I recently had a former student email me some questions she had. She was wrestling through things in that email, big questions about life and living as a woman in our culture, and something she wrote struck me like a bell. She said that our culture points to the belief that a woman’s wedding day–the day those vows are made at the altar–is the best day of your life.
She is single. She is wondering if she will have that day. But you know what she wrote me, what floored and humbled me?
She wrote that she is choosing to believe that the day she vowed her life to Jesus was the best day of her life.
Yes, I say in response. Yes and yes and yes again. And so, here is my response to her:
Yes, the day you gave your life to Jesus was the best day of your life. It always will be.
But first, you must come to terms with the fact that you have not had a wedding day. That day you long for–it was not that. You did not walk down any aisle draped in layers of white, and you did not have a hundred guests watching you pace in time with beautiful music. You did not lock your eyes with a man who had won your heart for months and years, with a man who had paid for a diamond that sparkled like fire on your hand.
You did not stand in front of a priest or a pastor and promise all faithfulness unto death, for richer or poorer, for better and worse.
You did not have a reception afterwards where you toasted and cut cake and danced and laughed and hugged.
You have not had any of that. I can offer no promises to you that you will have any of that before you die.
But here is what you have had, sister and friend. On that day when you gave your life to Jesus, whether you were four or fourteen or twenty-four: here is what did happen.
You walked down the aisle of your life covered, like me, in the rags of brokenness and shame. Thousands upon thousands of angels looked on and celebrated–God himself, in fact, celebrated your steps toward himself. You looked at the Man waiting for you there–the One who had been wooing you and had finally won your heart over months and years, the man who paid for your life not in diamonds but with his own blood.
You stood in front of him, both High Priest and Shepherd, and accepted him. And then he made promises to you–promises of faithfulness unto death, promises of giving you true riches, promises of never leaving or forsaking you.
And you left that moment clothed in his righteousness that covered–removed–all of those rags you had come to him with. You left as one washed clean and made pure.
The Great Reception is coming–a party that will surpass all others. There, you will share a cup with Him and there will be music and laughter and hugging so rich that all eternity will hardly be enough to contain it.
So yes, that day–that day when you gave your life to Jesus was the best day of your life. It was mine, too.
