One year ago, seventy-seven of the people closest to Denise and me gathered at Villa Valentini Bonaparte in Umbria, Italy, to celebrate our marriage. These were not simply wedding guests. They were people we are doing life with, people who have prayed with us, encouraged us, challenged us, laughed with us, and witnessed pieces of the story God has been writing. The villa was magnificent, the Umbrian countryside almost unfairly beautiful, and the food and wine did exactly what Italian food and wine are supposed to do. Yet what I remember most was not the setting. God was present.
A year later, Denise and I were blessed to return to Italy and walk those grounds again. We also returned to Reschio, where we honeymooned, and revisited places that now carry memory differently because they belong to our story. There is something powerful about returning to a place after time has passed. The buildings look largely the same, but you do not. Covenant has added another year of conversations, prayer, laughter, healing, sacrifice, adventure, and choosing one another.
That is what I love most about my wife. Denise speaks truth. Not convenient truth, polished truth, or truth adjusted for the room, but the kind that forces both of us toward who God is calling us to become. God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit are not decorations around her life. They are at her core, shaping how she loves, challenges, forgives, dreams, and keeps pushing us toward obedience.
Scripture says, “Two are better than one, because they have a good return for their labor.” Ecclesiastes continues that if one falls, the other can help them up, and that a cord of three strands is not quickly broken. I have come to understand that third strand differently in marriage. It is not poetic decoration tied around two determined people. It is God woven through the covenant, strengthening what human strength alone could never sustain.
Bitcoin has taught me to think deeply about scarcity, time, and what deserves to be preserved. There will only ever be twenty-one million bitcoin, which gives scarcity meaning. But marriage has taught me about a different scarcity: we receive only so many days with the person God has entrusted to us. Time cannot be mined again. Yesterday cannot be reissued. Once a moment passes, its value becomes memory.
That makes presence one of the greatest forms of stewardship.
The world teaches us to measure wealth by what accumulates. Scripture repeatedly teaches us to measure differently. Faithfulness. Love. Generosity. Truth. People. A table surrounded by seventy-seven friends may ultimately represent more wealth than anything shown on a balance sheet because relationship is one asset death eventually makes impossible to acquire more of.
Bitcoiners love the idea of compounding value across time. Marriage compounds too, but only when deposits keep being made. A prayer before the day begins. A hand held when life becomes uncertain. A truth spoken when silence would be easier. Forgiveness offered before resentment earns interest. Laughter. Adventure. Intimacy. Choosing the same person again after learning more about what that choice actually requires.
Returning to Villa Valentini Bonaparte reminded me that our wedding celebration was never the destination. It was a marker. A block in the chain.
A testimony that something happened there before God and before the people closest to us, and that what followed would matter even more.
I would marry Denise again today with even greater conviction. I know more about her courage, faith, sacrifice, strength, tenderness, and truthfulness than I knew standing in Umbria one year ago. I also understand more deeply that covenant is not preserved by nostalgia. It is preserved by continuing to build.
So today I celebrate the villa, Reschio, Italy, seventy-seven extraordinary friends, and every memory God allowed us to create.
Most of all, I celebrate my wife.
My greatest earthly treasure is not something I custody. It is someone I covenant with. And unlike bitcoin, love was never meant to be held. It was meant to be given.
Kingdom Principle 👑
The greatest wealth we steward is often measured not in assets, but in covenant, time, truth, and the people God entrusts to us.
Scarcity teaches us to recognize value, but Scripture teaches us what is ultimately valuable. We cannot manufacture more time with those we love. We can only steward the days we are given. A strong marriage is built through thousands of small deposits of truth, forgiveness, prayer, service, affection, and choosing one another again.
The wisest investment I can make is to continue building a marriage with Denise where Jesus Christ remains the cornerstone and the Holy Spirit remains woven through every strand.
Prayer 🙏
Heavenly Father, thank You for Denise, for our marriage, and for the extraordinary gift of celebrating our covenant one year ago at Villa Valentini Bonaparte surrounded by seventy-seven people we love. Thank You for allowing us to return to Umbria and Reschio and remember what You began while also seeing how much You have built within us since.
Continue strengthening our marriage through truth, grace, courage, laughter, intimacy, forgiveness, and obedience. May Denise always know how deeply I treasure her, respect her voice, and thank You for the woman of God she is. Keep Jesus at the center of our covenant and the Holy Spirit alive within our home. May every year compound not merely in memories, but in faithfulness, love, service, and the legacy we build together.
In Jesus’ name, Amen. 🙏❤️🇮🇹💍🍇📖₿🕊️👑
Awww…congratulations on your and your bride’s beautiful one year anniversary! Your reflections remind me of how Christ loves his bride, the church.
I love that scripture in Ecclesiastes too; marriage is a precious covenant. And I agree, we only have a set amount of days in the natural to be generous!