Just married, April 26, 1980
Marriage is a metaphor for the mystical union between the bride, a born again believer, and the Bridegroom King, Jesus. The bride belongs to the Bridegroom. (John 3:29)
The person who is joined to the Lord is one sprit with him. 1 Corinthians 6:17
One last excerpt from 1000 Gifts: A Dare to Live Fully Right Where You Are by Ann Voskamp
Jesus says there is no other way to take up the faith but complete union: "I am in My Father, and you are in me, and I am in you" (John 14:20). I am stilled. I think on being in Christ and Him being in me and He is wind whisperer and I am leaf and He stirs and I tremble: "Remain in Me, and I will remain in you" (John 15:4). He's calling me to graft on, become one with the True Vine, the vine the biblical symbol of joy, festivity ... fullness. He's calling to come celebrate being made one, and in Him, to bear the fruit of the full life round.
I see it clear, June coming in bright on the breeze through open window: there is no real reality, no full life, outside of the relationship with Love, because God Himself wraps Himself eternally in relationship: God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit existing in relationship, an encircling dance of communion sweetest. God is love -- everywhere! everything! -- and He can only be love because He exists in triune relationship. Before I ever breathed or the earth ever spun, the love within the Godhead orbited, Father loving Son "before the creation of the world" (John 17:24) and when I am in union with Christ, I too am lavished with the love the Father has for the Son. In union, that love is mine -- ours! I can't simple ignore His serenade because I'm unsure, uncomfortable, uninterested, thinking I've claimed Christ as my Savior already anyways. God is relationship and He woos us to relationship and there is nothing with God if there is no relationship.
Mystical Union. This, the highest degree of importance. God as Husband in sacred wedlock, bound together, body and soul, fed by His body, quenched by His blood -- this is where eucharisteo leads. Lover bestows upon the Beloved gifts, the Beloved gives thanks for those gifts and enters into the musical love union. If God, who could have any life of His choosing, finds the most satisfying joy in communion within the Trinity, wouldn't I?
I know and don't know why I am afraid. How receptive to God do I really want to be?
God makes love with grace upon grace, every moment a making of His love for us. And He invites the turning over of the hand, the opening and saying Yes with thanks. Then God lays down all His fullness into all the emptiness. I am in Him. He is in me. I embrace God in the moment. I give Him thanks and I bless God and we meet and couldn't I make love to God, making every moment love for Him? To know Him the way Adam knew Eve. Spirit skin to spirit skin.
This is what His love means. I want it: union. This is the one gift He longs for in return for His unending gifts, and this even I could give Him, and anywhere. Anywhere -- in the kitchen scrubbing potatoes, in the arching cathedrals in Paris, in the spin of laundry and kids and washing toilets -- anywhere I can have intimate communion with the Maker of heaven and earth.
Thank You, God, for the bread of now...for Your Son and sacrifice...for the love song You keep singing, the gift of Yourself that You keep giving...for the wild wonder of You in this moment.
This is His song! I rejoice in you. Come rejoice in Me. The song that plays the world awake, the song that fuels joy: Enjoy Me. Enjoy Me!
Is there a greater way to love the Giver than to delight wildly in His gifts.