The Meaning of Things

It is a common mistake to demonize the idols we've chiseled out of good things. It is an easy solution to turn to when the axe falls, and we find our lover has exchanged our kisses for a killing, a stealing, and a destroying of our lives. But it is not always the fault of the object of our affections--sometimes we are the ones that dress it up in coats more than double its size, and become crushed when it won't play the part we've designated for it. When it does not fulfill that role, we are ready to throw it out, proclaiming to everyone the evils and inadequacies of the fallen one. Sometimes we go so far as to gather rallies, movements, crowds of people to join us in not only removing the halos from our darlings, but sending them on into exile. Our fingers are pointed at our former objects of desire, but really our disgust is only there because we are the ones who gave them a position they never had. We are the ones who confused their job titles but hired them on the spot anyway.

I see myself doing this time and time again in a multitude of ways, but recently I have seen this in my own view of marriage. Being a wife is something I am tempted to scorn or write off when I realize that men are just as desperate for grace as I am. Saying "I do" is scrubbed of its gloss when I watch a mother change another dirty diaper and try "one more time" to silence a night-owl-baby with another feeding. The nearer I get to single men and the closer I get to married couples, the more I realize that my category, my definition for "love" and "husband" and "wife" do not match up. I have tried to drag other definitions in their place, tried to write under them words like "security", "hope", "refuge", "peace", "worth". I have tried to write my own dictionary, but the Author consistently, graciously, shows me He's got a book of His own. When my hand reacts by grappling for the white-out, He grabs my hand and shows me He is the Word I was looking for all along. The other words follow later in the book, and they are far more robust and well rounded than I could ever make out in my daydreaming. I had, in my disconnected idealism, missed their meaning in this world. When they are set in the context of the Story of the Gospel, every crack that turned me away before shines. Suddenly, with the Word in His rightful place, everything is illuminated with Glory.