Thoughts on Weddings by Regina

It is good for a wedding to be focused on the bride; she is so valuable that Jesus laid down his life for her. Revelation describes the holy city descending out of heaven as a bride adorned for her husband. The glorious bride is a picture of what the church needs to be. Scripture repeatedly describes the bride adorned with jewels.

We have seen a wedding where the bride wore very simple dress. They tried to focus on the groom with trumpets blowing when he walked through a pasture to the wedding site, but it lacked the glory of heaven which I think God wants us to reflect.

Weddings are great evangelism. We need to build a biblical culture. One that celebrates good, not just condemns the bad. Drama is an example. Jesus did not tell people a two or three step formula for salvation, He told stories, teaching people, using examples they understood. The kingdom of Heaven is like leaven. It works slowly but it fills the whole earth.

The scripture is full of feasts where the people had to stop everything and rejoice before the LORD. Each feast had a purpose to celebrate, something to remember. A wedding is a celebration that should reflect that future wedding.

Paul Jehle has an excellent series on Marriage and Courtship. There is a meaning in wedding traditions that we have forgotten which is why we often don’t think they are important. The ceremony replays symbolicly the phases of courtship and coming to a covenant: The father's permission, eventually the veil is lifted after the vows.

If you ever go to a Passover Haggada they take hours to finish the meal, interrupting it with stories and symbolic traditions that point to Christ. The meal includes numerous toasts where they “bless the Lord.”

Wedding feasts ought to be festive with joyful honor for God. Truth and beauty are radical all by themselves. I saw a couple who saved their first kiss for the wedding. Some wept!

Honeymoons are important, even if they are just at home. God set aside the first year for a bridegroom to not be allowed to go to war or take on too much responsibility, so that he could “cheer up his wife.”

This was opposite of other ancient cultures that did not allow men to marry until they had years of mandatory military service. God put a high value on his people growing and bonding together. He put the family before the state. Greece put the state before the family. As a result Greek culture became pervasively sodomite with dishonor for women. One of the Greek philosophers said that women were not intelligent, and if you found one that was, she was so ugly she couldn’t be looked at. He thought the purest “love” was between men.

The honeymoon paid for with debt is all too common. Much of the problem is our human mind-set that “this person will make me happy,” not realizing that the purpose for marriage is to forward a dominion mission for God’s glory. Steve Wilkins, in a sermon Marriage is Not for You, said that marriage is not for us; it is for the Lord; it is for the world.

What you think and do is an example to your siblings, your congregation, your community and to your descendents. God is faithful to bless even the most stumbling obedience.

When patriarchy carries over into authority over children’s marriages it is devastating.

We think you’ll enjoy taking a look at this wedding where the groom runs in with trumpets sounding and speaks of God’s design for marriage to the congregation. The bride, Katie, is the first young lady featured in Return of the Daughters DVD.

http://www.visionforum.com/hottopics/multimedia/enn/

(go to Bradrick wedding, March 13, 2009)