part 3 of 3
In the last two blogs I have shared some things that I was able to learn through my step-dad’s accident on Christmas eve. If you missed what happened, then please go read the first two blogs in this 3 part series.
After the accident my mom did not leave her husbands side. She was the one who slept in hospital chairs in his room, the one who told him repeatedly what had happened to him, and where he was. After 3 days of my mom doing this I started reflecting on just what this was and what it meant.
To really show you the love that I saw i’m going to need to show you where this relationship has come from. My mom and dad got a divorce when I was 7 years old. My mom, younger sister Amanda, and I moved out of our house and in with our grandma. After the divorce my mom married her High School sweet heart my step-dad Steve.
Things were not always easy back then. My family did not know the Lord, we all had our own baggage we were trying to bring into this new family. I watched my mom and step-dad try to blend this family and have a strong marriage on their own and it didn’t work.
In the beginning of their marriage there was yelling, and my mom trying to figure out how to let my step-dad Steve father us without being his children. I knew they loved each other because they fought for their marriage and didn’t give up. However it didn’t look like anything I would ever want.
There came a point when I considered my step-dad to be my dad. He was there in every part of my life, and I knew he loved me unconditionally. This took some pressure off my mom’s marriage because her children were happy and the man she loved cared for her children. However God still was not the center of their marriage.
A marriage should be focused on God but I didn’t know what that meant when I heard it, because what I saw was two people with personal relationships with the lord, but who loved each other as well as they knew how.
A change started when I went off to college, I would come home and see them communicating better together, there was not the yelling that there used to be, and a lot of that was because my mom was allowing dad to lead them and have the lord start holding the spot in the middle of their marriage.
I then went on the World Race and would hear about how their marriage has changed and things were different, but I hadn’t seen it. I have been in GA now for a year so I wasn’t seeing the changes or witness them dedicate their marriage to the Lord on their anniversary this past November.
However after the accident I saw it with my own eyes.
There is a bond between these two people that nothing can separate. It takes Love, Trust, patience, and Faith for two people to go through what my parents just went through and not let it affect their marriage.
My mom never left her husband’s side, she was up before he was, preparing his meals when room service would bring it in, and she was preparing an atmosphere that was welcoming and peaceful for her husband during a time of trauma and recovery. She was and is the Proverbs 31 woman. Something I had never seen in her or in their marriage before.
My dad would ask for her whenever she wasn’t in the room with him. He wanted her by his side and that is all he needed. Yes he asked for us kids all the time but the person he couldn’t be with out was his wife or his baby as he calls her.
When and if she did leave the room to go to dinner with us kids, or run across the street to the store. He would call her several times, just to know where she was and why he couldn’t be with her. And not once did she get frustrated with him, or raise her voice. But instead talked to him like it was the first time they talked that day.
She told him over and over what had happened to him, where he was, and what was going on. She loved him the best way she knew how and that was to be there for him, and let their father minister to him in his time of rest.
They have a long road ahead of them, as he is still doing outpatient therapy 5 days a week. He still only wants her there all the time, so rest is hard to come by. But the Lord is their strength and you can hear it in their voices and the way they encourage each other.
Marriage is a bond that can not be broken no matter what. This is what I learned by watching a marriage go from bad to fully committed to the Lord. Love is a choice for sure, it’s a choice you have to make everyday. But it’s also something the Lord will not let you walk alone in as long as He is the center of your marriage.
Proverbs 12:4
A wife of noble character is her husband’s crown, but a disgraceful wife is like decay in his bones.
