Guest blog by Proclaim member Robin Fero
“I picked this wedding card out for you and Jeff some time ago. It fit you just perfectly. I knew one day I would be able to give it to you”.
Those were the words our dear friend Sandy spoke to us at the coffee shop one Monday morning after our civil wedding, as she watched my husband Jeff and I open the rainbow themed wedding card.
Sandy has been a dear friend of mine for over 10 years. She has been a supporter and a die-hard advocate for LGBTQ rights. We’ve sat together in PFLAG meetings and fundraising campaigns for Extraordinary Lutheran Ministries. She updates me on congregations within the synod that are in the Reconciling In Christ process.
Every time we are in contact, Sandy is eager to get an update of how the candidacy process and the seminary year are going.
Sandy, like many friends and loved ones along the journey, caught a vision of the future many years ago. It was a vision that, quite frankly, often gets blurred in my own set of eyes. Sandy dreamed of a day that this gay child of God could get married and also answer a lifetime calling from God to become an ordained minister.
It struck me that morning in the coffee shop how faithful Sandy was to that dream.
“You picked the card out before we were married?”
“Yes, it was just perfect for you two.”
I wish I could tell you how many times along the way I wondered how in the world I would ever get to even stand in a pulpit one day or stand in front of a judge and exchange precious vows with the one I love.
And I wish I could tell you how many times the Sandys in my life that God has blessed me with in the journey have said “I can see you up there!”
I thank God for my husband Jeff who witnesses my patterns of “how am I going to get all these school projects done before the end of the semester?”, and encourages me to see it through.
I am encouraged by all the visionaries in life!
I am so encouraged, I believe I will go buy that ordination stole today, because as Sandy so eloquently has said, “it fits you perfectly.”
Robin Fero is a 3rd year student at Lutheran Theological Seminary at Gettysburg. He is finishing up his last academic semester and will be doing his internship starting in July. Robin and his husband Jeff were married in October. They reside in Harrisburg, PA.