we got together.
Yeah, if anyone's got any questions
or anything you want to chuck out there,
feel free to drop questions in the chat here.
Or, yeah, I had a gun as well.
That's a good point.
Michelle, that's hilarious.
I hadn't thought of that.
Yes, that's true.
Yes, I had a gun.
That definitely never crossed my mind.
Yeah, I think that,
yeah, we didn't,
that was out of the truck anyway.
So, yes, but that's actually quite funny, Michelle.
You're a genius.
So, yeah, and then after that,
we started getting,
we started looking at rings,
which was interesting
because I'd never ever thought about anything
around jewelry at that stage.
So I think we'll tell you-
And we bought furniture.
Yeah, yeah, we bought a house, we bought a fridge.
Yeah, we started-
Like, all within weeks.
Yeah, we started kind of kitting ourselves,
kitting our house, future house out.
We started doing all those things.
We were kind of just fighting our time.
Yeah.
Until we got married.
Yeah.
So we,
this part of the,
oh, Selena, did you kiss?
Yes.
Okay, so, did you kiss?
That's a good thing.
So, Selena, yes, we did kiss.
We did kiss.
In fact, let me tell you something funny
on like the fantasy side of my life,
which we'll probably talk a little bit about fantasies
as we go forward on this journey.
One of the things that I just,
this funny thought that I just had in my head
that I was like, man, God,
this was just something that I was like,
wow, this would be the ultimate, right?
The ultimate would be,
is if you were just walking along one day
and then you saw this chick
and you knew she was going to be your wife
and you just went up to her and kissed her.
I thought, to me,
to me, I thought that would be the ultimate.
And obviously, so Alana and I had obviously,
we'd known each other since she was 12.
So it was-
Yeah, over 10 years.
Yeah, about 10 years, about 10 years.
We'd known each other for about 10 years.
Good question here from Bridget,
we'll come to that in a second.
So we'd known each other for about 10 years.
So it's going to be a little bit tricky for us to-
See each other for the first time.
Yeah, see each other for the first time.
But when the, we both describe it like this
because it really did feel like this,
that the veil was taken off our eyes
and we got to see each other for the first time.
And so, in that sense,
my little fantasy that I've had,
you know, like the first time you saw your wife,
you'd go up to her and kiss her.
And that's it, yes, my fantasy did.
get fulfilled. Like at the end of it, we were just so in love, crazy, like, like, ah, like,
just, we were, and the atmosphere in that little bush hut, the atmosphere in that little bush hut
was one of the most powerful atmospheres of the, just the atmosphere of heaven that I've
ever experienced in my life. You know, we do, you know, lots of worship times and, you know,
prophetic meetings and events and things like that. And of all the prayer times and glory times
and worship times and all the things that we've ever done and all the thousands of hours I've
spent in prayer, that was one of the most powerful moments I've ever experienced of the atmosphere of
heaven coming into a place. So it was like, we just got swallowed up. It was like, veils got
taken off our eyes, the atmosphere of heaven exploded in that place. It was like, whoa.
And Alana went from absolutely not to absolutely yes, totally 100% mutual.
And we were just in this like awe of the, of the atmosphere and awe of each other. And yes,
in that moment, Alana had the first kiss of her life. So yes, we did kiss and we liked it a lot.
So we'll stay as well, kind of in the process of leading up to marriage. We'll chat on that
a little bit here. But we, yeah, so, but to engagements, like we didn't have any money.
Alana was in a place where she was burnt out and just kind of taking a break.
Yeah, so we were kind of like helping her out. So Alana had no money. I had no money.
And we were, but we're like, let's go looking for a ring. The problem with Alana, right,
is she had no money, but she had really expensive tastes.
And we joke that his love language is touch and my love language is jewelry.
Yeah. So Alana comes up with all these pictures of wedding rings. And I have no idea about
jewelry. I've never thought about jewelry in my life. So I was like.
I drew him a little sketch.
And I sent her a budget, right? Like this is a faith budget. So I had no money. So I sent her
a faith budget. I was like, why don't you try and see what you can find for $5,000?
It was a super generous budget.
That was way more than, you know, like most people were spending on wedding rings back
then. It was usually like, you know, like a thousand dollars, you know, or something like
that. So I was like, yeah, like no idea how I would actually pay for a ring like that. But that
was while I was like, yeah, sweet, go for it. So in classic Alana fashion, the only ring that she
can find is more.
No, I drew you a picture of the ring that I wanted and Benji had been living everywhere
and he couldn't find it. And so he took me and we went shopping and we walked into the
jewelers and there was the ring that I had drawn in the counter.
The very last shop, the very last shop that we went into, there was this one ring that
looked exactly like the ring that Alana had drawn for me. And there it was, a one-off
handmade piece. It's just like, ta-da! And she put it on.
