No one expected this

Sunday was quite a day. Nick was off on a golf weekend. We normally go to church each Sunday, but I sometimes play hooky when Nick's away. Yesterday, I decided to go and Mollie, just home from her cruise, decided to come with me.

I’ve mentioned our minister before. Ann is a wonderful woman, intelligent, beautiful and somewhat sassy. She’s been at our church for five years now and I wrote about our first meeting here – go back and read that now if you have time.

She and her husband divorced when she came to us. He had said he’d come with her, but in the end chose not to. It was hard on her, but I feel it gave her lots of compassion. She was heart-broken when the Methodist church voted back in February not to allow gays full acceptance and membership. She herself, is very accepting, especially of LJ and Collin, and she is working to improved our church along those lines.

Sunday’s service was fine – very normal, until right at the end. She was giving the benediction when a man walked up the aisle. She halted, then froze as he stepped right up beside her. Turning to the congregation he said, “You may be seated.” Ann went down behind the podium, not even making it to the chair.

The man smiled and introduced himself as the pastor of the church about thirty minutes away. Then reaching down to help Ann stand, he told her, “Ann, you are absolutely the most beautiful woman in the world. I’ve known you for twenty years. It has been an honor and a privilege over the past few months to get to know you even better and,” he dropped to one knee, “I would be honored if you’d spend the rest of your life with me so I can get to know you even better.

After a pause, he said to her, “This is the part where you say something.”

Taking a deep breath, she proclaimed loudly, “Yes!”

We all applauded, absolutely thrilled for her. And her closest friend in the church – the one who knew all this was going to happen shouted, hallelujah!

I could see Ann was shaking, so overwhelmed. She turned to him and asked, “Can you do the benediction?” We all laughed a bit, few of us have ever seen Ann flustered.

He answered, “I’ll be happy to.”

Somehow that got me more than anything else. Ann’s a strong woman, all of us support her, but I’ve often worried that in her day to day life, no one really had her back. But this man does. You can feel it. Her simple request and his quick response of, ‘I’ll be happy to.’ let me know I could let go of this worry.  She has someone to talk to, someone who will listen. Someone who understands both the joys and problems of being a minister. She has someone to lean on – someone to love.

 It was a joyous Sunday morning.