Hi, I’m the assistant to the director of Music.

My name is Nate Wood, and I’ve been married to my beautiful wife, Amy, for almost twenty-four years.

In order to give you a full perspective, and to have a little fun, we’re going to tell the story of how we got together… from both of our perspectives. This will be fun.

Nate: The day we met wasn’t exactly the beginning of a fairy tale.

At the time I was on tour with the New Life Singers from Life Pacific University (back when it was still called Life Bible College). Besides singing, I also worked for our Director of Music, so I helped oversee parts of the tour. In my twenty-year-old mind, that made me pretty important.

One of our concerts brought us to the Willamette Valley. My family came to support me, but they had another agenda. They brought Amy because they’d decided I needed to meet her.

Amy: Nate and I met through his sisters at church. They called him Nathan. His friends called him Nate. And after meeting his mom for the first time and calling him Nate, she quickly corrected me.

“His name is Nathan.”

Noted.

Our first interaction was anything but fireworks or love at first sight.

I was friends with his sisters, and they invited me to a summer concert where their brother would be singing with his college choir. Side note: this wasn’t just any choir. It was a gospel choir, and they were very legit.

Okay, back to the story.

I met up with his family in Silverton, Oregon, and we all piled into their white Buick to head, I think, to Eugene. The whole drive they were talking about Nate—how talented he was, how great he sang, how amazing the choir was.

My first impression of their family? They were fun. Really fun. Funny, loyal, and completely devoted to one another.

What was not on my mind was, “Ooooh, I’m meeting a guy.”

Not even a little bit.

I wasn’t nervous. I was hanging out with friends and their family while they went to see their brother who had been away at college.

We got to the church, found our seats, and they pointed him out when the choir walked on stage.

Nothing.

No sparks.

No dramatic movie moment.

Just a guy standing in a choir.

The choir sounded fantastic. I’d actually heard them perform a few years earlier at a conference, but there were lots of new faces now, and they were just as good as I remembered.

Nate: After the concert I was busy helping tear everything down and directing the loading of equipment. My family tracked me down and introduced us.

I remember two things from that moment.

First, I noticed she was good looking.

Second, I knew exactly what my sisters were up to.

Unfortunately, instead of handling it like a mature adult, I handled it like…well…a twenty-year-old who thought he had important things to do. I hid behind my responsibilities, told everyone I was busy, and basically brushed the whole thing off.

Needless to say, Amy wasn’t impressed.

Looking back, I probably wouldn’t have been either.

Amy: Afterward, everyone was scrambling around packing up sound equipment and instruments. Both of his sisters were enthusiastically waving him over.

Apparently they wanted us to meet.

I, however, was completely oblivious.

He came over and immediately launched into a recap of the trip, the concert, his solo, and all the important responsibilities he had helping the director.

“I really need to get back,” he said. “David needs my help.”

Then he’d circle back.

“But the choir sounded good, right?”

Translation: Please compliment me again.

This conversation lasted maybe five to seven minutes.

I mostly stood there listening.

Then he glanced over at me.

“Hi, nice to meet you.”

And just as quickly he was off again because David, the director, needed him.

Now, maybe I completely misread him.

But the vibe I got was:

“Hi. I’m kind of a big deal.”

Internally I said to myself:

Sir.

You attend a small Christian college in a small denomination and you’re singing in a church.

Let’s all take a breath.

All I could think was, “Well, look at you, Assistant to the Music Director.”

To be fair, I have never been particularly impressed by people who seem impressed with themselves. If someone wants respect, my immediate response has always been:

Prove it.

I’m still a little like that today.

Just… significantly more mature about it.

After that interaction there was absolutely no sign of a budding romance.

We climbed back into the Buick and headed home.

But somewhere during all the conversation about Nate, the choir, and college life, a quiet thought crossed my mind:

They will be your family someday.

It wasn’t dramatic.

It wasn’t emotional.

It was just there.

Nate: A couple of months later I left school and moved to Oregon to be closer to my family. I started attending the church where both of our families went and got involved in the youth ministry.

Amy and I ended up serving on the same leadership team.

Somewhere along the way she stopped being “the girl my sisters wanted me to meet” and became a friend. We discovered we had a lot in common. We wanted many of the same things out of life. We enjoyed talking, laughing, and serving together.

It also didn’t take me very long to realize that the pretty girl I’d awkwardly blown off a few months earlier was someone I really wanted to know better.

Amy: Then summer turned into fall.

We kept running into each other at parties. Somehow he ended up at my family’s house for game nights. We served together in youth ministry.

And little by little something shifted.

I genuinely enjoyed being around him.

He was—and still is—one of the funniest people I know.

He had this Chris Farley routine that would absolutely destroy a room. The kind of laughter where your stomach hurts and you’re trying to catch your breath.

I loved that.

He was also incredibly kind.

Still, I wasn’t sitting around daydreaming about him.

What changed was youth ministry.

I started hoping he’d be at meetings because I knew it would be more fun if he was there. And when he wasn’t, I felt a little disappointed.

