two becoming one - engaging this mystery

Tuesday, August 4, 2009


The weekends are our time. Time to sit and chat over lengthy breakfasts, to answer the deeper questions, to fill the kitchen with the scent of french press coffee and remember colder winter mornings begun together with soundtracks and sunshine. We dream on the weekends. We let Piper make big messes while we hang out, knowing we'll have to clean up later, not quite caring, because we're together.

All my life, I looked for a friend like him, someone to challenge me to love deeper, to give more, to own the passion in me I feared because it was rejected so many times. I wanted to marry a best friend, spend my life with a person with whom I could be me, the me I am when I'm alone, the me I am when I'm with God, faults, questions, idiosyncrasies and all. I only half-expected to find him, and I never expected it to be this man I married.

He wasn't afraid of God. He knew Him. He knew He was more than the God we'd grown up with, the boxed vending-machine God. He knew Him differently than I did, but their relationship was real and deep. At the beginning, we loved each other for what we saw of Him in the other. The conversations went on forever. I fell in love with his zany humor, his tender heart, his unflinching desire to know God more, the desire that mirrored my own desire.

We are both so human, so disposed to give place to our own gripes and preferences. This rising and falling and rising again is breath, inhalation and release, necessary for life. I thank God for him, for this sweet radical fellowship we find among dishes and laundry and cooking and clean-up, deep conversation mingled with dailiness, soft touch reminding we are not alone, friendship deepened by desire, always ebbing, flowing, breathing...

I am so blessed to be with this man who loves God, to walk with him, knowing God together, learning Him together, trusting Him together. The weekends are the best, the filling times, the sharing times, the being times, and I can hardly put into words my gratitude for this wonderful crazy, the mornings and evenings we spend becoming one, sharing soul and spirit in mystery indescribable.

I don't often speak of it; it is something I ponder in the quiet places in my heart, when I see something that reminds me of his love for me, when I realize that this is my husband, that he is not just my guy named "Pete." It is in the quiet, in our soul-deep conversations that I know he is a man and Peter, "Rock," the name that once would never have done for my own son, is the strongest, funniest, lovingful name I know, and I almost whisper it as I find shelter in the shadow of his strength.

Words are too much sometimes, and not enough at others. I think this must be the way of love, the mystery of "the other side," when relationship moves beyond the defined and into the ebb and flow and one of marriage. I am still me, and he is still him, and we are changed alone and together as we become one with God. I could not have met the Lord on my own in the last few years; my husband is my "two" that is much better than my one, and we have withstood where we should have fallen alone.

Every time he leaves to work, I am reminded that we are not promised tomorrow, but today, I have his hand holding mine, and I hold it back, and I am so thankful.

(Also shared at Tuesdays Unwrapped @ Chatting at the Sky and One Thousand Gifts @ Holy Experience - These two never cease to inspire...)

9 comments:

dancebythelight said...

Beautiful post! I want to read your link (when I have more time) to the post about the beginning of your relationship, because I've often wondered about that. :)

I too, did not realize or expect to for my husband to be my best friend. It wasn't really something I'd ever seen before. Although I would never marry but for "true love" I don't think I realized how much of that is actually friendship.

Kelly Sauer said...

Yeah Danielle, that is a long post there - I am really needing to learn to work on my succinct. ;-)

I loved one guy, and everything was there, but Pete was a friendship that has grown into something far deeper. It's so precious.

Alison said...

Beautiful, as always. I love how you mention falling in love with God in each other at first--that is so much like me and my husband. The God in ourselves helps us love the rest of us that isn't.

deb said...

I can't put into words the soul kisses and earth that is the love of my husband and me.
Thank you for sharing what I feel too, in our days to serve and live and love.
Blessings for this always.

togetherforgood said...

This is so sweet. :)

jenn said...

beautiful--thank you for your gorgeous words--I need to go hug my best friend!

Dawn said...

what an unbelievable tribute to your husband... and to your relationship! this was just beautiful...

Marty said...

I love when someone glorifies God by honoring their husband...

Sharone said...

This is so beautiful! :) You've expressed so many of the wonderful feelings and surprises I've found in my own marriage. Thank you, I loved reading this.

Post a Comment

Talk to me, if you like.