I'll give you one guess what I'm thinking about...
Did you guess?
This guy pretty much dominates my thoughts at any given time. Tonight, I'm thinking about becoming Mrs. Kelton, the hugeness of placing my hand in his and knowing it is FOREVER. I feel like I have always kinda been on the other side of a pane of glass watching other people fall in love and get married. I've thought a great deal about it, and developed my own ideas of commitment and what it looks like and what it entails. But now I stand before it-- 87 days off-- and the magnitude of it brings me to my knees. This is huge. What we are about to do is huge. What hundreds of people do every day in getting married is huge. And I so want God to prepare my heart. I so want to be the best possible thing for this handsome man in my life. As ready as I can be...
Planning the wedding has been fun... and stressful... and lonely sometimes as he's so far away. Often, I just wish we were married already. The tiny little details seem so petty in the grand scheme of things. I mean, do I really care what kind of china people eat off of on the 1st of June when I am stepping up to make a most solemn vow to do what is really quite impossible-- faithfully love this other fallible human. We say that word so nonchalantly, but truly loving is active and alive. I'm promising to ALWAYS treat him with and feel toward him love with patience, with kindness, without envy, without boasting, never dishonouring him or seeking my own good instead of his own, not getting easily angered, not keeping a record of ways he wrongs me, not delighting in evil, always delighting in his good, always protecting him and this sacred space between us, always choosing to trust him, always persevering with him, always hoping with him...
I am a romantic to a fault, I'll admit. But even as I envision in my head that moment-- me in my Mom's dress remade for me, clutching my fragrant bouquet of peonies, him in his grey tux with tails, springtime trees blooming, the pastor holding the bible out before him, our family and friends from far and wide gazing at us as we stand side by side in my parents' beautiful backyard... Even as I envision that moment of saying, "I do," to the man I adore with all my heart, I know I can't really love him that well. I KNOW there will be hiccups. Because I know the extent of my selfishness. I know how unlike Christ I am. I know how desperately I am in need of grace every day...
But I also know I can make that pledge, and Charles can too, because Christ in us loves through us. Perfectly. His patience never wears out. His hope is endless. And when the moments come where the ideal of marriage truly feels impossible, He is where I can turn-- where we both can turn-- so that we can turn back to one another with that same old adoration in our eyes...
That doesn't make this vow any less huge or the thought of making it any less daunting. But I am so excited to step into the impossibility of marriage and find Christ waiting to show us how to walk in His footsteps within it. Isn't this what we're here on earth for? To learn to walk in trust of Him. Marriage is the next adventure He has for me to learn that in...
And I am wide-eyed in wonder at Him.
And at the fact that it's my turn! I'm on the other side of that windowpane and I'm not even sure how or when that happened :)
And at the fact that it's my turn! I'm on the other side of that windowpane and I'm not even sure how or when that happened :)
So, the countdown continues.
p.s. Completely off topic-- this song is very pretty :)