That’s when I should have known.

By December we were spending quite a bit of time together, even outside of church. He’d stop by the coffee shop where I worked. We’d find reasons to be around each other.

Nate: Eventually I worked up the courage to tell her how I felt. To my relief, she didn’t disagree. She was interested too. In fact, she agreed to give dating a try, and we made plans for what I still think was a pretty great Valentine’s Day dinner theatre date.

The Valentine’s Date we definitely did go on.

Then came the youth retreat.

Somewhere between leaving for the retreat and coming home, Amy got cold feet and decided she didn’t want to date after all.

I’ll be honest—I was disappointed. But I also respected her enough not to try to change her mind.

After the retreat she got very sick and went MIA for a while. Then one day out of the blue she called and asked if I would pick her up and drive her to a youth leaders’ meeting because her mom didn’t want her driving yet.

Of course I said yes.

It wasn’t some magical evening where violins started playing in the background. We just talked. We laughed. It felt comfortable because, like I said, we’d become genuine friends.

Amy: And by January, we finally had “the conversation.”

The next morning we were leaving for a multi-church youth winter retreat.

By the time I arrived at the church parking lot, apparently every youth leader and every student already knew we were dating.

EVERYONE.

I was completely overwhelmed.

In my heart I knew he was the one.

But my brain?

My brain was having an absolute meltdown.

By day two of youth camp I broke up with him.

At youth camp.

Not my finest moment.

When I got home, I got sick for two weeks and spent a lot of time lying around thinking about what had just happened.

We had a youth leader meeting coming up, and I needed a ride. So I called Nate and asked if he’d pick me up.

He said yes.

He drove me there.

He drove me home.

Nothing was weird.

Nothing was awkward.

Nate: Then either later that night—or maybe the next night, the details get a little fuzzy after twenty-five years—my phone rang.

It was Amy.

She said she wanted to talk. Now, that’s not unusual. Amy has always had something to say. She’s confident, quick-witted, a little sassy, and she’s never had much trouble sharing her opinion.

What was unusual was how nervous she sounded. After a very long pause she finally asked, “Can we start over?”

She admitted she’d gotten scared. Then she told me she really wanted to go on our Valentine’s Day date after all.

I don’t remember pretending to think about it for very long.

I said yes.

We went on the date. Then another.

Then another. And honestly, we’ve never gone more than a couple days without the other since.

Somewhere between Valentine’s and “Will you marry me?”

Amy: And somewhere in that evening I realized I wanted another chance.

So I called him.

“Can we start over?”

And thankfully he said yes.

Unfortunately for Nate, that wouldn’t the last time I panicked.

Three months later we were sitting on a bench in California, and I was unloading all my doubts and fears.

The infamous California trip.

When I finally finished, he looked at me and said:

“Amy, I really like you. I could even see myself loving you at some point. And I’d still like to give this a shot.”

Two months later we were engaged.

The day we got engaged.

Four and a half months after that, we said, “I do.”

Our kids are absolutely shocked by this timeline.

Honestly, sometimes I am too.

But it’s our story.

Nate: Today, almost twenty-five years later, she’s still my favorite person. Outside of my relationship with Jesus, she’s the greatest blessing in my life. We’ve raised two incredible kids who are now adults, welcomed a wonderful son-in-law into our family, and we’ve also raised our four-year-old dog from the day she was born. She’s pretty convinced she’s the third child, and if we’re honest…we’ve probably done very little to convince her otherwise.

When I think about our marriage, one thing stands out more than anything else.

We’ve always talked.

Not always eloquently. Not always calmly. But honestly.

From the beginning we’ve said what we were feeling. We’ve celebrated together, disagreed together, worked through hurt feelings together, and refused to let silence do the talking for us.

I think that’s one of the keys to building your marriage.

Talk it out. Say what you’re feeling.

Don’t expect your spouse to read your mind.

Honest conversations may not solve every problem overnight, but they build trust over a lifetime.

And somewhere between all those conversations—the easy ones, the difficult ones, and even the awkward ones—you just might build a marriage that lasts.

Amy: And twenty-five years later we’re still building on it.

I’ve always thought marriage is a lot like building a house.

My dad built homes for a living, and growing up we’d spend hours sketching floor plans and dreaming about what we’d build someday.

If I were to describe our marriage as a house, it would be a big, beautiful antebellum home.

Creamy white siding. Creamy white trim. A long front porch wrapping all the way around. Big columns out front. Double front doors.

Large living spaces filled with people resting, laughing, visiting, and feeling welcome.

Plenty of bedrooms and bathrooms for anyone who needs a place to stay.

And a kitchen with a long dining table where people can eat, play games, tell stories, celebrate victories, and cry through hard seasons if they need to.

Outside are giant shade trees and overflowing gardens.

Can you picture it?

I can.

We’ve spent twenty-five years building that house together.

Not the physical one.

The marriage.

The life.

The family.

And the best part?

We’re finally starting to see the vision come to life.

Our marriage holds all of that possibility, and I can’t wait to see what gets built next.