It's a paraphrase of Genesis 50:20; "You intended to harm me, but God intended it for good to accomplish what is now being done, the saving of many lives."
Christians take from Romans 8:28 as well: "And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose."
This past summer, my husband and I witnessed the power of those verses played out in a wedding ceremony that shouldn't have happened. And one to which we should have never have been invited.
Let me explain. The bride involved was not a bride from our shop but rather, like my daughter, an unfortunate victim of sexual abuse by the same man.
Prior to the start of the investigation that led to this man's arrest, this girl's family and ours went way back, connected by the mutual "friendship" with the man's family. Although the families got together from time to time, our two families never really associated together without the other couple.
We discovered, during the police investigation, that the couple had managed over the years, to keep all of the couples (involved with the case) from associating with each other separately, by telling lies and half-truths (about each of us) to the other couples. We had tolerated one another for the sake of the kids.
When our family and this girl's family were thrust together into the same nightmare, something unexpected happened. It wasn't "the enemy of my enemy is my friend" kind of reaction, but rather the realization that what we had believed about each other for so long, had been wrong.
There grew to be mutual understanding and support for each other as (together) we dealt with the humiliation and embarrassment of being deceived by two people whom we trusted.
Over the course of the four years since the investigation, the silence that had been created between this girl's family and our family had been replaced by the chatter of frequent phone calls and text messages to see how each other was doing.
Then it came...the invitation requesting our presence at the wedding ceremony of the couple's beloved daughter.
The very same daughter who, at the sentencing hearing of the man who molested her, was just a tiny shell of a human being, with no light in her eyes. We all cried in that courtroom as this girl, through her tears, told the judge how she didn't want to live anymore.
Now, this same girl, who four years ago, had to break-up with her boyfriend because she couldn't stand to be touched, had come far enough in her recovery to let love in again.
So there Cliff and I were, guests at a wedding that shouldn't have been, had the devil won.
Rather, there we were, eating and laughing with the bride's parents, hugging and wishing the newlyweds all the best in the world...and knowing that the only tears shed that day were happy tears.
