Marriage is a Love-ly Gift -- Valentine's Day Edition

Papa and I are nearing our the nine-and-a-half-year mark of our marriage. How do I know this?

Because our half anniversary falls on Valentine's Day. Pretty nifty, huh? (For those of you doing the math, that puts our anniversary date on August 14. Nope, we didn't pick it so the half-date would fall on the day typically thought of as one for lovers, but it gave it a certain romantic cachet. And that way I could finish undergrad and Papa could be between things in his seminary schedule.)

Our first Valentine's Day as a married couple found us hosting a visiting pastor to Papa's vicarage congregation. He was nice, and we liked (and still like) hosting, but...it was Valentine's Day. And we were six months into our marriage. I think you can fill in the blanks.

Look at those newlywed goo-goo eyes! And Papa's hair!
...and that dress I'll never fit into again.

Well, we survived. And other Valentine's Days found us alternately working, studying, dealing with pregnancy symptoms, wiping up baby spit, dealing with pastoral care concerns, washing dishes, sorting laundry, and generally looking significantly less attractive than we did during our dating and engagement days (well, probably just me. Papa rarely looks anything less than handsome. But I suppose I'm a little biased). In other words, the day found us dealing with Life generally. We've also exchanged sappy cards, enjoyed candlelit dinners, and received beautiful bouquets (okay, just me on that one). One time I found a post-it love note from Papa. And honestly, both the mundane and romantic ways of marking Valentine's Day are good. Really! So you, like any other normal person, ask "What do you mean, Emommy?" (Go ahead; say it. You know you want to.)

Well, let's consider a little history. Valentine, an early Christian martyr, supposedly left an encouraging note for his jailer's child before he was killed. This note became the inspiration for those mass-produced cards sold by the boatload this time of year. But Valentine's gesture hardly fits our image of a day for lovey-dovey chocolate-swapping goo-goo-eyed lovers. Rather, it reminds us that love is a gift, one steeped in selflessness. No one, not even an outwardly good man, can truly love a man who's responsible for leading him to (or imprisoning him until) his death--unless that man has been given the ability to love his neighbor out of the incredible sacrificial love His Savior has first shown to him.

Love is Christ. Christ, who died for us and suffered for us, who totally renounced Himself so that we might live. This gift manifests a ripple-effect throughout our lives, sometimes in glorious moments, like weddings. But it also comes in everyday moments, like finding post-its and ironing shirts and scrubbing toilets (yes, you read that right).

So with this in mind, I appreciate this day mostly because it reminds me of what a gift Papa and I have been given in our marriage. God has used the vehicle of marriage to deliver us a measure of His regard for us. And we, then, are able to love each other, and the children we have been given, day in and day out. As the years pass, I am more and more grateful for Papa, and for our marriage, as a source of love that is pure gift. I don't receive love because I've been especially lovable (and usually, I am far away from lovable. Just try talking to me before I've had coffee in the morning. I mean that rhetorically, of course. Don't actually try it.). I don't receive love because people owe it to me (they don't). Yet I get it anyway. And marriage--this wonderful, mysterious relationship that God created and Christ blessed--is a major way that I receive it. And wouldn't you know? With every day and month and year that passes, love grows between us. As Dietrich Bonhoeffer so aptly put it, "It is not your love that sustains your marriage, but ... your marriage that sustains your love."

I thank God for our marriage that sustains our love.

Because love lasts ALL year. Even on holidays when we dress like fictional characters.
Well, Cardinals players and National Park Rangers are real.