A Wedding Sermon

Grace and peace to you from God, our creator and from Jesus, who is the Christ, Amen!

Jennifer and Mike…we are all so happy and proud of you. Please allow me to be the first to say congratulations! This is a wonderful day, and a blessed day, and we are all honored to be here to share in it with you.

Having said that, I have a word of warning for each of you:
Mike, you need to know that there are an awful lot of people back in Maple Grove who love and care about Jennifer. You take very good care of her…we’ll be watching…

And Jennifer, there are people here in Baxter who will be doing the same. Mike, if she gives you a hard time at all, I have entire photo albums of embarrassing photos of Jennifer going back to 5th grade. I’ll be happy to send some up to you if you’re looking for material to embarrass her with. As a matter of fact, I brought up a “starter kit” with me today…nah…we’ll worry about that later…

A marriage is a sacred, and holy thing. We are taught from an early age that a marriage is like a fairy tale. It should begin with “once upon a time” and end with “and they lived happily ever after.” In the middle is the time of the man and the woman, often a prince and princess, finding each other, falling into an incredibly passionate love, honoring and worshipping each other, caring for each other, never arguing…with a fairy god mother always watching over them, dispensing assistance and advice

This is a beautiful image. We all grew up with it. Each of us hoped to someday find our prince or our princess.

However, I’ve come to realize that the image of a fairy tale isn’t necessarily an accurate depiction of marriage. For that matter, it isn’t even a very helpful image.

For one thing: the fairy tales never told us what happened when Prince charming would leave the toilet seat up. The fairy tales never took into account how busy and over committed people get, and how it always tends to make the princess late, driving the prince nuts.

Let’s look at your own life together so far: I never heard of a fairy tale that began with “competitive flirting” …with disagreements over whether the princess won the air hockey game or if the prince “let” her win. A fairy tale romance never began with the phrase “How would you feel about a relationship?” Fairy tales never took into account graduate school…medical school…in-laws…goofy friends…long distance in relationships…

No; as fun as they are to dream about, modern marriage is not like a fairy tale. Modern day marriage is much more like a reality TV show.

Now, you know the kind of shows I’m talking about. They are the shows where people’s strengths and weaknesses, their foibles and quirks are on display for the other. We are all imperfect people. We live in an imperfect, sinful world, in imperfect, sinful homes.

In the midst of the imperfection that is our reality, we have to learn how we can live together as married couples.

Jennifer and Mike, There are three things I’d like you to remember about your marriage:

The first is this: You must let go of yourselves. I remember a conversation I had with a friend once about a year after his marriage. I asked him how it was going, and he said “great, But it’s really hard”. I asked him what was hard and he said “I feel like I don’t get to be myself anymore. I feel like my freedom and my independence has died.” I thought back to all of my pastoral counseling courses, rallied all the wisdom I could muster and gave my best pastoral answer: “Well Duh.”
You see, God is busy at work today. In this place, at this time, God is creating something brand new. God is making a new creation in you. You are no longer Mike, the independent…you are no longer Jennifer the free. You are a new being, fused together. Not individuals, but together in a way you have never experienced before. You are bound by God’s Holy Spirit into something brand new. You are literally a new creation.

It is amazing. You will know each other’s thoughts, finish each other’s sentences, be able to know the other’s feelings with a glance…or sometimes a glare…

It is the letting go of some of the individuality you had before. In John 12:24, it is written that “unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit.” At one level, to enter into this new covenant we must “die to ourselves” and embrace being a part of this new creation.

The second thing to remember is that you are not alone in this. The scripture you chose for your wedding today is especially meaningful for me. It is the same one that Lori and I chose for our wedding service. What makes this new creation that we all witness today happen at all is the infusion of God’s Holy Spirit into this marriage. God is present in this relationship in a way that you haven’t experienced before.

Now, because we have spoken, I know that you know this. Mike, when you proposed, Jennifer’s first question to you was “have you prayed about this?” You nodded, just wishing she would get on to saying “yes.”

An old couple was driving in their pickup truck one day when they pulled up behind a young couple in a convertible. The young couple was sitting close, with his arm around her. The romance was obvious. The old wife looked at her old husband, sitting behind the steering wheel across the cab of the truck from her and said “remember when we were young, and we used to sit like that?” The husband looked back at her and said “well, I haven’t moved.”

The focus the two of you have on your faith is wonderful. God is present, fused in your marriage with you. God promises that He will not move. Together, continue to draw near to Him.

Finally, no matter what, you need to forgive. You can argue and fight all you want. But at the end of the day, you must forgive. Ephesians 4:26 reminds us to not let the sun go down on our anger. You are forgiven. So forgive each other.

Every night talk with each other. Talk about your day. Talk about your joys. Talk about your frustrations. Talk about what you did to make each other angry, or hurt. And then pray. And forgive. Forgiveness is a lost art. Reclaim it.

Jennifer and Mike, you have been gifts to all of us. Now God is calling you into this marriage. Let go of yourselves…draw near to the God who draws near to you, and love and forgive over and over and over and over…

And in this new reality, this new creation, may you live happily ever after.

Amen.