Wedding Wendling Colossians 3
Wendling/ Augustine
Wedding Sermon
Genesis 2:18, 21–25; Colossians 3:12–17; Matthew 19:4–6
A Covenant of Love
after V.Gundermann
Grace be unto you and peace from our triune God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Jenny and Nathan
Well, this is it! You’re getting married. You’ve gathered your dearest family and your closest friends for this very special occasion. You’ve asked them to join you as you join in the covenant of marriage as you pledge and promise your commitment to each other for life..
As you’re undoubtedly aware, there are some people here this day, probably your grandparents and perhaps your baptismal godparents, in addition to your own parents, who are seeing this as an answer to their prayers. They may well have prayed on the day of your birth and at your Baptism that someday, you would stand with someone that you have chosen to love before the altar of the Lord and pledge your love in marriage This is that day. Their prayers are being answered.
This is not the end of their prayers for you, of course. This day their prayer becomes that in this marriage you may each always be a source for each other of God’s blessings, and that through the two of you, God may bless many people. In just a couple of minutes you’ll be making such a public promise.
Today, the two of you and God, are joining together in a covenant of love. Here are four reminders before you make such vows.
First, I want to remind you of what you already know—that marriage is one of God’s very good ideas. It’s not a human idea. It’s not the idea of the state, nor of the church. It’s not your idea. It’s God’s idea.
In the beginning, when God created the world, he completed the creation by bringing together a man and a woman, a groom and a bride. I expect that the Garden of Eden was a perfect setting for that first marriage. God saw in that first marriage that this would be the way the first groom, whose name was Adam, could be everything God meant him to be. And it would be the way the first bride, Eve, could be everything God meant her to be. It would be the way he could release his blessings to his whole creation.
The second thing I want to remind you of is that God has made a great commitment to marriage. That’s not to be taken for granted. I don’t know about you, but when I do something really nice for someone and they mess it up, I’m tempted to say, “I don’t think I’ll do that anymore.” God could have said that about marriage, for through this first marriage sin came into the world. We have been making a mess of marriage ever since.
But God didn’t say that then, and he doesn’t say that now. In fact, he continues to affirm marriage, and he does so in almost every book of the Bible by using marriage as an example of how he cares for his people. He calls himself the Bridegroom; he calls his people, the church, his bride. Again and again he talks about his great love for his bride—and about his faithfulness. He does that even when we, as His bride and people, act unfaithful.”
But God never gives up on us. His love never fails. He wants to bless us and all people through marriage, the joining of one man and one woman in a covenant of love. He expressed his ever faithful and undying love for us by sending His Son Jesus Christ into the world, that through His suffering and death on the cross, and glorious resurrection, we might fully know the covenant of love He has made with us.
The third thing I wish to remind you of is that, as God in Christ has loved you, you are to love one another. We, who are gathered with you here today believe that most of the time this will be pretty easy for you. Our confidence and prayer is that you’ll come into each other’s presence day after day, week after week, month after month, year after year, and express in so many ways your love and devotion to each other.
But if your marriage is like some of ours are at times, it may be tempting for you to say, “I don’t think I want to do this anymore.” On those occasions I urge you to remember how much your Bridegroom, Jesus Christ, loves you. He has been your example of love and forgiveness. It’ll be proper on those occasions to say such things as, “I’m sorry.” “Forgive me.” “I forgive you.” “You are precious to me.” “I love you.”
The fourth thing I want to remind you of is one of the reasons we, your family and friends, are here. We want to give you much more than a hug, a kiss, a blessing, and perhaps a gift. We want to be a Christian community for you, to support you in your marriage. We want to gather with you often to sing great hymns and to join you in prayer. We wish to share your in times of joy so your happiness will be multiplied; to share your sorrows so that your sadness may be divided; and we promise to remember your marriage in our prayers.
It is our earnest prayer and hope that in this marriage, this man, this groom, might be everything God meant for you to be, and this woman, this bride, might be everything God meant for you to be. To do this God has established His covenant of love with you as you make your vows to each other.