The conference registration email sat in my inbox for three days before I finally clicked it open. Heartlight Ministries, where our oldest daughter worked, was hosting a conference, "Parenting Adopted Teens: A Weekend of Hope and Healing." My cursor hovered over the register button. Most of our teens were adults now, scattered across different cities, building their own lives. Did we really need this?
Then I scrolled down and saw it: Special Guest:
Steven Curtis Chapman - Q&A and Private Concert.
My heart did a little flip—the kind you're supposed to
outgrow after your twenties but apparently never quite do. I registered us
before I could overthink it.
When I casually mentioned it to Jeremy later, I tried to
sound educational and growth-minded. "It could be really good for us, you
know, to process some of the harder years. And we would get to see Katerin
working that weekend."
He looked up from his phone, one eyebrow raised. "Uh
huh. We’ve been to a lot of parent workshops the past year. So basically you
just want to go to see Steven Curtis Chapman?"
I felt my face flush. "That's... that's just a
bonus."
I asked the kids if they knew who Steven Curtis Chapman was.
Blank stares all around. One of them said, "Is he that guy from the
worship songs?" Close enough, I guess.
But when I was their age? Oh, we lived for
those songs. Youth group trips where we'd belt out "Saddle Up Your
Horses" with the windows down! Diving into swimming pools at church camp
while "I'm Divin' In" blasted through cheap speakers. Those songs
were the soundtrack to our becoming.
And weddings. So many weddings. If you got married in a
church in the 90s, someone was singing "I Will Be Here." You could
set your watch by it.
Despite the chilly weather, the conference center felt warm
and inviting. We checked in, grabbed our name tags, and I felt that flutter
again. He was here. Somewhere in this building, Steven Curtis Chapman was
actually here.
The Q&A was scheduled for 4 PM. At 3:55, I slipped into
the conference room, and my breath caught.
There was Jeremy. And there, standing not three feet from
him, gesturing with his hands as he talked, was Steven Curtis Chapman.
They were having a conversation. An actual conversation.
Like two regular humans.
Every instinct screamed at me to rush over, to be part of
this moment. But I could already imagine how that would look—me, gushing and
giddy, probably saying something embarrassing about youth group or crying or
both. Instead, I forced my feet to carry me to a seat in the middle of the
room, trying to look casual, composed, like I hadn't just registered for an
entire conference primarily to be in the same room as this man.
I pulled out my phone and pretended to check messages while
sneaking photos. The lighting was terrible. My hands were shaking slightly. I
didn't care. I took seven pictures.
Later, as we walked to dinner, Jeremy was grinning.
"So," I said, trying to sound nonchalant,
"you two seemed to be having quite the chat."
"I told him we had one of his songs at our wedding.
Almost thirty years ago now."
"You did?" My voice came out higher than intended.
"What did he say?"
"He assumed it was 'I Will Be Here.' Everyone
does."
"And?"
Jeremy's grin widened. "I said, 'Actually, we went with
When You Are a Soldier.'"
I matched Jeremy’s grin, "What did he say?"
"He kind of froze for a second, like he was searching
his mental catalog. Then he goes, 'Wow. I haven't sung that in years.
I might have to dust that one off for tonight.'"
My heart was pounding now. "What if he sang it tonight?
That would be cool.” Answering my own question.
Jeremy got to the concert room early—not because I asked
him to, but because after twenty-nine years of marriage, he knew. He saved our seats, front row, slightly left of center.
The room filled quickly. Donors and extra friends were
invited to this private concert plus the twenty-five conference couples, most
of them our age, many wearing the same expression I probably wore—a mix of
nostalgia and anticipation and barely contained excitement. These were people
who had chosen the hard road of loving teenagers who came to them through
trauma and loss. These were people who knew about battle scars.
When Steven walked out with just his guitar, the room
erupted. And when he started playing, something unexpected happened. Everyone
sang. Not polite church singing, but full-voiced, unself-conscious,
singing-in-your-car-with-the-windows-up singing. We were all teenagers again,
all young adults again, all sitting in youth group rooms and wedding receptions
and church camps.
I spotted his setlist on the floor near the mic stand—just a
torn piece of paper with song titles scribbled in black ink. I squinted, trying
to make out the words, trying to see if our song was there.
Halfway through, he played "I Will Be Here." The
room swayed. Several women cried. I thought about all those weddings, all those
couples making promises they hoped they could keep.
Then he paused. Set his guitar down. Looked right at us.
"I met Jeremy today," he said, and my stomach
flipped. "And Jeremy and Vanessa had one of my songs sung at their
wedding."
Time seemed to slow. I reached over and grabbed Jeremy's
hand.
"Now, it wasn't the song you might expect," Steven
continued, a smile in his voice. "And I'll be honest, I had to go back in
the archives for this one."
He sat down at the keyboard, adjusted the mic, and began to
play.
The first notes hit me like a wave. Our song. The one we'd
chosen because it wasn't about romance or butterflies or easy promises. It was
about showing up, about staying in the trenches, about being a soldier for the
person you loved.
He was singing it to us.
For us.
Steven Curtis Chapman was serenading us with our wedding song,
nearly thirty years later.
I felt tears streaming down my face and didn't care. Jeremy stood
up and pulled me up for a hug…or slow dance…but then we retreated to our seats.
Around us, the room had gone quiet—everyone understanding they were witnessing
something sacred, something unrepeatable.
When he finished, the room exploded in applause. Steven
looked at us and smiled—not a performance smile, but a real one, warm and
knowing.
"That's a good one," he said. "Thanks for
reminding me."
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Later that night, lying in our hotel room, I kept replaying
it in my mind.
"That was the most unexpected gift," I whispered
to Jeremy in the dark.
"Yeah," he said. "It really was."
I thought about gifts like that—the ones you never see
coming, the ones that reach into your chest and rearrange something
fundamental. Have you ever received something like that? Not expensive,
but expensive—the kind of gift that costs someone their time, their
attention, their willingness to step outside the script and say, "I see
you"?
That's what it felt like. Being seen. Being honored. Being
loved by someone who didn't have to love us, who could have just performed his
set and called it a night.
And those lyrics—about being a soldier, about the
battlefield of loving people through their hardest moments. If you've raised
teens, especially teens who came to you carrying wounds you didn't inflict but
are trying to help heal, you know about minefields. You know about never quite
knowing when something might explode. You know about the trenches.
Maybe that's why that song hit differently all those years
ago. And maybe that's why it hits differently now. Because we're still in it.
Still showing up. Still choosing to be soldiers for the people we love most.
Still being here. Thirty years later.
