Grateful

       After a long night studying for my midterm, I finally crawled into bed and began my regular routine of bedtime prayer followed by listening to an audiobook until sleep comes. At 2:40, my 20 month old, who still can’t grasp the concept of sleep, woke me up. By 4:45, she finally started sleeping steadily, but I couldn’t sleep. I gave up, got up, and grumbled all the way to the shower. As I brewed, I remembered a lesson I learned a long time ago.

I often visited RCM before I began my apprenticeship. The youth group and I would worship with River City Church and then prepare lunch at the ministry. At that time, my understanding of serving the poor amounted to a vague sense that Jesus expected us to do something for the poor. One visit, I sat talking with the first person I ever met who lived under a bridge. I thought trolls were the only people living under bridges, and furry green grouches were the only people living in trash cans (since, I’ve met several people, no grouchier than you or me, who spend nights huddled in dumpsters to stay safe and dry). I couldn’t help but think how devastated I would be if this was my life. Church service began while I sat stunned, not knowing what to say. Not knowing what to do. That same man got up and reminded us of what we had to be thankful for, but maybe not in the way you think. He didn’t tell us how blessed we were, no, he told us how blessed he was.

“God has seen me through so much. I should be dead, but He protected me when I was in a gang, even when I had a knife to my throat, He protected me. He didn’t let my sin or my stupidity get in the way. He showed me patience. He let me wake up to a warm dry day, He made it a joy to be outside. He gave me a family here that loves and accepts me. He gave me time to come to Him, time to change. So today, I get to walk in His world, enjoy its beauty, and listen to what His creation tells me about Him.”

When he finished, those of us who knew his story sat in tears. I have a wife, children, job, and home and I don’t wake up that thankful. He taught me that we choose the tone of our narrative, we don’t have to just whistle along to the devil’s tune. He, like Paul, learned to be content in whatever state he found himself (Phil. 4:11). Not just content, grateful.

I stood this morning at the bathroom mirror, I recalling that lesson and staring ingratitude in the face. I thanked God for my beautiful, healthy, precious, sleepless children. It changed my attitude. I went to watch the sunrise over one of my favorite spots on earth. I listened to the choir of birds and babbling brook and, like my teacher, listened to what God’s creation taught me about Him. God speaks as loudly through the hard concrete slab beneath a bridge as He does through the beauty of the sunrise. God speaks everywhere and through everything if we have the ears, eyes, and heart to recognize it. I pray you find the words of this dear brother as life altering and comforting as I have.

My Shawn

“Good morning Shawn.” Mrs. Lilly said for about the hundredth time. Mrs. Lilly has a little place of her own, lives alone, and finds comfort in the community aspect of RCM. She visits us about 3 times a week and always greets me this way. It would be really sweet, except my name isn’t Shawn!

Mrs. Lilly is one of the first people I met upon coming to RCM. She has no teeth, and can be difficult to understand, but she loves to sing. She sings old spirituals, new praise songs, old church standards, and especially songs of her own invention set to the tune of old classics. She reads everything she can get her hands on (including an entire encyclopedia set, article by article, someone donated) and asks me every day if I have something new for her to read. And I better never give a book to anyone else unless I also have a copy for her or she says “I’m gonna get you Shawn!” Again, this is not my name! I found it hard to believe that someone that is on this familiar of a level with me could not know my name.

Finally, one day I said, “I’m not Shawn, Mrs. Lilly, I’m Steven.”

“You’re my Shawn.” She said. Now I was even more confused! But, hey, if this sweet old lady insists on calling me another name, what’s the harm?

Then the craziest thing happened. Mrs. Lilly brought a friend to meet me and she said “This is Steven, he’s my shawn, the preacher.” And it finally hit me! She wasn’t saying Shawn at all! She was calling me her son this whole time! As I mentioned, her toothless speech can be hard to understand. Here I was feeling that she didn’t even bother to remember my name and the whole time she loved me enough to call me her son! How often do we miss what we mean to people and what they really mean to us? How often do we miss the blessings of human connection and compassion that God gives us? Sometimes I have to take a step back and realize the blessing of being where I am and having the place in people’s lives, and the people in my life, that I do.

