Arranged Just Right

One October afternoon my aunt Sandra gave me a call at college. She excitedly claimed that she knew who my future husband was. With my curiosity aroused but my will very doubtful, I asked for some details. He was her son’s second grade teacher. Strike one. As a Junior majoring in Elementary Education, I had just decided that being a teacher is not really the career for me. Why would I then turn around and marry one? “What’s his name,” I asked. Matt Byrd. Strike two. It was going to take more than a “Byrd” to make me want to give up my maiden name, Rinehart. I wanted at least two syllables! “He drives a pick up truck,” she added. Well, I do like me a man who drives a pickup truck. “Sandra, thanks for thinking of me, but I’m not really looking for a relationship right now.” “Oh, well I kind of invited him to come listen to me and your mom sing this weekend. Margie said that you were coming home for a visit, so I guess you’ll get to meet him after all. I also told him we were all going out to your mom’s house for dinner afterwards.” Sigh. Obviously, the rest is history. Although, it took a couple more months for Matt and I to officially begin dating. Matt was already established in the whole adult-life thing, and was pretty leery about a long distance relationship with someone still in college. And there was also my other meddling aunt Becky. She invited “the perfect guy for me” to her Christmas party. But the ever-so-persistent-Sandra invited Matt to the same party. (I still don’t understand why my aunts thought I was so in need of a man already!) Have you ever worried about saying the wrong thing around someone? Maybe it’s an important interview for that job you have been wanting. Perhaps there’s a person in your life who you just never can seem to connect with the way that you hope. Or, maybe you are getting ready to meet the parents of someone you really care about. You may be racking your brain over the right thing to say. When you finally have the conversation, it may be a relief not to say anything necessarily “wrong,” but sometimes you still get this yucky feeling afterwards that the interaction did not go well. I even have some friendly relationships in which I often have that sinking feeling—something is off. Did I say the wrong thing? But in the case of that Christmas party, everything lined up perfectly. I wasn’t looking for a relationship. Matt showed up against his better judgment of dating someone who is in college, because there was something about me that stuck with him. The guy Becky invited seemed to think he was saying the right things by asking annoying questions. Knowing that I had just decided that I wasn’t going to go through with a teaching career, this guy suggested that maybe we should get a big picnic blanket with a basket full of food, and not leave until I figure out what I’m going to do with the rest of my life. Overhearing, Matt answered this creep to get him off my back, “She wants to open a coffee shop.” Ten thousand points. Not only had he been listening when we last met, but he actually took me seriously. Of course, Matt and I’s marriage wasn’t arranged in the way that we understand that custom. Most would call it being set up. But nonetheless, I am in an arranged marriage. It was arranged before the beginning of time, and I am still waiting to meet my Bridegroom. My aunts were both scheming to marry me off (again, I know not why!). But before the foundation of the world, the holy Father promised a people to his Son. The blessed Son agreed to the Father’s will, and to do the work to bring his people to glory. The Holy Spirit agreed to apply the Son’s work. And so Christ can say:

All that the Father gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me I will never cast out. For I have come down from heaven, not to do my own will but the will of him who sent me. And this is the will of him who sent me, that I should lose nothing of all that he has given me (John 6:37-40).

As Christians, we were sought after by a mighty King who became our compassionate Mediator. Not only has Christ done the work to bring us to himself, but even now we are being sanctified, made ready for that great Day. There’s no worrying about saying the wrong thing when out Bridegroom comes for us. We look forward to perfect unity applied by his Spirit as we finally get to behold the beatific vision, Jesus Christ himself. The perfect marriage was arranged in the covenant of redemption. In this, we also gain adoption by the heavenly Father.

Blessed be God the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him. In love he predestined us for adoption through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will, to the praise of his glorious grace, with which he has blessed us in the Beloved (Eph. 1:3-6).