Today, my wife and i celebrate ten years of marriage. It's quite something really. There isn't much else in life that we have done for that long (besides living, breathing, eating and the like.) As we sat sipping coffee, exchanging gifts and reflecting on our marriage, we slipped into thought regarding the passage of time.

On that day those two twenty-one year old kids looked into each other's eyes and pledged their lives they could not have imagined what it would be like to stare into the same eyes ten years later. But it happened.

The passage of time fascinates me. I can remember moments of my life in which i would realize an inevitable event. For example, high school graduation (assuming i continued passing my classes!) As a freshman, i knew it would happen, and yet it felt so far away that it seemed impossible! But the day came. And how surreal it was dressing in that cap and gown, looking around at my classmates knowing that we were sharing the same bizarre sensation. All we had known was over, and all we had imagined was immediately ahead.

Even weeks, at their onset, i can't imagine them passing; but they do. From Monday, Friday seems so far away, and here we find ourselves on Thursday. That just happened. It comes, it goes. And all things are unavoidably hurtling towards beauty.

"He has made everything beautiful in its time. Also He has put eternity in their hearts..." Ecclesiastes 3:11

As my wife and i remembered our beautiful years we also recalled some sorrowful moments. Those too have passed. And it struck me that the passage of time is in fact quite merciful; for there are some seemingly unbearable moments. They come, they go, and they, like all other things, must submit to the demand of God to work together for good, for beauty to those in love with Him.

When immersed in the aweful moment, it seems impossible that it will ever pass. I have had times of pain in which i went to sleep haunted by the thoughts of the unbearable brokenness, and to my dismay, they were there to greet me in the morning. Every day seems the same. The colors of life are dimmed and the variatiuon of emotion is diminished by this one droning tone. You cry. You pray. It doesn't go away. And then one day, almost without notice, it has slipped past you. Mercies are new.

As we discussed these things, we could not help but arrive at the ultimate graduation, the wedding celebration of all the ages, the one event that we are most sure of and yet seems the most impossible. It's real. It's actually coming. We will remember these times in which it existed only in our imagination, and, imagination will become realization. We will see Him. We'll hear the tone of His voice. We'll look into those eyes that we have seen so many times inside. He'll look into ours, and see the tears; not just saline secreted by glands in the skin: He'll stare into our soul and see the pain, the unbearable, the impossible. He'll see the confusion, and the unanswered questions, the "Why did You?" and the "Why did You not?" These things that we resolved to press past though they themselves remained unresolved in the records of the heart. And in a moment, a real moment, with His hand He will wipe these all away.

The passage of time is really quite merciful. It moves us ever closer to that moment. No one, nothing can resist it. All the ills and wrongs in the world must submit to this: the inevitable beauty and goodness that is to appear when He comes.