Dear friend,

As I was reading a reflection recently, I thought about how this global pandemic has kept many of us from celebrating and dancing at weddings. Some of us have missed mourning together in person at funerals.

Thousands of years ago, the prophet Jeremiah lamented the same: “… an end to the sound of mirth and gladness, the voice of the bride and bridegroom … you shall not go into the house of feasting to sit with them, to eat and drink … this whole land shall become a ruin and a waste.” Now, like then, a virus has imposed a huge silence among us.

But eventually, Jeremiah envisions a return of weddings as young people and their families bet on and invest in the future: “There shall once more be heard the voice of mirth and the voice of gladness, the voice of the bridegroom and the voice of the bride … give thanks to the Lord of hosts, for the Lord is good.”

What powerful images. Not of a far-away spiritual idea, but of the sights, the sounds, even the tastes and smells of the wedding celebration. Someday soon we will dance again!

We are not completely out of this pandemic yet, of course, and many of our Five Talents friends and partners around the world are still grappling with it, as they will be for months. But finally, just as Jeremiah wrote his song of thanks for what he knew would come, we also anticipate a new thing is coming.