“Praise the Lord, my soul, and forget not all his benefits” - Psalm 103:2 NIV

“That is why you are no longer foreigners and outsiders but citizens together with God’s people and members of God’s family” - Eph. 2:19 GW

An Expression of Divine Unity

Before there was time, there was a Holy Community. The Almighty, the Word, and the Spirit. These three were one and lived in Perfect Holy Unity, just as they do today. So there has always been community. At some point this Sacred Trio chose to incorporate a new creation into their Devine Circle; Holy Angels. These servant companions we created to share in the perfectly unified community of Heaven.

Then, the Godhead held Holy Council and conceived of a plan, a plan so grand all the angels were intrigued with it, but God shrouded it in mystery deep within the Word to be reviled in the distant future of the Divine Drama. This, Paul called “the purpose of the ages,” and was the reason for all temporal creation.

The first clue to this Holy Mystery was revealed in the statement; “Let Us make man in Our own image, in Our very likeness…” Yes, our God chose not only to include mankind in His Sacred Community, but He chose to produce on earth a collective body of people who reflect the unity of the Trinity.

Christ came to create the community, prayed to unify this group, and died so He could be embodied by these people.

He called the disciples to follow Him, gave them new names and a new purpose, He shared with them the greatest gift; Himself. He continually corrected their selfishness and showed them what true community looked like. When His time with them on earth was nearly complete, he prayed:

“Holy Father, protect them by the power of your name, the name you gave me, so that they may be one as we are one... My prayer is not that you take them out of the world but that you protect them from the evil one… My prayer is not for them alone. I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message, that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me. I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one—I in them and you in me—so that they may be brought to complete unity. Then the world will know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me. Father, I want those you have given me to be with me where I am, and to see my glory, the glory you have given me because you loved me before the creation of the world. Righteous Father, though the world does not know you, I know you, and they know that you have sent me. I have made you known to them, and will continue to make you known in order that the love you have for me may be in them and that I myself may be in them.” (John 17:11-26 NIV).

 

He left this life with the assurance that the Spirit would fill them, empower them, perfect them, and unify them. As the Spirit moved in God’s chosen community, men and angels stopped and took notice!

Paul said, “God told me to make clear to everyone how the mystery came about. In times past it was kept hidden in the mind of God, who created all things. He wanted the rulers and authorities in the heavenly world to come to know his great wisdom. The church would make it known to them. That was God’s plan from the beginning. He has worked it out through Christ Jesus our Lord.” (Ephesians 3:9-11 NIRV).

God doesn't give us just any place in this community. No! He ties us more closely to Him than we can be with anyone or anything else. He lives in us through His Spirit and we make up who He is in His Son.

“So Christ himself gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the pastors and teachers, to equip his people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ. Then we will no longer be infants, tossed back and forth by the waves, and blown here and there by every wind of teaching and by the cunning and craftiness of people in their deceitful scheming. Instead, speaking the truth in love, we will grow to become in every respect the mature body of him who is the head, that is, Christ. From him the whole body, joined and held together by every supporting ligament, grows and builds itself up in love, as each part does its work.” (Eph. 4:11-16 NIV).

“We proclaim to you what we have seen and heard, so that you also may have fellowship with us. And our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son, Jesus Christ… God is light; in him there is no darkness at all. If we claim to have fellowship with him and yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not live out the truth. But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus, his Son, purifies us from all sin.” (1 John 1:2-7 NIV).

So the Godhead brings about His great, eternal, work; drawing us into Divine Unity. But! There is another force at work, one at work destroying this fellowship ever since God began to reveal it. Our adversary lead Adam and Eve out of perfect unity with God, tried to drive Job from his relationship with God, deceived David, the king of God's Holy people, accused the High Priest Joshua who was appointed to serve in drawing the people closer to God, tempted and attacked the Lord in His work to reestablish mankind’s fellowship with God, and is still driving a wedge between us and the Holy Community.

