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| One year I painted our verse and hung it in the kitchen. |
I cannot remember why we began sending this phrase
back and forth to each other, but over the course of our long-distance courtship,
my husband and I repeatedly closed our letters or cards with the words: In All
Ways for Always.
It became a comforting concluding thought for our
telephone conversations. It reassured us to emphasize to each other that our
love would continue despite the circumstances or the length of time that kept
us apart.
During the early years of our marriage we tossed it
back and forth in laughter, whenever my husband travelled on his business
trips. Our end of day reports would feature the comparisons of my struggles
with our sons and his challenges with his clients. Every time we would close
with those calming words: In All Ways for Always.
Carefully chosen words that created a rhythm for us, a
refrain that repeated our commitment to the love we expected of and hoped for
each other. As is true for any stated pledge we had to follow through with the
appropriate actions to prove that our reality confirmed the intended meaning of
this verse.
Why declare such a poetic expression over and over? Why
didn’t we write or say something original for a change? Sometimes my writer’s
heart longed for a new inspiring declaration from my husband. However, to this
day I still know and believe in the sincerity and weight of those simple words that
we say to each other: In All Ways for Always.
Sifting through scripture I found repetitions of
covenants made by God that I might hear over and over again, as His love
letters to me. Psalm 136 reiterates the same refrain following a series of specific
accounts of why we should give thanks to God. After each trustworthy action the
writer claims, “His faithful love endures forever.”
What if we wrote our own Psalm of praise and
thanksgiving to God? What if we placed
the story of our lives line by line, noting each event that happened? Even when
we had to write of our moments of dark despair or embarrassing errors, after
each one we could hear, “His faithful love endures forever.”
It’s a closing line we could remember for ourselves. Perhaps
it could become our reminder that He will encourage us as we continue writing.
Another repeated concept in the Psalms mentions God’s
constant watchfulness. Picture for a moment how that might work. Even as we pray
for the ideas that will form our writing pieces, He guides us and provides for
us. In practice could we pause, allowing Him to watch over our selections? In
that watchfulness, His promise “His faithful love endures forever,” could
become a reality.
Psalm 121 echoes loudly in my mind, “The Lord himself
watches over you! The Lord stands beside you as your protective shade. The sun will not hurt you by day, nor the
moon at night. The Lord keeps you from all evil and preserves your life. The Lord keeps watch over you as you come and
go, both now and forever.”
I take great comfort in those words. I have a responsibility
as a writer to interpret through words, to persuade, to encourage, to relate
life situations that may evoke emotional responses from readers. I will
remember to pause, so that He may watch over me, as I choose the appropriate stories
to share.
Actually, I realize I don’t have to conjure up a
clever new closing to share with my husband. As I wrote this today, I
discovered these lines as a new lead-in to our own promise:
His faithful love endures forever,
The Lord keeps watch over you as you come and go, both
now and forever,
In All Ways for Always.
