Co-missioners,
We’re in the middle of peak wedding season in the U.S. This runs from May through October with spikes of activity in June and September. So Google says, at any rate. Lots of pastors would confirm this. One such pastor is our colleague, Steve Kuhl, who devoted the final weekend of this past June to a niece’s wedding for which he served as officiant. When he got home, he sent us his homily on the chance that we would share it. Here it is.
We last published something about marriage four years ago. We got that one from Lori Cornell who sent us a six-step Crossings reflection entitled “A Parent’s Wedding-Day Dilemma.” Lori draws there on one of the same central texts that Steve uses here. It too will reward a second look, or so we think.
Peace and Joy,
The Crossings Community
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Marriage: Participation in a Divine Tradition
A Wedding Homily by Steven C. Kuhl
Adam van Noort (1562–1641) – The Wedding Feast at Cana
From Wikimedia Commons
Dear Scott and Mindy—
We, your family and friends, gather here with you today to celebrate a victory. You have won the struggle to find that someone with whom you can share your life—and share it “for as long as you both shall live” or “until death do you part.” We rejoice with you at what you have found in each other.
But as new and unique as your relationship is, there is nothing all that new and unique in getting married. In this, you are simply doing what most of the people with you right now have already done. Indeed, you are doing what most people have been doing since time immemorial. In getting married, you’re participating in the world’s oldest known human tradition.
Of course, as Christians, we know that marriage isn’t just a human tradition, a tradition that we as human beings pass on from generation to generation. Even more, marriage is a divine tradition. The famous text from Genesis 2 illustrates how long marriage has been practiced in the world. And it is amazing. As long as there have been human beings, creatures like you and me created in the image of God, there has been marriage.
But more important than the age of marriage is the reason God gave it to humanity in the first place. Marriage is not a human invention, but a divine gift. This means that marriage and all that proceeds from it is integral to human nature. Specifically, it means that God does not want us to be alone (Gen. 2:18). God established marriage so that we might have helpmates and find joy in one another. More generally, marriage means we are social creatures. For from marriage comes the family, from the family comes the clan, from the clan comes the tribe, from the tribe comes the nation, and from the nation comes the family of nations. Marriage and its “by-products,” therefore, exist for the common good. And that’s true whether or not an individual person actually gets married (some may not, and that’s OK) or whether a married couple actually has children (some do not, and that’s OK). Nevertheless, the truth is that regardless of our marital or family status, our whole life is possible precisely because of the grand social reality that marriage creates and sustains.
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The texts that you chose to mark this, your wedding day, speak boldly about love. That’s because the glue that holds marriage together is the same glue that holds all the other social by-products of marriage together—love. The Song of Solomon, the first text you chose, is a love poem. And although the word “God” does not appear anywhere in the text, the ancient Hebrews, as well as Christians, traditionally understood the poem to be a description of the infatuated love of God for his people. But if God can be infatuated about us, his people, there is no reason why people, especially, husbands and wives, cannot be infatuated with one another.
Still, as you will find out, in the give and take of married life, infatuation—a word that literally means “foolish”—is an impossible state of love to sustain. But don’t worry. This does not mean that “love has failed.” It only means that infatuation is probably not the best indicator of love. And if we modern people make the mistake of thinking it is, well, then we of all people are most to be pitied.
For a more sustainable view of love, we do well to look at the text you chose from St. Paul. His great love song is preserved for us in 1 Corinthians 13. Here love is not about being infatuated with the other; rather, it’s about being concerned for the well-being of the other. As such, the opposite of being loving is being selfish. We need not go through Paul’s love song word by word to show this. But a few examples will due.
First of all, as Paul makes absolutely clear from the start, love is not about drawing attention to one’s self. To do that is to be a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. Nor is love about boasting in how gifted one is. What good is it to be the most prophetic or the most knowledgeable or the most religious or even the most self-deprecating if you have not love? Without love these things are useless; they do no one any good. Rather, love is simply being concerned for the well-being of others and exhibits itself in characteristics like patience, kindness, and truthfulness or, as Paul also says, “Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes, all things, endures all things.”
Significantly, today, the meaning of your love for one another will be reflected in the vows you exchange. When we come to that part of the ceremony, you—Mindy and Scott—think deeply about what you are saying; and you, dear family and friends, listen intently to what is being said. These are not mere words or hollow ritual. They are a sacred promise to love one another, to be there for one another, a promise that is received only when it is believe. Can you imagine someone making a promise to love you “until death do you part” and you decided not to accept the promise? Promises are received by faith, by trusting. And by letting your partner know that you trust them, that you believe their promise, not only makes the promise real, it fills the both of you with immeasurable joy.
