About five years ago, on a Friday night, I was sitting at my Shabbat table with a delegation of wounded IDF soldiers - the young men and women our communities fly over, feed, host, and wrap our arms around. My wife had made one of her gourmet Shabbat dinners, the table was full of love and laughter and people happy to be together.
At some point I brought out the whiskey and the beer. We had some l'chaims, everyone was loose and laughing, and the room had that warm Friday-night glow.
And at some point I turned to Matan, a young twenty-something-year-old guy, who had survived terrible injuries, difficult surgeries, and extended rehab after being shot at. I looked at him and joked around and said, “Nu, Matan? The Mishnah says 18 is the age to get married. Yalla! It's time.”
Matan, who had enjoyed a l'chaim or two, joked right back at me: “You know what, Rabbi? Promise me, when the time comes for me to get married, you'll be the one to officiate.”
And I must’ve been tipsy myself because I agreed, not fully appreciating the ramifications.
Fast forward five years and Matan is engaged to a beautiful girl named Adi, who he was introduced to by a fellow wounded soldier.
And about a year ago, my phone rang. “Rabbi, the wedding is on October 13th in Israel. You're coming to officiate, right?”
Keep in mind, this was about the most inconvenient time possible, a month before our annual gala, when I'm running around like a lunatic and every hour is spoken for twice over. The sensible thing would have been to apologize and bow out, but a word is a word and a deal is a deal. It doesn't matter that I said it with a glass in my hand five years earlier or that I'd half-forgotten the conversation and he hadn't forgotten a syllable of it. I gave my word to a wounded soldier at my own Shabbat table, and that word was going to be kept.
So last night, I stood at a beautiful, moving ceremony in Moshav Agur and officiated the wedding of Matan and Adi.
Just six years ago, this young man was lying in a hospital bed, severely wounded with an enormous loss of blood and little chance of making it. And now here he was, whole and in love, standing beside his bride, breaking the glass, the whole mishpacha dancing.
That is the entire mission of Belev Echad in a single photograph: we meet our soldiers on their hardest day, and we walk with them all the way to their happiest one.
Mazal tov Matan and Adi!