And I drew it straight on, like we can't buy this.
As soon as she saw the price tag on it, she took it off and put it straight back in there.
And then we went home and we had no idea what we were going to do for a ring. So we hadn't
quite found anything else that we liked. But then we had pulled off this epic faith move, right?
Benji, on the way home, I had the ring on my finger for like a second and took it off.
And then Benji's like, you know what, babe? We're going to go for that.
And I was like, okay, well, as long as it's all paid for before it's on my finger, that's okay.
Wasn't quite, but what we said in that moment, right, when this ring was totally impossible,
is we said, this is the line, we said, we're only limited by our imagination of how good God is.
And so we went after this ring that was significantly more than twice the budget.
So where we lived and at that time, it was a house deposit.
But we went after it and yay, Jesus.
So you went after it?
Yeah, so here, let's show them your...
I need to see me so that it's very clear.
Okay, there you go.
There you go.
That's the ring right there.
It's crazy.
It was a crazy faith move back then.
It would still be a crazy faith move right now.
a serious chunk of gold and diamonds and um he said when he gave it to me they bought 10 years
worth of jewelry so we have just celebrated our 11th wedding anniversary so there's jewelry coming
my way yeah yeah so we're working alana has picked out she's done it again so anyway she's got another
ring in progress um so well uh you haven't really answered oh yeah yeah oh yeah yeah
so let's go back to that question how did the um how did the church respond so the church um the
church let me just tell you what you're doing right we've talked for so long we've been hunting
like we kind of had a protocol because as a community that most of the people in the church
hunted um and i would normally tell people where i was going what i was doing if i wanted but this
is the one time i didn't tell them really what time i was going to be back um because i didn't
know how the conversation was going to go so i didn't want to give anyone a timeline so i just
specifically hadn't told anyone but because i hadn't told anyone people were like oh my gosh
so they actually sent out a search party to find us so they sent out a search party to find us
um to see what how we were doing if we were okay so that's how the church responded that was the
first thing is they sent out a search party to find us and then the next thing um that our senior
pastors did is i went and saw them the next morning you know not knowing what was going to happen
with because i didn't know what was going to happen with the um conversation with the
conversation i had you know i had no real expectation or hope but obviously the conversation
went better than uh than i anticipated so the next morning i went around and just talked to
my senior pastors uh about what was happening and they were like yay so everyone was actually
really stoked for us um about it and then we um we we also knew that because he was the pastor
there was going to be a lot more um judging i don't know there was going to be that we really
need to be on the approach and what we did and so we talked about that pretty early on about
what we were going to do to protect ourselves um each other our relationship those people around us
what was sort of like the rules and parameters of um this next phase for us um yeah yeah so this
so we then entered into this um interesting phase and we've talked to a lot of couples who are in
this you know like engaged phase or that you know like they're they're kind of together because we
had our own ministry school for over a decade so we had lots of young people that were in
relationships you know a lot of people got married after they did that you know did our
training with lots of couples and that have come from our um our ministry school so uh we lost
people that were in this process that we went through after that have really struggled and okay
how do you do this well like in terms of being and you know engaged like how do you do boundaries
and um we're so we wanted to really make sure we did a real good job of that so we had
accountability in place we set some some boundaries so so when it comes to setting boundaries like
we'll just kind of give you a quick version of this but if anyone's got any um questions on it
you could ask us but i think yeah so we just set in place like the first boundary was you know
physically what are we happy with and um that was basically a check up from the neck up
uh which is we're happy to you know happy to kiss um and that there was no touching of penises
there's only one penis involved but there's no touching of that um uh or vagina or boobs or
bums that was not going to be okay for us so there was no touching um and then kissing was just a
neck up deal so we set that boundary because that was for us that's that's what our purity
um boundary was and people will have their own different boundaries some people were like no
i'm not kissing and then other people are like you know having babies and you're like well that's
probably not a great boundary but um so for purity this is what we this is what we wanted to do we
want to just figure out what purity um what our standard was so we figured out what our standard
was right at the start and then we're like yeah this is our standard and we're like
We put that in place and then we told other people what our standard was, exactly what it is.
We're really accountable.
We let our pastors know because we want to set a good example for other people who are going to follow us as well.
Because we knew other people were going to, you know, we were working with a lot of people in that space.
So we were like, hey, this is how we want to do it.
So we set the boundaries and then we made ourselves accountable for the boundaries that we'd set.
And then after we made ourselves accountable for the boundaries that we set, we put other boundaries in place that would help us keep our boundaries.
Right. So, for example, the other boundaries that we put in place was time that we would hang out.
We weren't going to hang out past 10 p.m.
Because the dark is it's good to have sex in the dark.
So we put 10 p.m. down as a boundary for us.
