To my son on his wedding day

My son got married today.

It wasn't the beautiful November wedding he and his fiancee had planned. That will still happen as a celebration of their love, but Virgile is leaving for Washington, D.C., in less than two weeks to start his career in the U.S. Foreign Service and he wanted to take Sterling with him as his wife.

We have come to know her well over the three years they have been dating, and we have seen how good they are for each other.

Things got rather hectic on our way to the courthouse in Lancaster, the only one within a reasonable distance that could fit them in. Our brand-new car conked out a few miles short of its destination, and we took a cab the rest of the way.

I didn't really have a chance to talk to my son about marriage, which disappointed me a little. We have had so many good conversations about life and what to expect. We even had the sex talk that so many fathers and sons struggle with.

I have seen marriage from both sides, from a failed one in my twenties to a good one that is coming up on 17 years this fall, so I probably wouldn't presume to give him much personal advice.

I actually would rather tell him about love, and I've never known a better description of love than Paul's first letter to the Christians at Corinth. Here's the famous excerpt from what he wrote in 1 Corinthians 13:

"Love is patient and is kind; love doesn’t envy. Love doesn’t brag, is not proud, doesn’t behave itself inappropriately, doesn’t seek its own way, is not provoked, takes no account of evil; doesn’t rejoice in unrighteousness, but rejoices with the truth; bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never fails."


I learned those lessons about love from a wonderful person -- Virgile's mother and my wife. Nicole is the most loving person I have ever known and God granted me the greatest blessing of all when he allowed me to meet her on Sept. 12, 1992.

She and our two wonderful children from her first marriage, Virgile and his older sister Pauline, have brought awe and wonder, grace and meaning to my existence. I have fallen short of glory so many times, including today when the car broke down and I lost my temper, but Nicole's love epitomizes all the best characteristics of the words in the Bible.

She will always be the best person I know, my favorite person in the world.

So the best blessing I can give our son on the day of his wedding is this:

"May you be as good a husband as you possibly can, and may you have a wife as loving and as wonderful as your mother."