I had a dream the other night that I was wrapped in cloth from my toes up to my head, like a mummy. Sometimes fibromyalgia feels that way. Like I am a prisoner in my own body. Like I am suffocating. Like I am stuck.
Despite the chronic, unpredictable physical pain I deal with, I have something – or someone – that brings such light into the darkness of the tough days… and that makes those all-too-rare good days radiate with life and beauty all the more. Someone whose love I can so graciously lean on.
Marriage. It’s a true gift. Clay is light to me. He is tangible evidence of God’s grace in my life. And yet, what I love even more than this? That our marriage – that marriage in general – points us to the relationship with have been given with God made possible through Jesus Christ, and that it points to that Revelation promise that one day we will be forever united in perfect relationship with our true bridegroom in our true home and in new bodies! Praise Jesus for that!
I wrote the portion of this post below just a few months into our marriage…
. . . . . . .
marriage.
good times and bad.
happy and sad.
laughter and tears.
this season, harder than I thought.
so many adjustments in marriage – living together, eating together, sleeping together, cleaning together. and on and on it goes. together, together, together.
except when we aren’t together.
and that has been the other hardest part.
not being together.
not seeing each other as much as I thought we would.
busy schedules, busy lives, busy world.
and yet, in all times, in every season, through it all, we choose each other. we make the decision to work through it all. put in the work to talk it out (and sometimes fight it out.) but at the end of the day, no walking away (like I put on that list of qualities I wanted in a husband before I ever met Clay).
and at the end of the day, we have each other to lean on.
no matter what.
what a gift.
let us never forget the gift that marriage is. even when it’s hard. even when you don’t feel like fighting. when you’re tired at the end of a long day, turn to each other, lean on each other.
with Christ at the center, he will steer and guide. he will never fail. he always provides.
“love never fails” – like that song he sang to me on our wedding day.
“you’ve got my love to lean on, darlin’. that’s what’s up.” – Lennon and Maisy Stella, That’s What’s Up
. . . . . .
Clay, thank you for being such a strong and faithful shoulder to me to lean on. You are my rock. The one who points me always to my true Rock. The one who loves me with a love like Jesus – unconditionally, fervently, patiently… The one. My one. My one true love.
Thank you for all these things and so much more.
