"What is the object or ideal of a future romantic relationship?" was the question posed. "What do you dream love from a spouse to look like?"
Though not sharing publicly at that time, my highly poetic, wordy, and Romantic mind spun quickly into dreaming of the response, surprising myself with what the eventual outcome was*:
Let me not to the marriage of true minds
Admit impediments; love is not love
Which altars when its alteration finds,
Or bends with the remover to remove:
O, no, it is an ever-fixed mark,
That looks on tempests and is never shaken;
It is the star to every wandering bark,
Whose worth's unknown, although its height betaken.
Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks
Within his bending sickle's compass come;
Love altars not with his brief hours and weeks,
But bears it out even to the edge of doom.
If this be error and upon me proved,
I never writ, nor no man ever loved.
(Shakespeare, Sonnet 116...one of my favourites!)
Is that true? Is this what I dream of experiencing one day?
I dream a little of the Romantic, like Shakespeare's expression, and all-encompassing devotion, but love between man and wife more importantly as a prophetic declaration to our culture and generation of the eschatology reality of Jesus and His Bride.
Emotions true and beautiful, yes, but more so faithfulness and covenant that proclaims something of the transcendent.
The dream of love in my heart is not to only feel the moments of pursuit and excitement from a man but to join with another persons’ path and destiny in God that allows for testimony to come of our living and being. It is to invite one another into fuller revelation to what it means to be loved and created for intimacy: to be truly known and accepted by our Creator. To invite others into that truth with honesty and grace and to make unselfish room to grow, be transformed, and potentially train up children and impart to them our first-love: Christ.
If this standard is unreasonable, then with joy I embrace the love of Christ singly and wholeheartedly, content in Him who knows me and sustains me forever.
What a great gift then, that with the land-mark 25th birthday, people have stopped asking if I have any "special friends," or what my plans for a family are, or suggest where I might try finding some like-minded-available-males...the response continues to be a bit boring and tiresome for them. I don't blame them, feel any hurt, or judge these loving people who care so much for me and desire happiness for my life, just a burst of thankfulness!
Truth is: I don't simply want to date or marry or have children. I desire the fullness of God for my life, whatever that looks like. There is much more to life and love than portrayed in Shakespeare's sonnets or the barrage of RomCom's on iTunes.
And with that declaration, there is a release in my heart and soul into confident love in Jesus Christ and trust in the perfection of His will and provision in all areas of my life!
* This is not where I thought a musing adventure about spousal love would take me, but I’m glad. Very glad. Though it is nice to think of that some day in the future, I am not waiting on baited breath and anticipating it as being the pinnacle experience of my life or fullness of love. More than thinking of those questions, I want to spend time thinking, meditating and pursuing the knowledge of God that fills me with love for Jesus that is greater than any earthly experience.
