Of Weddings and Celebrations, Part I

Hannah Roorda writes:

I’ve hit that point in life where many of my friends have startes getting married, and I am just old enough to think of it as something I’ll be doing in the not so distant future. So when I go to my friends’ weddings, I pay attention, and note what I like and dislike.

Unfortunately, while it is easy to find things you like…

…it is also easy to find things you really dislike:

We were at a wedding this weekend (since a year ago in August I have been to 5) and while I immensely enjoyed the wedding, I found the reception slightly disappointing (that’s a sure sign there wasn’t enough dancing!). My family spent most of the ride home discussing what we did and didn’t like about the celebration, and what makes for a good wedding and reception.

We kept coming back to this point:

–The best weddings and receptions are the ones that celebrate marriage and families, not the couple themselves.

Why?

Celebrating Christ’s love for the church is a lot better than celebrating Kim and Jake. Or whoever. If all we can do is celebrate the two humans who are getting married, our celebrations are going to be silly, trivial, and boring. We have to learn to party like Christians. I can’t tell you how to do that yet, but I’ll be looking into it. But I will say that it’s got to include feasting and dancing.

Posted at 1:04 am EST on the 5th of December 2007 by H. G. Roorda.

Under Sundry as ,

There are 5 replies.
 
  1. Nate says on December 6th, 2007 at 5:04 am

    Shrewd piece of deduction, as brother J.R.A. might say in his younger years.

    Marriages are between one woman and one man. They’re the ones getting hitched, and they’re the ones on center stage. But it is interesting how most weddings ceremonies and receptions will focus on what’s “beautiful” or “memorable” or “sweet” or “amazing” about the couple’s relationship.

    As in a reception toast: “Jimmy, I just remember how you thought so hard about your first date with Mary. You wanted to please her so much. And that’s how you’ve been with her ever since. You’re so sweet together. I know you will have a wonderful life together.”

    This is nice. But also primary is the fact that an everlasting, God-ordained, family-oriented, community-involved covenant has just taken place. A Fiddler-On-The-Roof sort of wedding.

    You can’t have a marriage without a covenant. You can’t have a marriage without having a family. And you can’t RUN a marriage by only focusing on the relationship alone. A couple represents God’s covenant community, and that is an outward-looking stance. As you say, a wedding ceremony would do well to reflect that. Together with lots of jovial, all-involved, Biblical ruckuses.

  2. Vicki says on December 7th, 2007 at 5:55 am

    Hear hear. (: Again and again I’ve seen (already) that if Christ isn’t first in a relationship, the relationship isn’t worth much. And I suppose that goes about the same for weddings.

    I kinda figure, when I get married I want to have a big old barn dance type thing with a little ceremony at the beginning for “good measure”. *g*

  3. Regina says on December 7th, 2007 at 4:52 pm

    Amen, Han, amen! Fabulous post!

    (Vicki, sounds like a great wedding to me! ;D)

  4. Han says on December 7th, 2007 at 5:09 pm

    Vicki, I’m coming. :D

  5. Cosmo says on December 15th, 2007 at 4:59 pm

    Obviously, as I said earlier, the thing about this is that it’s purely inductive. You either agree with it or you don’t; there’s not really a way to argue for it, or against it. So, if you believe it’s true, you believe it’s true because it seems true. In other words, because you have an intuition. So the question that arises is whether intuition has any place in finding out the truth.