One way he loves to do this is by setting us at odds with each other. This is why Paul warns us: “Finally, let the Lord make you strong. Depend on his mighty power. Put on all of God’s armor. Then you can stand firm against the devil’s evil plans. Our fight is not against human beings. It is against the rulers, the authorities and the powers of this dark world. It is against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly world. So put on all of God’s armor. Evil days will come. But you will be able to stand up to anything. And after you have done everything you can, you will still be standing.” (Eph. 6:10-13 NIRV)

But Satan wants us to believe it is a battle against flesh and blood so we fight against our brothers and sisters, our fellow man, instead of him! This is why we should pray for ourselves what Elisha prayed for his servant: And Elisha prayed, “Open his eyes, Lord, so that he may see.” Then the Lord opened the servant’s eyes, and he looked and saw the hills full of horses and chariots of fire all around Elisha. – (2 Kings 6:17 NIV).

What better weapon could Satan have than causing us to believe he's not acting when he really is. When we hear about Satan appearing, demons possessing, rulers, authorities, and powers of this dark world and the heavenly world we immediately relegate it to Biblical times and in our minds all these have become little more than myths. Meanwhile Satan convinces us that, instead of making up Christ and finding our identity there, we are just sinners saved by grace. This way we accept that, at our best, we are just sinners. The truth is this; we may not be perfect but we are being perfected by God’s Spirit. But Satan would have us focus on our imperfections, or, better yet, the imperfections of others. Now we are back to warring with the very people with whom God wants us united.

When we have the eyes of faith to see where the true battle lies and who the true enemy is, it becomes a simple choice of who we want to be united with: The Godhead or the devil. So which is it? Do you want to share in the perfectly unified community which is older than time? Do you want to take your place in forming the very identity of Christ? Partaking of the divine nature, as Peter calls it? Or do you want to be a play thing in the hands of the adversary? Make your choice. Take a stand. Don’t miss out on fulfilling the greatest mystery of universe, the purpose of the ages, and the plea of God’s Holy Son.

What's your worth?

How much are you worth? What’s your first thought?  I’m priceless? Cynics would say we all have a price. Judas for thirty pieces of silver sold his beliefs and his friend (not to mention savior), Esau sold his birthright for a bowl of soup, politicians sell out for campaign endorsements, and we sell out to peer pressure all the time. But if you had to stop, think about it, and put a price tag on yourself, what is your worth?

I can’t say I ever gave much thought to it until the other day. Here is what shook me up.

“I found him!” Angie told me. She was obviously upset, but I had no idea who “he” was, so I asked. “The guy who gave me AIDS! At least I think it was, because he was there for treatment the same time I was.”

Empathizing is not the difficult part of my job, but sometimes comprehending is. What would it be like A) to know you have a deadly autoimmune disease, and B) to see the person who give it to you? I honestly cannot begin to imagine what is going on in her heart, mind, body, or soul… all I can do is love her, listen to her, and “mourn with those who mourn.”

“The woman at the desk saw that I recognized him. She said ‘he’s been getting treatment for a while.’ But I know him! He knows he has AIDS and what he’s doing, Steven. He buys a different girl every night!!

“I talked to my case worker about it and she said I should report him… it’s a crime. So, pray for me, cause I’m going down to the police office to report him. I’m so scared, but someone has to do it so no one else gets sick by him. Those girls have no idea; they were just like me. They don’t know that for $10 they are being killed… a long, lonely, painful death.”

 

$10… I heard very little after that. $10? All of this, the AIDS, the prostitution… all of it is new to me, but $10?! If it was $100 it wouldn’t make it any less sad and terrible. But you want to believe that someone’s body, life, safety, health, and dignity are worth more than $10.

This really changed things for me, because Angie and I have been talking for a long time. One thing that nearly always comes up is her value. To be honest, it's a conversation I have with every battered man and woman I meet. “Whatever you have been told or made to feel, you have value! I value you, and more importantly, God values you, enough to give His Son for you. You deserve better than the life that you’ve had.” I mean these words, every fiber of my being is committed to this belief and to convincing these precious children of God of this truth… and yet it often seems to fall on deaf ears. The reason for this finally hit me. In her mind, Angie is worth $10.

What would you have to go through to lower your worth to that price? That, my brothers, is the true cost of sin. Satan robs me of my worth and leaves me with the guilt and the pain. But, Christ offers forgiveness, He makes me new, He makes me a joint heir, He exalts me from my humble, miserable state, strengthens my weak knees and helps me to stand.

