Marriage

I married my sister last week.

That sentence is funny, and can also be interpreted the wrong way. I should probably rephrase to, “ I officiated my sister’s wedding last week.” It was beautiful and pretty standard as far as weddings go, no new age knot tying or candle lighting, just the basics for the most part, but that is one of the great things about weddings: as long as the vows and rings are involved, people enjoy it.

It’s a funny thing—why do we enjoy sitting all dressed up in hard wooden pews for 30 minutes, half of that waiting for it to start, to listen to two people say words you know they will say to each other, then walk out? We shouldn’t. We should dread the time and effort it takes to go to weddings. But we don’t, and you know why? Because it gives us a joyful reminder.

Whether or not you believe in Jesus, or just stumbled upon this website accidentally, we can all agree that in our heart of hearts, we desire for someone to love us unconditionally.

This unconditional love isn’t contractual—it’s covenantal. No matter how you treat me in return, I will love you unwaveringly until the end of time. The world today tell us this is impossible. Culture tells us that in order to be loved and have value we must contribute to the corporate machine, or we have to look a certain way, or we have to have a certain number of social graces. Covenantal love flies in the face of that, requiring nothing in return except acceptance of being loved.

Marriages are covenants. They may not always be perfect, and at times they may look far from the covenant between humans and God, but they are a covenant nonetheless. And when people attend weddings, for the briefest of times we get to transcend this culture and transcend this world, and have a glimpse into what the final wedding with God will be like. When he takes up his bride the church, repeats the vows and carries her away. This is why we love weddings, because we get a glimpse into being fully loved.