Second, as Paul also emphasizes, love becomes real through action. Love is what you do for one another and, therefore, love tailors itself to the needs of others. What love looks like now, what you need to do for one another now, when you are young and healthy, is very different from what it will look like when you old and frail. That’s not only because what you need from your partner is different; it’s also because what you can give to your partner is different. That’s why your wedding vows will also specify your commitment to one another even as circumstances change: Love adapts, love adjusts. It tailors itself to the times you find yourself in: whether for better or for worse, for richer or for poorer, in sick or healthy. Because of love’s adaptability Paul can say “love never ends.” Though our capacities end, love doesn’t. In other words, the commitment you have for one another never ends, even if your circumstances change or capacities diminished.
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From Canva
Of course, it is relatively easy to describe what love is. Fulfilling love in our daily life—that is something else. As life unfolds it is not uncommon that we might fall into the kind of quandary that Paul himself struggled with. “What’s wrong with me,” he said. “The good that I would I do not do and the evil I would not, I do.” The reality of that danger is why you chose the Gospel reading that you did: The story of the Wedding in Cana of Galilee.
The setting is a wedding, the beginning of a new marriage. And as it begins, things are going well. The wine is flowing. The guests are dancing. Love is in the air. Joy is the theme of the day. All seems to be in good order… that is, until a servant notices that the wine is running out.
The story is filled with symbolism. That’s why the Gospel writer calls it a “sign.” And it is crucial that we attend to the symbolism.
The noise. First, wine isn’t simply wine. Wine is a symbol of life at its best, of marriage at its fullest, of love in full bloom, of joy at its finest. In essence, wine is a symbol of God’s blessing—and the joy in which this, the wedding of Cana, and all weddings begin is a sign of the blessing of God. Marriage is itself a blessing.
But when the wine runs out, as it also does in this story, it means that life is being lost, marriage is being strained, love is diminished, and joy is passing away. In essence, the depletion of the wine in the story symbolizes God’s judgment on sin, God’s disappointment at what we have done with the blessings of marriage. But we should not be surprised at this. For remember, before our marriage was ours it was God’s. Therefore, God’s disappointment is a reality hidden deeply within our own disappointment with ourselves—a disappointment that very likely mimics Paul’s disappointment with himself: “What’s wrong with us?” we rightly say. “The care that we wanted for each other, we do not do, and the hurt we said we would never do to each other, we do.”
As important as that penitential self-questioning is, the text would push us to an even more important kind of questioning. When the proverbial wine runs out, how can it be replenished?
In this story, the answer is found in the fact that “Jesus and his disciples had been invited to the wedding.” When the unthinkable happens, when the wine of life runs out, Jesus, at the behest of his mother and by the grace of his Father, springs into action. First, he tells the servants, the wedding caterers, to fill with water the six stone jars that are reserved for Jewish rites of purification. The symbolism of jars is key. They point to the need of purification, cleansing, forgiveness. They symbolize the act of repentance. Repentance isn’t a woe-is-us distraction It’s the presupposition for renewal. In essence, Jesus is saying that the restoration of the joy of marriage begins with repentance, the acknowledgement that we have not lived as we ought.
But it doesn’t end there. Once the jars are full, Jesus commands the caterers to draw some of its contents out and give it to the boss, the chief steward. The big surprise is that the water of repentance has now been turned by Jesus into the wine of new blessing, that is, the forgiveness of sins. To be sure, the chief steward has no idea what has happened, and that conveniently serves to reveal the next big surprise.
When the chief steward drinks from the cup, he can’t believe his palate. What amazes him is how wonderful this wine tastes. It is better by far than the wine that ran out. That’s why the chief steward praises the groom for having saved the best wine for last.
That statement, too, is filled with symbolism. It means that Jesus can take a relationship, like marriage, that has been diminished and damaged by sin and selfishness, and, through his forgiveness, revive it to such an extent that the new life that follows it is even better than the former life that preceded it.
From this emerges the good news of Jesus Christ for you as you begin your marriage. Whether Jesus is invited into all marriages, I don’t know. But I do know that he has been invited into your marriage—and as his disciples you know exactly what he promises to do for you. You will articulate that promise in your vows when say to each other: “I will forgive you as we have been forgiven (by Christ).” In essence, then, the love and forgiveness that Christ has shown you will become the pattern of love and forgiveness in your married life together.
What a victory we celebrate today. What a wonderful tradition you participate in today. But as it turns out, we really celebrate two traditions today: your entrance into the tradition of marriage and your ongoing participation in the tradition of the gospel. The tradition of marriage begins for you today through your exchange of promises, when you are united to each other as husband and wife. The tradition of the gospel began for you in baptism, through the promise of God to unite you to Christ and make you children of God. Both traditions are given by God: marriage “‘til death do you part”; the gospel “unto life everlasting.” But in the meantime, these two traditions find their connection in the promises you will soon be making to one another, especially, when you say, “I will forgive you as we have been forgiven.” Baptism sets the pattern of your married life.
Amen.
