United in a Pandemic
I stood trembling in my lace wedding dress.
The only thing I could control was my focus - a stretching blue horizon over a calm lake.
What a day to be alive; what a day to be wed.
How is a bride to feel after so much adversity, so much change? How is anyone to feel?
I agree with my husband: In a time of adversity, what better time to be united?
Because blessings can turn threats. I don’t want to resist something good in the middle of what I don’t understand. If I’ve learned anything in the last year it’s that our tolerance for tension determines our potential growth.
And I can already feel God squeezing something good out of me through 2020. He’s pruning perspectives I’ve told myself and making room for the new.
And in my new, ivory wedding dress, I’m walking toward my husband-to-be, ready to unite, ready to commit to something bigger than each of us: marriage.
They say you will know a tree by its fruit and that’s exactly why I’m marrying this man - I’ve seen the product of who this man is. Even in a worldwide pandemic, his character and love are strikingly attractive.
I end my walk to the front in the midst of weird times. This pandemic may be weird but my normal will not be fear. If I resist what I don’t understand I’ll never receive the blessings. My husband-to-be is one of them.
And that’s why this was as good a time as any to get married. I’m standing with Adam’s hands in mine, listening to the Pastor speak, feeling a light breeze blow between and around us.
THIS IS WHAT I KNOW: This world has never been normal. It’s never been completely peaceful. It’s never been completely stable. It’s never been perfect. What was perfect in the Garden of Eden didn’t last long. And when it fell, Adam and Eve had to refigure out their new normal.
Adam and I are standing together and listening to what marriage is and isn’t. And we know that if we’re going to practice what we preach, it has to start right here, right at the pulpit of the sandy, lake shore, acting on our shared values before God’s mountainous throne.
We can’t live normal because this world isn’t normal. That’s why we have our faith - it’s always forward-moving. So we must move forward with it. As Christians we have to live forward to eternity while living in light of it.
Because when adversity comes, and it will - probably many times - we’ll have to be ready to stand firm. When the winds come, we’ll have to hold our ground.
Adam and I kiss and turn, walking united into the wind, grasping what we value and believe.
Photo taken by Grant Henry