Happy Ever After

“My soul yearns for you in the night, ​yes, my spirit within me keeps vigil for you;” Isaiah 26:9

Many women yearn for a perfect bridegroom. They think their life will be complete if they find that one man to make them happy for ever after. I suppose this idea comes from the fairy tales we read when we were children. There usually was a prince who saved a damsel in distress and the story stopped with a beautiful wedding. 

To live happily ever after, isn't that what any bride wants on her wedding day? I forget which husband on my Facebook feed said that his wife was the perfect gift for an imperfect man, but I thought it was a beautiful sentiment.

I read in 1 John 2:25, “And this is the promise He made us: Eternal Life” and I thought about marriage, and how it is a covenant, a promise. Here in this verse, God promises us eternal life. He put a ring on my finger, just as another father put a ring on the prodigal son's finger. A PERFECT GIFT FOR IMPERFECT ME! I do not deserve it, I can never earn it, but God desires to give me eternal life, to be together forever.

There are many things that God does that I do not deserve. He gives me a beautiful wedding dress to replace the rags of my sin and shame. He washes me clean by forgiving me time and time again like Hosea forgave his harlot wife.

Sometimes, because I pray every day, and buy food for the poor and do other good deeds, I think I am in right standing with God. I am complacent and un-needy. But I am as far from holiness and righteousness as the east is from the west! And yet, Jesus, my bridegroom takes me by the hand, and walks me down the aisle, and says, "Yes, I do. I do die for this precious one. I do promise to give her eternal life with Me and My Father in My Kingdom." 

That is the perfect ending and beginning, and the best part is, it is NO fairy tale!!