Leave and Cleave

I went to a wedding today. It makes me so happy to see two Christians get married. This is a sweet couple. The groom is from our church. I've known him ever since he was a boy (who loved Legos).

I cried.

I cried because sometimes something is so good you just cry. I cried at the message Pastor Bob IROACOMWTP gave. I love that reminder of what God intended for marriage; that coming together forever; that growing old together. I love thinking of the man I'm joined to forever. He's perfect.....for me. God really knows what he's doing.

I also cried because of the way this leaving and cleaving is 'goodbye' in a way. I watched the groom's mom talk to him at the car just before he and his bride drove away to begin their life together. In that private moment it was a mom saying something to that child she craddled in her arms, and rocked, and kissed, and doctored, and bathed, and dressed, and fed, and taught, and cheered for, and prayed for, and worried about, and grasping that one last sliver of a moment with her child, just the two of them in that moment before he goes off to be a husband, to become one flesh with his wife the same way she did with her husband. I cried because I know I'll be there one day. And I'll have to do it three times.

We raise them for that, don't we? We pray for that, don't we? We beseech God to give them a godly spouse that believes the same way they do; that wants the same things they do; that is of the same mind as they are in the raising of godly children. We raise them to do just this and then when that day comes...my, how hard it must be to let them go. I know now how my mom felt when I got married. I just didn't understand it then. I wasn't a mom then.

Although this mother and father will never again have their family of three, they rejoice in God's good blessings and providence. Their family has gotten bigger...and it will only get bigger still because they will give you grandbabies!

Got to go blow my nose. I cried again.