Time to assemble the troops

“Every soldier must know, before he goes into battle, how the little battle he is to fight fits into the larger picture, and how the success of his fighting will influence the battle as a whole.”
Bernard Law Montgomery

Not exactly the troops you had imagined?
This is the assembling of S&P Battalion–as in the salt and pepper shakers for the tables.
Oh, did I not tell you, the rehearsal dinner is at Churchill’s, Number 10 Downing?
Hence why Winston is driving down with me today.
Hence the Union Jack
Hence the Pimms Cup
Hence the army of the Queen’s Guard on the tables. . .

And as I prepare to go into what seems to be a battle of coordination, strategizing and organizing, this small battle will have but a minuscule influence to the situation of the Whole—as in the union of two becoming one.

This is a but a small step in the life long commitment taken on by two young individuals.
It will be a mission filled with triumphs as well as setbacks.. .
Joys countered with sorrows.
Success met by failure.
Heartache breached by wonderment–

It will be a rocky path littered with obstacles yet the bond that is forged in the furnace of life of a journey taken by two, makes for the sweetest life one can hope for.

There will be work.
There will be tears.
There will be tests.
The will be seemingly insurmountable trials.
and there will be
Tenderness
Support
Comfort
Caring
Union
Hope
Joy
Peace
and there will be
Love . . .

If I speak in the tongues of men or of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. If I give all I possess to the poor and give over my body to hardship that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing.

Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.

Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away. For we know in part and we prophesy in part, 10 but when completeness comes, what is in part disappears. When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put the ways of childhood behind me. For now we see only a reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.

And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.
1 Corinthians 13