Choose Joy
This was the devotion I gave at my daughter’s bridal shower last year. The theme is from a talk Michelle Duggar gave at a ladies’ tea, and I’m posting it now in honor of her continuing example of showing us how she chooses joy as she honors God by loving her husband and her children.
Daddy has always told his girls that every girl dreams of her wedding, but what she gets is a marriage. You have grown up with a sensible view of weddings, one that sees them as special celebrations of the gift of a covenant marriage, both solemn and joyous. Like so many things in this life, there is a godly tension between the seriousness of the vows you will make with Kyle and with God, and the fun festivities of the wedding feast. That’s where we will share a covenant meal with you both, topped off with wedding cake, a picture of the Feast we will share in Heaven with our Bridgegroom, Jesus.
But it’s still one day, then there is the rest of your life to share with your husband, and, Lord willing, the dozens of children he blesses you with, the ones I am already calling my little Wicklings.
There will be lots of feasts and celebrations in the Wick family. You know very well how to celebrate with gusto. Before we tore our house down, you used to get up every morning bright and early and wake us all up with your singing! Special times, though, will be punctuation marks in the mundane dailiness which you’ve heard me speak of often, and which we have lived together for 21 years. That’s where the rubber meets the road, so to speak. So I am speaking to you today not of romance, though we have talked of that together and I know you and Kyle will do well in your wooing after you are married. (more…)









