In Them Both

This week, I was a maid of honor in a very dear friend’s wedding. Loving both the bride and the groom equally, I was in tears as our pastor proclaimed the true significance of their holy union and how their covenant with one another should reflect our Lord’s relationship with the church. Without hesitating, my friends agreed to this very serious commitment of love and excellence. At the end of the ceremony, they sealed their promises towards one another with a kiss that just barely foreshadows what true joys and delights can come from this sacred bond of matrimony. Through their word, action, and faith in the Lord, they are no longer my two precious friends, but one very strong reminder of God’s great love.

I walk away from this experience and am in awe at how even in something such as the marriage of two humans, God signs His design and makes His point. There is no promise that we can make apart from Him. We are dependent creatures and we are created to reflect His loving ways.

Even in something as far less joyous on Earth, such as the death of someone we love, God is still present and it is not without purpose. Another friend of mine just recently lost her husband to cancer. While they were only married a few short years, she would never take back the time she spent with her husband based on the pain she feels now. Even in the worst struggles imaginable, God displays His love towards her and surrounds her with people who can help meet her needs.

It is not easy to compare two such occasions, but Ecclesiastes reveals that “God has made the one as well as the other,” and “better is the end of a thing than its beginning.” Knowing that “His ways are above our ways…Isaiah 55:8-9” and that “there is a season for everything under the sun…Ecclesiastes 3:1,” I conclude that God created both with the intention of bringing us closer to Him. Whether it is the birth of something new, or the end of something great, God is sovereign. He loved us so much that He experienced both life and death for our sake, so that we may one day sit fully redeemed in His presence. If I draw nothing more than this from these two very different events, I must admit that I’m wiser for having endured them. Because in them both, Christ is revealed.

“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life.”

John 3:16