Mission Accomplished

One year ago today, Christen, my wife of 6 1/2 years, passed away after a brief but intense battle with brain cancer. Writing that sentence took about 30 seconds, but the weight of it has reverberated through each of the last 365 days. I'll write a post tomorrow about the things I've learned in the past year. For this post, I want to focus on the impact of her life.

Christen's mission statement read: "To live a Bible-saturated, Christ-exalting life to the glory of God and for the joy of all people."

Christen's focus in life was always that God would receive glory from all people, that all would come to know Him and His love and His peace and His rest. That people would find their meaning in Him, and that they would be satisfied only and perfectly in Him. She wanted men to honor God with their worship and sacrifice and service and provision and leadership. She wanted women to glorify Him with their hearts and their minds, to find their identity in Him and not in worldly (read: empty) opinions, to be confident in Christ. She desired that the Church would take her place as the spotless Bride of Christ - but in so doing she would get her hands dirty with those less fortunate and in need. She wanted people to truly engage each other in relationship, knowing that it would be messy and fulfilling all at once.

She fostered an environment of hospitality in our home. To a person, and to this day, whenever someone steps foot in our 3-bedroom, typical Chicago style apartment, they say, 'This just feels like home.' Christen was a great designer, to be sure, but the feeling goes beyond the decor. The atmosphere of this place says, 'Welcome. Here, you will be loved.' She invited people into our home frequently, knowing that it would be messy with the activity of two imaginative children, noisy and at play and demanding attention. And people accepted the invitation for the opportunity to see a woman sold out for her Lord, opening her life to them and honestly answering their questions. She gave guidance and counsel in this home. She spoke the Word in this home. She exercised grace and love for the benefit of those who crossed our threshold.

Christen was one of the few people I have ever met that honestly put to death her fear of man. This was a work of grace from God that took a few years, but before she passed she spent nearly 2 years in absolute freedom from the cares and concerns of trying to please people for the sake of increasing her own reputation and pride. She had such a confidence in who God had created her to be that it didn't matter what this or that person thought. She knew she was dead-center in the will of God, and she was therefore unshakable. As her  husband, I was consistently amazed and inspired by her. And there is a lesson to be learned from this: these years of freedom were also marked by her most effective years of ministry and her greatest growth in influence. This is not a formula for gaining stature. It's a validation of the biblical principle that when you follow hard after Christ, He brings an increase. The best part? She had no idea. She just went after Him, and He gave weight to her words and actions.

I've written elsewhere about her as a mother and a wife, as did she in her own blogging, so I won't spend a lot of time on that here. It will suffice to say that she was a loving and gracious mother who adored her children while not spoiling them. She loved, laughed, played, taught, corrected, restored, repented for and to, prayed, sang, and generally encouraged Audrey and Hudson with the intentionality of one who knew she was training world-changing disciples. As a wife, she loved me well no matter what mood I was in or what the present circumstances of our life were. She respected me and built me up, strengthening me to a point where even the hard things of life became not only manageable but enjoyable.

Since her passing, not a week has gone by where I haven't received a fresh word regarding how Christen's life has impacted a person, a marriage, a mother, or a church. Some realized they were asleep at the wheel, woke up, and have turned their lives around. Others saw the peace she maintained in all circumstances, didn't understand why, read her blog, and had their hearts opened to Christ and His saving grace. Married couples renewed their commitments to one another, vowing not to take for granted any moment they had to share with one another. Mothers looked on the raising of their children with greater grace and fervor. Church leaders saw how one life, however brief, could impact so many and took their leadership to new levels in God. Bibles were opened that had been shut for years. Church seats were filled that had been vacant. Prayers were prayed that had previously been silent.

And we who remain, we issue forth praise from our mouths to a great God who honored us with the privilege of knowing and learning from this great woman!

A Love Song

I have spent this entire month trying to think of what to say on this day. Normally, I can come up with a few ideas, a phrase, even a key word, that will spark enough of something to get my mind and emotions together in order to express the message I desire. I have even taken these last few weeks 'off' from writing in anticipation of writing this post. The day is rapidly drawing to a close; it's 11:27 on the anniversary of my wedding, and I just came to this realization:

There aren't words.

There aren't lonely enough words to express how deeply I miss my wife.

There aren't sufficient celebratory words to communicate the beauty of the marriage we shared.

There isn't a sensual enough vocabulary to describe the intimacy of truly knowing her the way I knew her.

For perhaps the first time in my life, I am at an actual loss for words. I have used that expression many times, but inevitably I follow it up with something clever or witty or insightful or inspiring. I don't know if I'll be able to do any of that here.

I wanted to find a way to tell you all what an astonishing woman Christen was. I wanted to communicate the depth of her beauty, the ferocity of her loyalty, the sweetness of her smile, the song-like quality of her voice, the way her fingers fit in mine, the way she loved the Lord, me, the kids, family, friends, strangers, everyone. I wanted just the right phrasing and prose and poetry so that you would know - like I knew - how a marriage founded and rooted and grown in the Lord can blossom into an ever-increasing adventure of faith, hope, and love.