It may take a long time for Angie to experience that, for her to see herself as a precious, beloved, child of the King, but that is why it’s important for someone to commit himself to giving as much time as it takes. This is why it’s important for her to be greeted with love rather than reproach, with a smile instead of a scowl, a prayer and uplifting word in place of a curse, and the love of Christ instead of the judgment of the self-righteous. It is a tall order for someone who has had the luxury of being sheltered from this world must of his life. But Jesus didn’t turn from the woman caught in adultery, he didn’t reject Levi, or Zacchaeus, the tax collectors just because he had never done the things they did. He connected with them in their suffering. He saw their worth, just as He sees Angie’s.  I can’t take her pain away but I can sit with her in that pain. I can show her the love she shows me, and our Lord shows us both.

 “Because you are precious in my eyes, and honored, and I love you…” (Isaiah 43:4 ESV).

Lord of the Harvest

Our God is amazing and he teaches me more of His glory each day. Some lessons, however, are easier to take than others are. In the month of June, we had 13 baptisms! That’s the most we’ve had in any one month this year. The Lord made it clear though, He gave the increase; we just shared in the blessing.

 

Randy looked no older than 18 when he walked through our doors, though he claimed to be older. I knew he’d never been here before, so I asked him to sit and talk with me. He told me, “I don’t want to hear any God talk, I’m not a believer.” So, I offered him what kindness I could, and told him I was still glad to talk to him and asked him to remember me if he changed his mind.

Randy was soon a regular and we talked frequently, but the door to his heart was still closed. Then one day he disappeared. This isn’t unusual, but it saddened me because I’d tried to talk to those around him about God, praying he would take an interest, but now he was out of reach. Oh, how much we convince ourselves we can achieve on our own. A week later, Randy stepped into my office and asked for a Bible. I jumped at the opportunity, but before a word left my mouth, he said, “I don’t want to talk about it. I want to read it on my own.” And read he did.

One week later, Randy stood at my door and asked, timidly, “… do you baptize people here?” You can guess my answer to that question. He was finally ready to talk. “I’m a believer now, and the Bible says believers should be baptized, I’m already working on the repenting part so, I’m ready to be baptized.”

“What changed?” I asked. He said he saw the evil ways people lived and it made him believe there had to be good to counter it. “So I prayed... I didn’t even know where to start, what book, what faith, but that day I saw a cross wherever I looked so I came and got that Bible from here and I just started reading. It was kinda simple from there.”

As I left my office, overjoyed, Margret, another client, was coming to my office. “I’ll be with you as soon as I get back, we’re going to a baptism,” I said. “That’s actually what I came to see you about!”

I could hardly believe my ears. I had to take a moment and thank God for His awesome power. He walked them all the way to the water and just brought me along for the last mile of the way. After the baptisms, we rode back to the ministry, talking about their new church family. Then Margret yelled, “Stop the car! There’s my daughter, I haven’t seen her in ages!”

They spent a little while catching up and then Margret shared Jesus! “Honey I just gave my life to Christ, don’t you think it’s about time you did that?” And she agreed! Sometimes God’s message is as simple and agreeable as “Just be available and I’ll do the rest.” But not all His lessons are that way.

 

Once in a while, a drought follows rain. Satan seemed to block every attempt to bring someone to Christ this July. Some said “tomorrow,” and never showed. Some said, “I know it’s what I need to do but I drank this morning and I want to make sure I’m sober when I do this and that I stay sober this time,” only to show up drunk the next day or disappear. Some even called and said “I’m coming in the morning! Be ready for me,” only to leave me waiting and let their phones ring.

This lesson was hard to swallow, and I wasn’t even sure what the lesson was. Doubt crept in. Maybe I’m not the man for the job, maybe I have forgotten how to show compassion, maybe I should have been harder on them, etc. July 31st came with another failed meeting. Suki had to leave for work as soon as she realized she needed to be baptized. “Meet me early; I really want to be baptized tomorrow before I go to work!” And there I sat in an empty parking lot.

I prayed that the Lord would help me not to be discouraged but to keep my faith in whatever He was doing. Then two women started yelling at each other, “just what I need,” I thought, and stepped out to calm things down. One of the women left and things did calm down.

