I will be here

I have been a part of more weddings than I can even keep track of. Today, I am working on one for a couple in our church. It is one where not only am I the minister but will also be singing a duet with my wife. It is an old wedding favorite, “I will be here” by Steven Curtis Chapman.

Here is a line in the song that struck a cord within me yesterday…

“If in the dark we lose sight of love, hold my hand and have no fear ’cause I will be here”

Profound.

It reminds me of those times Nicole and I have experienced, where we argued, got upset at each other, misunderstood something the other had done and things got dark.

In fact, we have had a few times that were really dark.

And when things are dark you tend to lose your sight, and you lose the “feeling of love” you had before the dark times.

You “lose sight of love”

When that happens what do you do?

Well, you reach out to each other. You walk hand in hand through the darkness… as long as it might last. Until you are through it.

I wish that we could say that we have never had dark times in our marriage… after all that would be more “pastoral”. But here is what I can say, when it was hard to see why we fell in love in the first place, when we asked the question, Why did I marry this person? By God’s grace, mercy and strength we stuck to our commitment to Him and each other. And even though it was a mess, and not anything we would ever want anyone to know about, we held on to each other, hand in hand and walked through the darkness to the other side…

where we could see love again.

And it’s the commitment to each other and to God (not the feeling of love) that got us there.

It is more than worth it to stay with it.

PS…

To Nicole…
“I will be true to the promise I have made, to you and to the One who gave you to me” yes…”seasons are made for change but our lifetimes are made for years… so I will be here.”

I love you Nicole!