The first time she told me her “Hope Story” I had known her for a little over a year. She didn’t plan on telling it to me. We were sitting in her car talking about scones and indian fry bread, I think. I don’t know how,but one thing led to another and before we knew it we had been sitting in front of her house for two hours. Her story had many components similar to other native women from the reservation, and it contained things that, even from my jaded social work point of view, were hard to hear: abuse, neglect, addictions, brokenness and death. Her story was different though, because despite where she’d been and the hurt that she carried, she was filled with hope for the future and praised her Creator for bringing her from where she’d been and into new life. She spoke of her “rescue” and learning how to walk each day in new steps.
Since then her life has not been easy. Is life ever? She’s a single mom, working for a ministry and honestly trying to figure out how to reconcile things from her past with her new life. We have cried and laughed together. We have been angry and excited. We have shared secrets and sat quietly together. Last year she started dating a man and she has struggled with what this kind of relationship should look like in the context of her new life. Their journey has been filled with much joy and sorrow, but their strength through it all has been incredible.
This last Saturday I was privileged to be a part of the joining of two beautiful Hope Stories. Saturday my friend married her best friend who is an incredible native man who values her and has found beauty in what was once thought to be ashes. I have been in a lot of weddings(this one was number three in three months!) and I have never cried. I’m just not a wedding crier. Weddings are happy and full of joy. Saturday I cried; not because I was sad, but because the soverignty of it all was overwhelming. As they stood together saying their vows, I cried because their wedding symbolized so much more then two wonderful people finding love in each other. It symbolized more then new life and joy. Their wedding was living proof of grace, forgiveness and restoration. It was evidence that something broken can be turned to something beautiful. Their wedding stood alone as a Hope Story. It is what I envision the wedding analogy in scripture being. It said, “You think that you’re broken? You think that you’ve screwed up and have been used up? Well I don’t! And I want to give you the most wonderful thing you could imagine and I want to give it to you in all the ways you were told you couldn’t have it. And I’m not just going to stop there. I’m going to make you a living breathing example to everyone who ever hears your story, that you are beautiful through me and that I really do make all things new.”
Awesome.