The Wedding

Suzanne and I went to a wedding last night. Weddings are cool because you get to witness the creation of a brand new entity...the two become one. But I wonder how many of us really get a chance to take in what the pastor has to say at our wedding? I know to some it may seem unimportant, but it really is something we all need to pay attention to. Maybe we'd end up with fewer divorces if folks really took notice of what it means in God's eyes when two people make that commitment.

I couldn't have told you what was said at our wedding until several years later. Suzanne's grandfather, a Nazarene minister, presided over our wedding. I remember talking with him before the wedding about the commitment we were making, but it wasn't until his sudden passing and the ensuing trek to Kansas City for his funeral that we were blessed to find the very notebook that contained the notes (and the invitation we sent him) from our wedding all those years earlier. What a blessing to go back and read that again and again! I'm sure he'd done dozens upon dozens of weddings over the years, but this one was special enough that he kept the notes on his bookcase in his house...as if he intended us to have them one day.

I want to share with you today some of what he wrote and then spoke on my wedding day.

Dear friends,
People everywhere and in all ages have drawn together, especially in times of joy. It is thus we come together here in the presence of God to celebrate with a man and a woman their union for the founding of a new home among us.

The bond of marriage was established by God at creation, and is recognized as right and honorable around the world. Christ sanctified this holy estate by His presence at a wedding in Canaan of Galilee, and beautified it by His first recorded miracle.

Christian marriage is a covenant of faith and trust between a man and a woman, strengthened by freedom from suspicion. It is also a covenant of hope in which both husband and wife commit themselves to understanding and compassion toward each other. Furthermore, Christian marriage is a covenant of love, in which both partners seek to subordinate their own personal concerns to the concerns of the other and of their union.

I regret that I did not fully take in those words at the time, but am eternally grateful that God, through Grandpa Garrett, made sure we were given the gift of that little notebook. I've read it many times since and continue to strive towards an even stronger bond with my love. While I may have made my originally promise without full recognition of it's weight, I gladly wake up each morning and commit myself again to having the marriage God called me to have.