Knot Just One

August was a busy month for me this year.  We started off with a big carnival production at church that consumed much of my time for the 2 short weeks that we had to put it together and pull it off.  That was followed closely by my 10th wedding anniversary, and then a 9 day family vacation in no-man's-land near Paradise, MI (delightful, but quite the packing extravaganza) and we returned a mere 38 hours before I had to have my oldest daughter at the bus stop, starting public school for the first time (second grade) AND home-schooling my kindergartener while my 2 littlests tear my house to shreds.  There was also soccer registration, reading group sign-up, ballet enrollment and tuition deadlines, doctor's appointments and the usually housework and groceries....  But the most stressful thing BY FAR that I have had to deal with lately has been sending my biggest girl off to school.  

 That week was full of physical, mental and emotional stress for all of us as we adjusted to the new routine, and fear on my part as she ventured out into a peanut contaminated world with her Epi-Pen at her side, but without me there to protect her.  It all got me thinking (look out). 

10 years ago I didn't just "Tie the knot" as they say.  I don't think that, in any successful marriage, you can simply tie THE knot.  It's not just one.  One knot can't hold you together through stuff like this (and the other things that we've come through and the much BIGGER stuff that we will face in the future).  Your wedding ceremony is just the FIRST knot.   That’s a BIG DAY!  It’s the FIRST DAY of your entire future together, and you stand there at the alter stringing two lives together with a tight bond that matches it’s metaphor well.  You tie a knot.  It's undoubtedly the one that starts them all, the one that none of the others can do without, and you could certainly argue that it's the one that is the MOST important.  It says, before God and men, "I love you and I promise to always be with you." But it can't stand alone for long.  Each trial that your marriage comes through ties another.  When you graduate college and tackle the job search, when you move to a new home, when you face failures (that WILL come), when you find out you're going to be a parent for the first time, when you fight like only two people who love one another passionately can... and then apologize and more forward... each one ties a new little knot, a little further down the line, but connected all the same.  Knots that say “I still love you,” and “I’m still here.”  

Then you welcome your first baby, you change careers, you face financial hardships and deaths in the family, and your baby becomes a big sister... and still you keep tying.  It's the little things, those knots.  The dinner on the table after a long day.  The date night that you set up at home after bedtime.  The hug when it's needed the most.  The "thank you."  The "I'm sorry."  Suddenly you find that you have a little net.  It's stronger than the lone knot.  It can hold more.  It can stand up to bigger things.  You buy a house, baby 3 comes along, and you keep tying. Knots of “Hang in there, we’ll get through this.” and “Look what we did!” and “You were right, I was wrong.”  Stringing them together, knot after knot.  Sacrifices for one another, that reinforce your net.  You buy a new car, you get a promotion, you start home-schooling... and keep tying.  “Let’s do this together, I’ll help you.”   Your net is able to handle these bigger changes/stresses that are thrown at it.  Baby 4 comes along, you drop into bed exhausted at the end of every day.  And still you keep tying knots.  “We’re a team.”  And your net grows.  

It grows strong enough to hold back the temptations, the heartaches and pain of a fallen world.  All that life throws at us, our net can stand against.  So that, when we're staring down a week of highly stressful changes like the one we just came through, we know that it will hold.  We will have the little things to deal with, the stuff that slips though the holes; lunches to pack, school clothes to wash, fears to conquer, confidence to build, routines to adjust...  but those are the opportunities for new knots, and we don't have to worry about the big stuff.   Because the big stuff isn’t as big as what we’ve built (with God’s help and direction for sure) for ourselves.  

Just by tying little knots.  Every.  Single.  Day.