The Start

Today I marry my best friend.

Doesn't that sound ridiculously cliche?

And yet, all the best things in life are, are they not? Originality and uniqueness are overrated. As my sister says, all couples end up saying and doing much the same things - if they don't, they're doing it wrong.

This is philosophical for a wedding day post, you are probably thinking. That's me for you, although I am sure it would be less so if I actually wrote this on my wedding day. I didn't. If I have time then, I will be writing my beloved a letter.

I am getting married. I am excited to have the chance to prove all those terrible jokes wrong. Marriage is good and to be held in high esteem by all. I have resolved never to tell any young person a joke like the three rings of marriage: engagement ring, wedding ring, suffering.

Of course marriage involves suffering. Life involves suffering, and marriage is life at its richest.

I would rather suffer with my beloved than without him. As my dear sister-in-law said when I was beginning this journey with him, this won't really add to the problem. It just gives a face to it. That's how marriage is - it doesn't create problems, it's just really good at revealing them. At showing you your sin.

With my husband - wow, what a weird thing to say, although I have accidentally called him that before - who always so longs to help me walking with me, suffering is easier to bear.

Does this seem heavy for a wedding day?

Why, my little sister asks, do you have to get married? You don't, she says. He can just come over to visit. Why do you want kids? You don't have to have kids.

What is the purpose of marriage? The romantic and sweet are delightful benefits - and essential. We need them. Yet our highest goal in everything must be to honor the Lord.

The undeserved, unwavering, relentless love that Parker has shown me has given me a knowing of God's love that is mind-boggling. Many times I have shaken my head, looked at him, and asked, "Why? I don't understand."

"You're never going to," he says.

And he's right. There are three things that I do not understand, and four that are too wonderful for me. A ship in the sea, a snake on a rock, a bird in the sky, and the way of a man with a virgin. The desire, the devotion, the love are too overwhelming, too strong to be explained by looking at their object. When he sees me, my sin, how I have hurt him, he only loves me more. Such knowledge is too wonderful for me. It is high, I cannot attain it.

I can't wait. I can't wait to be able to be free to be fully united. How wonderful it will be to not have to say goodbye and tear ourselves apart! So long we have been in this strange partial state, me under him, but not quite; our own family, but not yet - how does one live in this state of unity of mind and spirit, and yet not quite reality?

And this is the beauty of marriage: everything is a picture. I wasn't meaning to make a parable, but is this not just our state here, waiting to be fully united with Christ?

I am learning for myself things I have heard. Like marriage gets better with time. And that is perhaps what I anticipate most. Romantic ideals are overrated. The best things are simple, everyday things.

Like cooking a meal for Parker. Like coming home from school and going to my own house. Like arranging the million and one generous gifts we were given in our little kitchen.

God has been good to us, though we are so undeserving. He is faithful, so I know that He will for the rest of our lives. For one way of God showing His amazing, unconditional love for me is through Parker's. Thinking about it, I can't help but smile.