I couldn't come up with it. I thought about sharing stories from past anniversaries. I considered writing about the grace of a biblical marriage. I toyed with the idea of expanding on the post I wrote on her birthday, re-enumerating all of Christen's exceptional qualities and how she loved me so well as a wife. I thought I had hit on it when I remembered Song of Songs 5:16 - this is my beloved, and this is my friend - as that effectively defined our marriage.

Nothing felt right.

Today, I read a couple of her journals and the letters she had written me over the years. The first time I did this, I was deeply grieved because 1) her writing has stopped, and she was so good at it and 2) I wanted to love her more and better than I had up to that point. In rereading them today, I was encouraged. God gave me the grace to love her well, in spite of myself, and she saw and appreciated it - and she returned to me her grace-given love, which I will always cherish.

Yet even in all of her writings, I could not find the words to properly tell our story. Perhaps there are too many words and too little space to try to tell it all. Perhaps they are just inadequate words.

Ultimately, Christen provided the solution for me, as she did so frequently in our time together. There was a song that she felt defined our love. I share it with you in the hopes that you will celebrate with me this day - the day I married the most beautiful woman I've ever known.

A Beautiful Inconvenience

There are two lies that have been popularized in our culture regarding marriage. The first is that marriage is simply about how two people feel about each other. They're 'in love', so they get married - of course! Just like all the fairy tales, the princess stories, the hero saving the damsel, the Richard Gere getting the Julia Roberts, the 'you had me at hello'. Love is something you fall into, and marriage is where you land.

The second is that there's always an out - just get divorced.

A quick note on the above point: There is acceptable, biblical precedent for divorce and remarriage. I am not condemning all divorce as ungodly. However, 'I just don't love him/her anymore' isn't one of the precedents. Which brings me to why I'm writing this at all.

Here's a truth that needs to be accepted in order to begin to overcome the two lies mentioned above:

Marriage is inconvenient.


Okay, I actually heard your sharp intake of breath just now. Calm down, and I'll explain. Think about it for a moment - you're a sinner and so is your spouse (or soon-to-be spouse). Unlike in math, two negatives in this case don't make a positive. In fact, each partner's sin is going to be thrown into sharp relief when exposed by the other. Nothing reveals our innate selfishness more than getting married - until you have children (which is a completely separate post). Prior to marriage, you were concerned with you, ultimately. With a spouse you are concerned with 'we'. Consequently, you must give things up daily for the sake of the other. Hot water in the shower, time in the bathroom, sheets on the bed, space on the couch, your preferences, your pride. And that's hard and difficult and uncomfortable and frustrating. Why can't you just 'win'? Here's the honest truth: marriage doesn't 'fix' anything - it unhinges everything, puts the pieces on the floor like so much IKEA ware, and asks you and your spouse to put it all back together again.

And it is a uniquely beautiful expression of God's grace.

This post was sparked by a video I saw via Desiring God, found here. It tells the story of a woman who, in spite of her husband's disability, has chosen to marry him and live a life of love and inconvenience. It is a remarkable story, and it is the kind of story we should use to inform our daughters and sons rather than what we see in culture.

This will not be easy for me to say, but I'm freewriting at this point, and so I hope you will bear with the rawness of it.

Christen dealt with me graciously for 6 1/2 years. I freely confess that I'm not the easiest person to live with. I read Gary Chapman's Five Love Languages, and I had 2 primary languages and a third just behind them. In other words, I'm high maintenance. I'm needy. All the time. And Christen had me figured out. I've never felt more trusted, respected, and loved than when I was with her. Even when she started getting sick, she would say how sorry she was that she couldn't take care of me the way she wanted to. And I thought, 'No, it's my turn now.'

We only really had two days to process what was happening from the MRI to the biopsy. For the sake of being able to make sound decisions in the midst of varied advice from friends, family, and doctors, we focused on taking each step one at a time. Therefore, we weren't thinking too far beyond just what was next. Still, we did talk. She was scared but determined. We talked about the reality that when the doctors said 'aggressive treatment', they meant chemotherapy. Intense chemotherapy. That meant her whimsical, ever-changing hair was going to fall out. And she said, 'No wigs.' She said she'd be bald and strong and creative with scarves (as ever). We discussed that her going through this would stand as a testimony to the sustaining power of God.

In this moment, as we were facing the potential of a brutal battle with a particularly vicious form of brain cancer, I learned the most valuable and important lesson I'll ever learn about marriage:

Christen was never more beautiful than when she was lying in her hospital bed, unshowered, gown on, electrodes glued to her head, unreservedly and unashamedly declaring the glory and grace of God in our lives.

Yes, marriage is an inconvenience, but oh! how beautiful an inconvenience it is.