And then if we were going to do something special and we needed kind of an exemption for that, we actually asked our...
What we did is we just made ourselves accountable to our senior pastors and said, hey, this is the boundary that we'd like.
And we would like to just basically be kind of submit to this.
And I'm not saying that everyone has to do this and not all pastors are trustworthy enough to have this type of, you know, authority in a person's life.
But ours were. Our senior pastors were awesome for this.
So we were happy to be accountable to them like this.
And we're happy for them to say, hey, we want you to speak into our lives.
We see anything that we're not doing right or anything that looks dodgy or anything, you let us know.
And we're going to set our boundary at 10 p.m., not hanging out past that.
And if we are going to hang out past that, we're going to ask you for permission.
You know, is it going to be OK? And if you say no, then we won't do that.
Right. So that's what we did.
And then we just put some parameters around, you know, like where we would be hanging out and those types of things.
So the cool thing was that we didn't we didn't break our boundaries.
And I actually think a lot of that comes down to the male taking a leading role and protecting me.
And the way that he does that is by respecting those boundaries and not tempting me to cross them.
Yes, I'm quite tempted.
Yeah, I know. I'd be like, stop it, I'm a stubborn girl now, I'm stubborn.
No, you can't do that when I'm married.
Yeah, I'll tell you what, this is like a real, I don't know, I had to hold it back sometimes.
So yeah, I just thank God for the grace.
Maybe that's true, maybe it's not. But I was.
I was actually going to say something that we've been talking about in
in the online school of Sonship a bunch is about willpower.
And because to be honest, most of the couples that we work with haven't been able to keep their boundaries.
They've said, I don't know if we've worked with one couple that's kept their boundaries, that's been open about it.
Most of the time when we're working with couples, they don't.
We probably would have had one or two. Maybe, maybe one or two.
Majority of the time, the couples that we've worked with, they haven't been able to keep their hands to themselves.
Great intentions, but no willpower.
That's at the end of the day, that's what we kind of realized that she was.
Hey, Adriana, good to see you there.
At the end of the day, that's something that we realized was the real issue for people.
And hi, Jackie, as well. I didn't say hi before.
Something that we realized was that the.
Willpower was the issue for people, and that's why in the online school of Sonship,
that's why we do hard things, because doing hard things is where the willpower comes from.
And it was even after this process that actually, you know, just kind of some of these things like, OK, well,
why were we able to easily keep our boundaries?
Why are we easily able to do discipline?
Why are we able to do all of these things?
So I did kind of like a psychoanalysis on myself and what actually had built that willpower.
And I was like, flip, that was that was our farm growing up.
And my dad just getting me to do hard things all day long, every day.
We were just boys doing hard things.
I was like, oh, that's where the willpower came from.
And so willpower got, we don't know what it is, like willpower, self-control,
personal sovereignty, it's all the same thing.
So we're able to control and bring respect for ourselves and for each other.
Yeah. So the values is one thing, but.
values without willpower just leads to disappointment you know like you betray your own values if you
don't have willpower so and we've seen this countless times of people betraying their own
values because they don't have willpower to match their own value system so that's why we do hard
things all the time as often as possible just to develop willpower develop sovereignty develop
self-control um yeah so then that pretty much brings us up to um we've got marion so we'll
just do one last check here on any questions um oh yeah okay quick um willpower respecting each
selena can you
can you just uh ask me about uh like clarify can we talk about why it's so important one session
like which why what's so important you can just clarify that would be awesome and then i will
understand what you are talking about i'm one because i wasn't sure if you're talking about
willpower or boundaries or accountability or yeah so you can clarify that would be awesome
um anyone else who's got any cheeky comments to make feel free to make cheeky comments
any curious questions um remember this um whole journey is going to be really vulnerable so you're
welcome to ask um any questions
oh one question here is um
why does alana struggle so much with her behavior
that's your question okay okay i think you need to look in the mirror um
um oh okay why keeping the boundaries um why keeping the boundaries is a good uh
someone here says doing hard things sounds like works rather than grace so there's two questions
there um
so niamh is saying doing hard things sounds like works rather than grace so
um if you think doing hard things sounds like works rather than grace then
um let me try and unpack that for you for a little like a little bit um
um first of all just give me a yes or no if anyone has to do hard things or have hard
experiences in their life right who has who has gone through hard things in their life right
yeah anyone here gone through hard things we've gone through lots of hard things
you know when it comes to going through hard things you go through hard things in
lots of different areas right you can go through hard things in every area of your life you can go
through hard things in the area of health right finances relationships um your you know personal
identity struggles self-hatred shame uh you can go through hard things in every single area of life
and that doesn't actually have anything to do with grace right it's got nothing to do with grace so
in terms of grace right so grace um and grace and works grace uh it's grace that you are made in the
image of god right it's grace that you're one with god it's by grace that you're seamlessly one with