A few minutes later, Jeannie, the woman who walked out, tapped on my window. “Can you pray with me?” she whispered. When we sat down, she told me that she knew she shouldn’t have yelled but the Lord gave her strength to walk away instead of letting her anger build any further. She said she was really trying to grow in the Lord and I asked if she’d been baptized. She said she wanted to be but needed a church home so that she could really be a part of the church and not just get baptized and walk away. She is now a Christian, in one of our housing programs, and worshiping with us.

 

And what did God teach me? To really wait on Him, and be reminded one more time that this is His work and to see the importance of just one soul.

 “So neither the one who plants nor the one who waters is anything, but only God, who makes things grow.” 1 Cor. 3:7

 

Please consider supporting this apprenticeship or River City Ministry. Feel free to forward this newsletter or share our contact information with them. Thank you and God bless you.

 

He Left Everything and Followed Him

“I just woke up one day and knew it all had to stop.” Keshon said when I asked what made him give up drug dealing. Coming to Christ, for him, is about more than changing his mind, saying a few words, and getting dunked—it’s a new life at a high cost.

“You can’t just walk away from the drug game—it follows you. I knew I couldn’t live for God and stay in it, so I walked away. That meant no income, no rent money—so no home—but that wasn’t the worst of it. I stayed in the shelters ‘cause I knew I didn’t need to be around my old friends and their bad ways. When I went out looking for work, I got jumped by one of the other dealers and his guys. I told them I was done, I didn’t want any trouble, I just wanted to live for God. They thought I was a snitch, so they beat the tar out of me and told me that if they ever saw me again they would kill me.”

“I went to the hospital and as I was checking in, I saw someone I knew, but I didn’t think anything of it. I guess they made phone calls, ‘cause when I walked out of the ER, the waiting room was full of people who were mad that I left my old life. I sat down so there would be witnesses around, but one of the other dealers told me ‘you gotta walk back at some point.’”

Keshon feels like there is a target on his back wherever he goes now, but he knows what he has to do. “It’s hard to hang on sometimes. I know I can’t turn my back on God, but it is hard when it’s been days since your last meal, you have no money in your pocket, you’re sleeping under a broke-down truck and you know that in a matter of hours you could have several thousand dollars by dealing.”

“I learned something though, every time I’m put to the test, when I’m not sure how much longer I can make it, and I choose trusting God, He comes through. Someone will offer me some food, or a place to sleep, or I get a call, like today, telling me I got a job! It’s not the kinda money I was making, but God is showing me that He’s enough.”

Keshon was even able to help his uncle to leave his old ways and draw closer to God. I haven’t seen Keshon in a month. I pray he’s just busy working, but I don’t know. Sometimes discipleship comes at a greater cost than we would imagine. Levi walked away from his tax booth and left everything to follow Christ. James and John left their father and the family business. Keshon left friends, family, home, wealth, and puts his life on the line every day.

People like Keshon are why I’m at RCM. God’s message changes lives and is making a real difference here in North Little Rock.

In the 11 months of my RCM apprenticeship, I have helped to lead 140 people to be restored and 47 baptized. I look forward to the opportunities that God allows me in the second year of this apprenticeship.

God bless you all.

“After this, Jesus left the house. He saw a tax collector sitting at the tax booth. The man’s name was Levi. “Follow me,” Jesus said to him. Levi got up, left everything and followed him.” (Luke 5:27-28).

 

A Woman's Worth

We live in a male dominated world. We take a day, like today and "honor" mothers, but I wonder if it only emphasizes the difference in how we treat women every other day of the year. Women have gone from being property to objects, and some days I have trouble seeing the difference.

Women are still sold, just take the awful mass kidnaping that has been on the news for an example. Sex slavery is a real thing, as a matter of fact, there are now more slaves in the world than there were at the height of 1800s. Women are still treated as objects of male fantasy. Women are fed adds representing the image of who every woman "should be." When women don't live up to this image they are ignored, while those who try to become what they see in magazines or on TV are called sluts by the same men who do the fantasizing.

Women are made to feel that if they do not have a career they are "only a mother," as if that was some small and unimportant identity. At the same time, women who do enter the work place are paid less than men doing the same work. Women are viewed as somehow less valuable.

