Dearly Beloved

When I was a newly-minted, fresh out of seminary pastor, and about to do my first wedding with my mentor, he went over some of the changes he had made to the traditional service over his time in ministry.  The first one was that he had changed the greeting from "Dearly Beloved" to "Friends in Christ".  "Nobody uses that kind of language anymore," he argued.  "My wife and I don't ever call each other 'Beloved'."  He was younger then than I am now.  And while I adapted his changed greeting for a long time, I have come to believe that this was one of the few things he was wrong about.  For "beloved" is an important term, a useful styling, an expression of a relationship that goes far beyond friendship.

Beloved - the people whose presence brings you to tears of joy. 
Beloved - the people you seldom see, but who hold your heart in theirs.
Beloved - the people you might not hear from but once a year, yet you are so glad to get that Christmas letter.
Beloved - the people with whom you worship, sing, cook, pray, eat on a regular basis.

These are more than friends.  They are sometimes closer than family.   Blood is thicker than water, but love is thicker than blood.  There is a bond of love forged hard as steel - you forgive their foibles even if you can't laugh at them. You trust them with your heart, your hopes, your pain, your fears. 

Sometimes we call someone a friend when they're actually more of an acquaintance than a friend.  But a true friend is beloved.  They are there for the long haul and you are there for them.  When you think of them you feel that "ping" in your heart.  What matters to them matters to you, even when it doesn't matter to you.  They are those friendships that exist out of time - the ones where even if you haven't seen, talked with, or written to each other for years, when you get together you know each other as if you had been together just yesterday.  You listen deeply to each other.

They are your dearly beloved.

One can only hope that your life partner falls into that group.  It makes life a whole lot easier if they do, at least I suppose so, because I cannot imagine being married to someone I did not love dearly. 
More on that next time.