For Janice and me, tomorrow (Sunday August 19, 2018) marks our fiftieth wedding anniversary. As always, we’ll be in church on Sunday, so this year’s anniversary outing was on a Saturday. We both love art and Turkish food, so we partook generously of both today. We spent the day at the Saint Louis Art Museum [SLAM] then went to Sheesh, a Turkish restaurant down near Saint Louis University. We’ll definitely return to both places—in the case of SLAM, I imagine over and over again.

Janice and I have actually been together for fifty-six years, because we became an item when we were thirteen. Neither of us ever had another sweetheart. I joke, “If you don’t like how I turned out, you should have raised me better.” To which she responds, “You’ve always been a difficult child.” Seriously, we did rather raise each other—after we found each other. We dreamed our dreams together at an early age; we said, “I do” at a young age; and we’ve walked together for about six decades. For the two of us, it’s “’till death do us part.”

Another phrase of those vows was “in sickness and in health”; and these last twenty months have at long last exercised that clause. Both of us have faced serious health challenges, although I believe we can say we’ve put the worst of it behind us. And in the thick of those challenges, we’ve each told the other more than once, “I don’t know what I would have done without you.” I know that sentiment was heartfelt when I said it, and I heard that same conviction in Janice’s voice when she said it while I sat with her in doctors’ offices, “nuclear medicine” dungeons, and beside hospital beds.

I posted a bit on Facebook a few minutes ago, saying, “We’ve been good to each other and good for each other.” We’ve been resolute at that, and what’s marked our history together should mark the rest of our years together, as God enables us.

Thanks be to God—and to the wife of my youth. And as the “Theologizer,” I believe what I’ve just written is sound theology, certainly good practical theology.