I was one of the first of my friends to get married. My marriage is still young– we celebrated six years this June– but I’ve stood as a bridesmaid several times over for my friends who have been married since. Anyone who has been through the wedding planning process can relate that the process is full of self-imposed stress. And that stress has a way of making you forget the stuff that really, really matters about a wedding.

I think for every friend I have ever been a bridesmaid for, there was a moment where the pressure was high and they asked for a reality check. My best advice was always this: The biggest part of the wedding planning is already done. God has provided the man, and praise Him! Because without that piece, the day isn’t happening. Absolutely everything else could fall apart– the dress, the flowers, the food, and the DJ– but if the one that your soul loves is still in, the most important part is covered.

I have a books my mother in law bought me of famous hymns and spiritual songs, containing their hymnal sheet music, and the back story behind why the song was written. In one of the volumes of these books, there was a song that caught my eye: Lily of the Valley by Charles Fry.

Lily of the Valley is a pet name I have for my second-born daughter named Lily– who was born and lives in a valley town. Upon seeing the title, I had to flip to the song and pull up a rendition of it to hear.

“I have found a friend in Jesus, He's everything to me / He's the fairest of ten thousand to my soul / The lily of the valley and in Him alone I see / All I need to cleanse and make me fully whole”

Husbands and wives are addressed many times throughout the New Testament, and it seems that one doesn’t receive a command without the other. I find it interesting that when people bring up “Wives submit to your husbands,” there is not conversation in the same breath about a husband’s obligation to love his wife as if she were his own body. And that’s not some prosaic prattle from Paul to the Ephesians. He’s not giving the women a literal command to submit and then giving the men some flowery metaphor to live by. Sit and consider this with me for a moment: Paul commands husbands to love their wives as if they were a part of his own body. Not a thought, nor a suggestion. They are morally obligated to do so by scripture.