Photo and Commentary ©2025 by Shelley Schurch
Sunday, May 18, 2025
I’ve shown you this weather vane before; it’s one we see at least once a day as we tread our neighborhood trail. But this week I looked at it with “anniversary eyes.”
On Wednesday we celebrated our 47th wedding anniversary. I type those words calmly, yet with astonishment. It seems only a few years ago that our families and friends traveled by plane, car, and bus to witness our wedding vows. We pledged our love and loyalty with eyes wide open, but we were still blind to all that would befall us – banes and blessings – as the years rolled on.
I remember hunkering down together in our living room last November as a ferocious storm roared outside. This storm didn’t take us by surprise; we’d been warned that a “bomb cyclone” would hit our area.
We’d never heard that phrase before, and we’d never experienced such severe winds before. They buffeted our house for hours. We prayed for the winds to stop, we prayed for our roof to stay attached, and for no trees to fall on it, or branches to blow through our windows. We prayed for all our neighbors, and for the whole region being pounded and pummeled so relentlessly.
Finally the winds moved on. We had survived, roof and windows intact. We had weathered the storm. We had weathered the weather!
How aware of and thankful we were that the “we” did not refer to just the two of us, but also to the Lord who heard our prayers and was in the middle of the storm with us, holding us safe.
That’s how we’ve weathered all the storms of life these last 47 years, facing them together, and asking the Lord to be in our midst, to provide and guide. The two of us and the Trinity, we’re walking Home together.
I looked again at my weather vane photo, and laughed. I realized that in focusing on the WE letters, I’d not paid any attention to what was fastened above them: a horse and buggy. A snatch of an old song floated into my mind: “Love and marriage, love and marriage, go together like a horse and carriage . . . ”
Although I don’t suppose they always do. I’m glad that all those years ago when we said, “I do,” they did – and that they still do!
Thanks be to God, giver of all good gifts.