He Restoreth My Soul

Saturday evening, I officiated Sarah and Mark’s wedding ceremony at the Adolphus Hotel, in Dallas, Texas. Here are the remarks I shared with them and their guests:

I have every person I marry write about themselves and this writing not only enables me to get to know them better but informs these very remarks. Sometimes what a couple writes is so deep, that these remarks almost write themselves. This is one of those cases.

Now, they start off seemingly contradicting each other. Mark says, “In all honesty, I wasn’t sure I ever wanted to marry again.” Sarah says, “I knew I always wanted to be married again.” LOL, one might exclaim.

However, I really think this is more of a Mars and Venus semantic kind of thing than a true contradiction, because when I was reading their essays and when I was talking to them about their story, a verse most of us are familiar with, whether Jewish or Christian or even neither, kept coming to mind, or rather a snippet of a verse. This verse is part of a Psalm that is often included in liturgy, and this snippet includes one of the words that shows up only once in the entire Hebrew Bible.

This snippet in Hebrew is “Nahfshee yishoveiv,” or as you may know it, “He restoreth my soul.” Because though on their surface Sarah and Mark seem to contradict each other, when we delve a little deeper into the rest of what they say, they say the same thing. What they did for each other was restore in each other the very idea of the institution of marriage and through that their souls.

Just listen to Mark’s comment in its full context: “In all honesty, I wasn’t sure I ever wanted to marry again. Then I met Sarah, and it’s important that she becomes my wife, because she is more to me than just my beautiful, sweet girl. She’s become my life, and I don’t want to imagine my life without her. I need her to be by my side for the rest of my life.  For the first time in any relationship I’ve ever been in, nothing I do with or for Sarah is an obligation or responsibility of being a boyfriend/husband. Rather, I want to make her happy. Her smile makes me feel fulfilled. I want that forever.”

And listen to Sarah’s comment in its full context: “Very shortly after meeting Mark I knew we had something special. He is the perfect balance to my sometimes uptight or stressed personality. His level headedness calms me… He helps bring me out of my shell. I knew I always wanted to be married again.  I always wanted to share my life with someone and have a companion that I feel safe and loved by and vice versa. Mark is that person for me. I love him more deeply then I knew possible… I look forward to our days together.” 

Sarah and Mark, what we wish for you is that you continue to experience together happiness that is emblematic of another word in that Psalm that shows up only once in the Hebrew Bible, “rivaya,” or as you may know it, “runneth over.”