Strand of Three
by Paula Slayton
 Paula
Slayton is the Christian Writer for Strand
of Three, a website with a focus on Christ centered marriage.
With more than eight years of experience in the field of Domestic
Relations, her writing is based both on her personal and her
professional life.
In 1993, she endured the pain of divorce, and through that, is able
to use her experience to minister to the hearts of those both
married and divorced. Paula considers herself a web missionary with
a heart for Internet evangelism. She and her husband Bill have been
married since 1995, and reside near Atlanta, Georgia. Paula is
the mother of four children, one of hers, two of his, and one of
theirs!
Email
Paula
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Special Delivery
Paula Slayton, March 2006
 It was a typical Tuesday at the law office. The phone was ringing off the hook and my “in box” looked like a mountain too high to climb. I needed to focus and get busy, but I was too distracted by visions of cupid and the red and pink hearts that were dancing in my head. From my office upstairs, I had a window’s view of the parking lot, so I couldn’t help but notice a delivery man about to enter the building. In one hand he held a clipboard, and in the other a gorgeous bouquet of flowers. My heart fluttered with excitement as I imagined how lovely those red and pink roses surrounded by baby’s breath would look on my desk. I could almost smell them. As I listened to the footsteps of the delivery man making his way upstairs, my heart began to race even faster.
“Are you Camella,” he asked.
“No, her office is over there,” I pointed, as disappointment hit me like a tidal wave. There’s still hope I reminded myself, the day is still early. By quitting time, I knew I wouldn’t be receiving my much anticipated flowers, Urgh!
Driving home, I questioned and grew irritated with my ‘Romeo’, until I heard a voice of reason--my mother’s. “I don’t want flowers at my funeral or grave site,” she’d often say, “I want my flowers while I’m living!” Even though she loves and grows her own roses, she wasn’t referring to actual flowers. “Give your loved ones flowers while they’re around to enjoy them,” she would say, referring to the acts of loving kindness you do for others in your life. Remembering Mom’s words made me realize how silly I was to be upset with Bill and reminded me of the flowers he gives to me every day.
I have been blessed in this life with a Godly husband who personally delivers me flowers all the time--not dozens of roses or carnations, but so much more! I was 33 when my 5 year old son and I both came down with the chicken pox. I can still envision Bill tenderly applying calamine lotion to the sores on both of us, I was not a pretty site to behold. I have a memory book full of sticky notes that my husband has left for me to find on the bathroom mirror, telling me how special, beautiful, and loved I am. Despite the extra 25 pounds I’m carrying around, he still calls me “the girl of his dreams”. Every night he insists on reading and praying with our youngest child and putting her to bed. These acts of love are priceless!
Mom taught me the best flowers in the world, are the ones you can’t buy from a florist. Some women like wine and roses, but me, I’ll take calamine and sticky notes any day!
If your loved one has ever left you feeling disappointed, reflect on the every day acts of his love, and I’m sure you’ll see a beautiful bouquet right before your eyes.
My beloved is a bouquet of wildflowers picked just for me from the fields of Engedi. Song of Solomon 1:14, The Message
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The God Spot
Paula Slayton, February 2006
 I used to spend my days at a law office reviewing files and preparing legal documents. I worked for a prominent Atlanta attorney who specialized in family law cases, so I was quite accustomed to the “ins and outs” of domestic relations. Even so, I never got used to seeing couples go through the pain and aftermath of a divorce. So often these clients viewed divorce as a solution to their marital problems, when in reality divorce only made their situations worse.
I can speak from personal experience when I tell you that divorce will literally shatter your life. Divorce not only divides husbands and wives, but it also divides parents from their children, the in-laws from the out-laws, and friends. A broken marriage will leave most families financially devastated. Imagine taking the income one family has been living on and having to provide for two households. Think about how you’ll feel the first time Johny or Susie wakes up on Christmas morning and you’re not with them, because they’re visiting your ex-spouse.
If you survive the trauma of a broken marriage, you might one day remarry, but not without a price. I am so thankful that my husband Bill and I chose to place God at the center of our marriage. Without God, our blended family could’ve never survived the struggles associated with a second marriage. All the step family issues take their toll on such marriages.
The biggest lesson I’ve learned in marriage, is that no matter how wonderful my spouse is, he neither can or won’t make me happy like Christ will!
Inside the heart of every man and woman exists a God spot--a spot only He can fill. When we find our wholeness, peace, and worth, in our relationship with Christ, then people and things serve only to enrich our lives. Have you let Him in your heart?
The world cannot accept him, because it neither sees him nor knows him. But you know him, for he lives with you and will be in you. John 14:17, NIV
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