god it's by grace that you're made in the image of god it's by grace you're exclusively defined by
god so works is working to try and make the truth true okay that's what that's what paul's
referring to and paul says works when paul talks about works he's talking about you living from
the belief that you're inadequate and separate and trying to live in such a way that your works
bridge the gap of on the belief that you're inadequate and separate from god
so works is anything when you work you work towards who you already are
or when you work towards what you already have okay that's but whether you but even when you
have grace paul still worked hard right like paul worked hard real hard paul prayed in the spirit
a lot paul got beaten paul got shipwrecked paul did hard things all the time so works
in the way that paul was talking about it is working to
like make it's trying to make the truth true right so it's performance-based living when you're
trying to earn your identity when you're trying to earn your acceptance when you're trying to earn
oneness rather than waking up in the morning and living from the present reality that you're
one with God living from that reality so okay from this place of oneness I now invest myself
in hours and hours of prayer from the space of knowing who I am I serve God wholeheartedly and
I do hard things from that so that hopefully helps you understand um doing hard things has got
nothing to do with grace okay so doing hard things it's absolutely got nothing to do with grace or
not so Les Brown has a great quote he said if you do what is easy your life will become hard
if you do what is hard your life will become easy so if you just want to think about that purely on
an exercise dynamic that principle is true in every area of your life right if you
if you practice running and you train for a marathon and you've trained and trained and
trained and trained and trained um or even say for a 10k run right you train and train and train
for a 10k run and after a while doing a 10k run is real easy right but if you haven't trained and
you just try and do a 10k run that'll be really hard for you so what's the difference it's if you
do what is easy uh your life will become hard if you don't work out your muscles if you don't work
out if you don't steward your resources well you'll end up in poverty all of these things so
if you take the easy option all the time your life will be hard whereas if you do hard things
if you exercise if you're disciplined with your finances if you engage yourself in wisdom if you
you know if you challenge yourself to learn and all those things your life will get easier okay
so that's the that's that dynamic um doing hard things um so god asks us to do hard things all
the time that's why jesus said walk the narrow road not the wide road he said broad is the road
that leads to destruction and many go that way but narrow is the gate towards salvation and few find
it so that's about doing hard things that doing hard things is making the choice to follow jesus
to pick up your cross when everyone else is doing something else that's one of the hard things but
hard things happens in every area of our lives right are you going to be disciplined with your
finances or are you not you know are you going to um you know how are you going to behave in
your relationship you know it might be easy to like that um just that quote i put out yesterday
you know it might be easier not to be vulnerable in your relationship it might be there might be
the easy option right not be vulnerable not share how you're feeling not share where your heart's at
but um that easy option leads to isolation versus doing the hard thing like a hard thing is being
vulnerable and just telling someone exactly where your heart's at exactly how you're feeling exactly
what you want that vulnerability can be a hard thing but two things happen when you do a hard
thing one it strengthens you psychologically it strengthens your self-control strengthens your
willpower strengthens your free will um and the other thing is it'll produce fruit you know in
your in your life so um that's that question and then selena i think you're right we probably
it probably does deserve a session on boundaries so um we will put that up there
um cool cool so next session we're going to talk about um our chaos all right we're going to go
deeper on our chaos uh on our story what happened after we got married we thought we'd done everything
right we you know we did training on marriage relationships communication you know like we
did all this training while we were you know leading up towards getting married we did some
run missions trips where we had issues and we yes we had issues that we needed to overcome together
yeah just in general so our next session which we are aiming for uh actually a monday morning
same time monday morning yeah i lied to you before it was an accident i said wednesday to
you but it's monday monday yeah so um we're aiming for monday 10 a.m next week to have our next chat
and what we're planning on doing is a seven-part series uh but then going forward actually doing
a regular just having regular um space here for the seven sacred pathways
training. So I hope that's been valuable guys. That's cool. Thanks for sharing that Donna.
And Selena is saying it would be amazing for her to do that boundary session because she is
she's not in the zoom room but she's very single and very ready to mingle and one nice
attractive hot lady. She's like man how do I steward my assets in this context. So we will
talk about that and we'll wrap it up from there. So thanks everyone. Bless you. We aim to have our
book come out next week as well. Seven Sacred Pathways to Intimacy. So get ready because
everyone in the online school association will get a free copy of that. Yes Selena knows it.
Yeah I've got some cool things coming up as well. If you're single and ready to mingle
or if you're married and you want an upgrade. This whole process is not as it's like
not someone else. No no no no no no. You want to upgrade your current marriage.
Let's clarify that. If you want to upgrade your current marriage. We've got lots of things
in the pipeline for you all. So bless you and we'll catch you soon. See you guys. Bye.