‘Twas a few decades ago when I met my bride-to-be. There were several things about her that struck me right off. But one particular characteristic was overt: she was brutally honest. She called a spade a spade. I could tell right away I would not have to wonder what she was thinking about any issue.

This morning after breakfast I checked my phone to read the text messages that had come in during the night. One was from her. It read in part, “Good morning my love already up and worked out read my Bible but most importantly prayed for you . . . ” No fluff. Just a sweet early morning greeting with a snapshot of her morning and a reminder that she had already prayed for me.

Because it was a text, the grammar was not the heart of the issue. (Anyone who knows me knows that my blood pressure spikes at the pervasiveness of atrocious grammar.) The heart of the issue was what it revealed about her, about her prayer, about her commitment to petition the Lord on behalf of her husband.

As I completed my morning regimen, I did my PT (physical training), my studies in Scripture, and prayed, I was encouraged by the wife God gave me.

Solomon wrote “An excellent wife is the crown of her husband” (Proverbs 12:4, ESV). She is a crowning achievement, a visual symbol of that which is beautiful.

This week my bride and I will celebrate over two decades of marriage together. I used to think I loved her thoroughly when we were younger and thinner and I could still hear and my hair was brown instead of gray. I did, of course.

But as the years have worn on, there are deeper beauties I have grown to treasure, too. And one of those deeper beauties is her commitment to brutally honest prayer.

When you wake to find your wife has texted you that she’s already prayed for you that morning, and you have a day of military duties ahead and ministry obligations that often remind you of man’s fallenness and of this world’s brokenness, it is salve for the soul, cold water to a thirsty spirit, to be reminded that “He who finds a wife finds a good thing and obtains favor from the LORD” (Proverbs 18:22, ESV).

Happy early anniversary to my Carrie Jane. You are loved.