A Whitest Day

"I do" are the two most famous last words,
The beginning of the end;
But to lose your life for another, I've heard,
Is a good place to begin.

'Cause the only way to find your life
Is to lay your own life down,
And I believe it's an easy price
For the life that we have found.

And we're dancing in the minefields;
We're sailing in the storm.
This is harder than we dreamed
But I believe that's what the promise is for.

That's what the promise is for...

It's Midsummer. It's kind of a special point, don't you think? Midsummer. And it has such a beautiful ring to it. Speaking of a ring to it, two years ago yesterday, on Midsummer's Eve, this young lady was married. In our age, marrying at the age of eighteen strikes people as unwise; and, in many cases, sadly, they might be right. But being unfettered by social winds and adhering to a more biblical method than contemporary wisdom, my father and my husband's father raised, not children, but adults. So by the time I was eighteen (my husband had just turned nineteen) we were ready for marriage. We had been gearing toward it for years. This precocious child, at the age of four, had already decided that the blond bean-pole of a gentleboy was for her, so everyone could see this marriage coming from a league off.

After twenty years, though, two years doesn't seem like much: only two years of being actually married, and yet it seems like forever. It hasn't been an easy twenty years, of course. There were pockets of mines and rough patches, and my husband and I had a lot of growing to do, which is perfectly natural. I'm usually one to fixate on the traumatic moments in my life, but in these cases all those delightful moments of shared childhood and shared adolescence come to the fore. We were like Peter Pan and his shadow, one always tagging right behind the other, and always getting into some kind of trouble. It isn't often that one gets to have such a history, and to be still making that kind of history (we don't get into so much trouble now, though our childish streaks are still glaring - silly artsy people, us) and I'm very, very grateful to God for this gift.

You're the first light of the morning, my cool sunrise;
You're my love across the table, a little sleep in your eyes;
You're my strong cup of coffee, you like to laugh right with me.
You're my heart's companion, my one true companion:
Sweet darling, lover of mine.

In It's A Wonderful Life, it is brought home to the viewer how important even a single person is in someone's life. I know I would not be who I am today, nor where I am today - not even a shadow of who or where - if it were not for my husband. He has always been there for me, and he has been patient with me, and helped me grow, indulged and even shared my quirks, been "such a child!" with me, and been serious with me... I look at what God has given me in him and I can't quite believe my eyes. God's gifts are rather splendid like that, aren't they? They are all different, but each one fits perfectly. There will still be minefields, and storms (these drive us to the arms of the Father together, don't they?), and moments of peaceful quiet and ridiculous fun (these refresh the soul, don't they?) - but Lord willing we will have many Midsummer Eves to see yet side by side, and, Lord willing, each Midsummer will find us grown a little more in our Father than the year before.

"Dear heart, press on; let not husband, let not anything, cool thy affections after Christ. I hope he will be an occasion to inflame them. That which is best worthy of love in thy husband is that of the image of Christ he bears. Look on that, and love it best, and all the rest for that."