HIS STEPS ARE ORDERED—

I dedicate my post to my husband of fifty-three years, father of my four children; I love him with passion. He doesn’t read my posts, so I can tell you, I bought him a card that says the steps of a good man are ordered by the Lord, and he delighteth in his way (Psalm 37:23). He’s gonna love the card. I know him.

Tomorrow is Father’s Day. My Daddy went to heaven in February of 1998. His death left a big hole in my heart. I could only imagine what it did to my mother. They were so close. Sometimes I look at my husband and I think I’m looking at my father. The once straight, now slightly stooped shoulders, the white hair brushed with every strand in place. I heard his voice crack today and he shed a little tear, something he rarely does. It gave new meaning to the old saying, “real men do weep.”  For he’s a real man. One of the greatest men I’ve ever known. Oh, sure, I’m prejudice because he has been my man since I was sixteen years old. He turns seventy-three this year. He has the normal aches and pains of one getting on up in years, walks a little stiff when he gets up after sitting a bit, and gives in to that hip that has caused him pain since he was a teenager. His steps don’t come as easily as they used to.  But in the morning when I wake, he’s already up, making coffee, Bibles out and on the counter where we sit to read the Scriptures together and separately. It’s a way of life for us. Our comfortable place. Side by side. He’s still got a lot of preach in him, and most mornings he already has something for me by the time I get there. “Do you remember reading this?” or “I found something brand new today.” Of course he has read it before, but it was more relevant today than yesterday. More pressing, more needful.

I think a lot about what will happen when one of us leaves in death if the Lord tarries. We’re just two years apart in age, so it could go either way. I almost lost him once and I find myself being very protective of him, though he doesn’t need that from me. He’s awfully independent. Nevertheless, I watch after him just like he watches after me. He doesn’t have to know it. That’s just the way it is after all these years. About the Father's Day card. When my Dad was living, I never, ever missed giving him a card for Father’s Day. Oh, he expected it, and I don’t know what he would have done if he hadn’t received nine Father’s Day cards and one from Mother, too. We used to love to watch him stack the twenty dollar bills neatly, grinning, shaking out the cards. Anyway, I found this verse written by Charles Jefferys that goes like this:

We have lived and loved together
Through many changing years;
We have shared each other's gladness
And wept each other's tears.
And let us hope the future,
As the past has been will be:
I will share with thee my sorrows,
And thou thy joys with me.

Happy Father's Day, Sweetheart!
For the fifty-third time since you looked like this!






Posted by Jane Bennett Gaddy
House Not Made With Hands
iUniverse 2007