Listen to music or the language boys and men often use and you will find that ladies have been reduced to hoes, sluts, bitches, and whores. Men abuse women sexually, physically, and emotionally and justify and joke about it. Men who refuse to take responsibility for their actions leave women to raise and provide for children on their own and then treat them as lesser beings for being in their situation. Men who stay with their women often act as if they are kings who make all the decisions and cannot be questioned for their actions.

It was not intended to be this way! God did not make men to behave like this, or women to be treated like this. Just take a look at what I mean.

Genesis 2 tells us that God placed man in a beautiful garden, he gave him every tree good for food, beautiful scenery, a source of life everlasting, and a purpose, but something wasn't right.

Everything God created He called good, but then he looked at Adam, alone in the garden and He said "It is not good..." God created man to have a relationship with him, he showered him with blessings, but He saw that for man to be without the woman was "not good."

He said, "I will make the companion he needs, one just right for him." This word translated companion or helper is not best translated this way. It is actually the same word used to describe God over and over in the Old Testament when He is called strong deliverer or savior. God said, man is in a terrible situation, I will make a savior to deliver him from loneliness. But God did not make her right away.

Now, God could have made woman in that moment, but He did not. God does all that He does for a reason. He wanted man to appreciate what he had, so he allowed Adam to come to understand his aloneness and desire deliverance. He brought all the animals before Adam, everything that crawled and everything that flew, but Adam did not find a companion who was right for him. No animal could play the role of savior and deliver Adam form his lonely state. When it says there was no one right for him, the term literally means to stand in front of. There was no one Adam could look at, face to face, eye to eye and share his experience with. No  animal knew what it was to be Adam, when he looked into the eye of the animals and birds, he could see no mirror back into his own soul.

Only when Adam realized this did God act. He caused a deep sleep to come over Adam and He took a rib from Adam's and formed Eve. He did not use one of Adam's toes to form the woman. Had He done this it would suggest that the woman was below the man. He did not use part of Adam's skull to form her either. Had he done this it would suggest that the woman was above the man. No, God took a rib from his side. This was the only one who could stand in front of Adam, an equal, taken from his side.

When God brought her before Adam, he was amazed! In the moment of face-to-face, when he looked into the eyes of his equal, he gained understanding of who he was, he found his identity. He said I am man and she is woman, flesh of my flesh. He used a new word here, the word translated as man, up to this point was Adam, but now he recognizes himself as man because he sees himself and something not himself in the woman, the same, but different.

Genesis 1:26-27 Then God said, “Let us make mankind in our image, in our likeness... So God created mankind in his own image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them.

The image of God was expressed in man and woman. A complete picture. In seeing this, Adam saw himself cast in a different light. This is why a man leaves his father and mother and clings to his wife, and the two become one. (Gen. 2:24). Because the man's identity is not in his heritage, not in his title, not in his inheritance, but in his wife. What a beautiful picture. Relationship according to God's design.

So what ever happened? Sin! The very next chapter tells of the fall and the curse. We know the story, but there is a part of the curse we seem to always forget, "Your desire will be for your husband, and he will rule over you."

This was not the plan, this was the result of sin, the curse. This explains why it is so hard to leave the man who mistreats and underappreciates you. The woman's desire is no longer toward her God or toward herself, she no longer finds her identity there, her desire is towards the man, and she does not know who she is without him. This allows the man to rule. But there is hope which comes from the seed of woman!

In Christ all are one! Christ is the true savior of all! He delivers us from sin, from death, and from the curse! Your identity is not in any man, it is in your relationship with God.

The woman was made to complete the representation of God in mankind, to deliver the man from his loneliness, and to experience oneness with man and God. What is a woman's worth? God said that without her the crown of His creation was not good, but together they were very good. That is worthwhile!

Women, take pride in the place God has given you. See yourself for who you are. Understand your identity in light of who your God made you to be, not in light of the way you have been treated by anyone. You were made because man needs you, not because you need to put up with any man mistreating you. 

Men, treat your women right. Be a man! Admit your need and treat women with respect remembering that she was made so that you could have an equal.

Things don't have to be so twisted, we can have the relationship God made us for if we are delivered by His Son and live as He guides us. Christ left everything for His bride and he promises her everything. Take a lesson from him.