THE IMPORTANCE OF BEING THURSDAY

I know people that love Saturday. I knowpeople that love Friday because it is the day before Saturday. These peoplelove Saturday almost as much as they hate Monday. They hate Sunday also,perhaps more some weeks, because Sunday is the day before Monday. I neverreally understood this concept until two or three years ago.

I love Thursday. I didn’t always loveThursday—in fact, I hated it. It seemed like everything went wrong onThursdays. If I woke up late because I didn’t hear my alarm clock, and thendrove off to work without any breakfast, finally arriving twenty miles later, inWisconsin Dells only to discover that I’d left my work shirt in the dryer, Iknew it was Thursday. After a while, Wednesday was no longer the day in themiddle of the week, it was the day before Thursday. Friday wasn’t the daybefore restful Saturday—oh, no. Friday was the day after Thursday.

Everything important in my life happens onThursday. To begin with, almost twenty-three years ago, I was born on aThursday. I don’t much remember it, but my mother tells me it was a blusteryday.

It was on a Thursday in July of 2004 that Icalled my dad fromm Michiganto tell him that he needed to bring me home from the ministry program that Iwas in. I had made my first real friends there, and had even fallen in lovewith one of them, or thought I had. The same day, I told my friend that I wasleaving, and made him cry.

Tears come on Thursday. I cried one Thursdayin September of 2004, when I found a stash of love-letters to mysixteen-year-old sister from a dirtball who worked in the meat department. Healready had a child with his last girlfriend, and he wasn’t a Christian.

I cried for that little sister again thissummer. The day before Thursday, she announced she was not going to collegewith me. The next day she moved out without a word or a note. That was aThursday, too.

Some things happened on Thursdays that we hadno control over at all. My oldest sister, Melanie, was carrying a son inSeptember of 2005. The doctor told her that he saw something—a spot—on thebaby’s liver.

“Don’t worry about it,” he assured her. “It’sprobably nothing, but we’ll have a specialist take a look at it anyway.”

On a Thursday, she went to see thespecialist. The nurse came in, gelled Melanie’s belly great with child, andturned on the ultrasound machine. Not five minutes passed when the nurseswitched it off and hurried from the room.

We prepared ourselves for everything when weknew Owen might be in trouble. Maybe he would have some mental retardation;maybe he would be a midget. We never thought he wouldn’t be. Melanie called us from the hospital to tellus that Owen died.

Not every important thing that happens onThursday is a bad thing. My best friend, Haley, lives in Texas. Whenever she comes to visit me, shealways arrives on Thursday—but sometimes she leaves on Thursday. Every Thursdaynight for three years, Haley and I would spend hours on the phone, closing thedistance between Texasand Wisconsinwith a phone cord.   

My brother DJ got engaged on a Thursday, asdid my sister Melanie. These were wonderful important things—things that Icould chalk against a prodigal and a short pregnancy.  

I declared to my mother a year ago that Iwould marry on a Thursday. If the best thing that could ever happen to mehappened on a Thursday, I knew it would redeem the day for me for the rest ofmy life.

On the day before a Thursday, I received anemail from a dear friend of mine, asking if I’d take a walk with him the nextday. We walked and talked for an hour and half, halfway through which Markasked if we could be more than friends.

“Why?” I asked, dizzy with happiness.

“Because you’re the only girl I’ve everwanted to ask.”

I had been fighting my love for him for overa year. I tried not to think about how devoted he was to God, how tender he wastoward other people, and how alike we were in every way. I tried to avoid himby taking the long ways around to church and chapel so that I wouldn’t seehim—so that I would know that I didn’t do anything to make something happen. Iknew that if it was right, God must do it. Finally the time was right to takethe step toward Mark, instead of away from him.

We began courting that day. The timing wasperfect, and I know because my Heavenly Father made sure that it was aThursday. It may be a long time, and I’ll try to act surprised when the timecomes, but it wouldn’t surprise me at all if we get engaged on a Thursday.

I look forward to Thursday now, and have fora long time. Whatever is going to happen, my Heavenly Father knows what day ofthe week it is. He is not surprised by anything that does happen. I get towatch Him work in my life, and in the lives of those around me. Thursday standsas a day of testing, of growth—and of fulfillment. I will never forget theimportance of being Thursday.

NOTE: I did get engaged on a Thursday. In fact, I got married on a Thursday. Mark and I celebrate Thursday every week: this is our 232st week being more than friends.