But he'd found this

Jason and I had two very different church beginnings. I didn't grow up in church but started attending after I got saved at 19. He did grow up in church and has much of the background that goes with it. When we met, my Bible was in a well-loved, sorry state. It was falling apart, and there were entire sections that I could remove completely. We hadn't been together long when he gave me a Bible he had received many years before. He wasn't using it, but it had his name engraved on the cover, and I found this written on the inside...



Sweet, huh? I thought so too. And so, this book with his name on it became my Bible. Many others made their way into our home after we got married. We have quite the collection of different versions now, but this was still my first choice for a long while. It was misplaced when we moved here a little over a year ago, and I looked for it a few times after we first moved with no luck. Another Bible was purchased, and I haven't thought much about it in a long while.

Then came Monday with our flooded basement and met me with something to treasure again. A couple of names and a few question marks scrolled in a Bible. Things were lost on Monday. Jason and I both lost things that we loved as children and carried with us into adulthood. In the middle of that, something else was preserved. At some point in the early afternoon, Jason made his way up the stairs and presented that Bible to me once again. His words were blurred as I really took in the sight of something I'd held in my arms so many times before. He'd just thrown out a box of books all ruined by the waters, but he'd found this at the bottom. Dry. Not wet. Not damp. Dry. At the bottom. He held it out to me, and I took it in my arms again, opening it to the page I'd seen so many times before.

My list of valuables here is short. There are things that matter to me that won't turn my world upside down when they're gone. In this life, things are lost and stolen all the time. But Monday, God gave something back to me that I'd lost in a way that meant so much more than if I had just found that box a year ago. On Monday, we had a flood. It was followed by a promise, and what we lost couldn't make me happier than what was found.