A Walk Down The Aisle

There’s a girl. She’s only known one kind of love for most of her life. Actually, she is in chains to it. She is not free to fully embrace any other kind of love.

It’s no one’s fault. It’s a lot of circumstances and things happening behind the scenes. In fact, she doesn’t even know she is chained to this one way of love.

She knows that there is greater love out there. She has experienced it throughout her life. But she doesn’t know there is something in the way of her fully embracing and experiencing this love that she was created for.

One day, someone asks her a question. And that question penetrates to her soul. She starts weeping. She is beginning to understand that she is chained in this love. And it’s not the love she was meant for. It’s actually not love at all.

Because love brings freedom and life. Love is sacrificial. It does not chain you up.

So how does she find freedom from the chains of this thing she thought was love? She needs to cut the chains. And she has been given a powerful sword to do it with. All she needs to do is cut them.

But… she is not ready.

The One whom this greater love comes from looks softly at her and says, “Do not worry my dear one. I will sit with you until you are ready.”

He starts to give her visions.

Visions of His son walking her down the aisle toward Him. His Son is her safe space. And He knows that.

She sees His Son slowly and tenderly walking her down the aisle. She knows it will finish at the end of aisle with her cutting off the chains and leaving them with the Son as He hands her off to her Father.

But she feels no rush to get to that point. She knows that the Son will walk as fast or as slow as she needs to. He will sit with her when she needs to sit, and He will run with her when she wants to run.

While He is walking her down the aisle, He sends other people to speak truth and life into her. He sends other people to be the love to her that He gives.

But she has been scared to accept that love. To receive it as His. She has been scared of falling back into seeking love from others instead of Him. She has been scared to risk.

So she has been rejecting the gifts He has been sending her. She does not feel free to receive, so she rejects.

How will she find freedom to receive? Freedom to be loved? Freedom to be who she was created to be?

A cry utters in the night. “Papa. Help her.”

He responds, “Receive my child. Receive.”

Now… she is at a loss. A complete loss. She has finally let go. She has cut the chains. She has opened her heart to receive.

But where does she go from here? Is she at the end of the aisle? Is the throne room in front of her? Will she be seated with the Prince at the right hand of the King?

She doesn’t know. All she knows is the peace surrounding her in this darkness.

The walk has slowed to a crawl. She feels like she’s walked this part of the aisle before. Yet, it feels different. It’s deeper. Farther than she’s ever been before.

She doesn’t like what is being brought to the surface as she walks deeper into the journey down the aisle. She thinks it makes her unqualified to be at the point of depth that she’s at.

So she puts up walls. She stops the walk. And stands there. Trying to figure out what is going on and where she should be. She tries to bring up the past and use that as a guide marker. It doesn’t work.

She tries to look at what others are doing and use that as a guide marker. That doesn’t work either.

She cannot seem to find any marker. She feels like she is going in circles. Round and round. Not moving forward and not moving backward. She’s exhausted. Still at a complete loss.

Until someone helps her to stop. It’s a friend. And this friend helps her see that she has not actually fully let go of all the chains. She cut them, but she has not let go of them.

She cries. She thought she had made it farther than she was. But no condemnation comes from her friend. Only love and encouragement. Only hope and life.

And now she feels free. Free to accept where she is at on the journey down the aisle. And free to love where she is at. Free to not try to be anywhere else on the journey but where the Son has her.

So, she has started walking down the aisle again. Except now it is more of a skip. There’s freedom to explore. Freedom to create.

She’s learning how to discover who she really is. Without any influence except from the One who created her.

She realizes she does not know what is at the end of the aisle. She doesn’t know how the journey will end or who she will be.

But all she can think about is her Father cheering her on. Looking with hope, life, and encouragement in His eyes for her.

So she decides to trust Him fully.

And she starts to remember. She starts to remember all the times He has been so kind to her and so gentle with her.

All the times He has called her forth and lavished His love on her.

And suddenly she is running down the aisle. Running to her Father. She arrives at the end and falls in His arms.

And as she rests in His loving embrace, she sees who she will be. She sees that who she will be is actually who she is right now. Because she is seeing herself with her Father’s eyes.

And He sees who she will be and who she is now. To Him there is no difference. She is love and peace and beauty and she is enough. Right now. She is His Holy Daughter whose inheritance is and always has been within her grasp.

All she needs to do is receive. Receive His sight, for her and for the world. Receive her inheritance. Receive the love.

She turns back to the Son and asks, “Will you do life with me? Will you help me to keep my sight in Him and nothing else? So that I can see this love and live from it for the rest of my life?”

He looks so tenderly into her eyes and responds, “I thought you’d never ask.”

All of the sudden He is on one knee, offering her the love she’s been longing for all her life. This love, THIS is the love that she was created for. And now she is fully free to receive it.

Receive. That is all she has to do. That is all she has ever had to do. Receive what she was created for and who she was created to be.

The Father calls her attention past His Son back down the aisle. She sees the places they have walked and the things they walked through. And not just recently, but her whole life.

And she sees all of them (the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit) in EVERY moment of her life. Right next to her. Even when she couldn’t see them or feel them. They were right there with her.

They have always been beckoning her forward into their love. Beckoning her forward as a bride. A beautiful bride clothed in majesty. Their bride.

She turns back to the Son and together they turn to the Father. To the altar.

She is clothed in white. The Son as well.

She commits to always come back to Him and His love. She commits to trust Him and His love. When things get hard and dark, when she feels like she’s lost her way, she will come back and hold onto His love for her.

He commits to never leave her. He commits to always lead her down the path of life. And He commits to always love her. Because that is what she was created for.

The Father smiles. He’s been wanting this for His daughter for such a long time. He blesses His Son and Daughter. Brought together in union under His love.

And now she will journey through life as a bride. The bride of Christ.

It’s a new way of living. A different way. But its more beautiful than she could have ever imagined. And each day as a bride is more beautiful than the last.

Sometimes she forgets that she is a bride. Sometimes she forgets that she is CHOSEN. But her groom never fails to reminds her.

He never fails to help her find her way back to the Tree of Life. And so she will do the same for others. For the rest of her life.