m&m wedding___________________________________

My Mary.

I remember when I first knew I loved you. You were in Nicaragua. I was in Philadelphia. You wrote to me and spoke from your heart about your experiences and the people you met. My love for you grew out of seeing and witnessing your love for others. I remember that as we grew closer we began to feel vulnerable and exposed because of the affection we had for each other. I remember being too nervous to say the words, "I love you", out loud, so I wrote them on dyed Easter eggs and gave them to you. I remember walking through times of doubt as you sought God's direction for a job. I remember you telling mee that it was a miracle you were being vulnerable with me.

I recall these things because of themes they represent...themes which I look forward to in our marriage: a heart for others, seeking Jesus, vulnerability with each other, working together through difficulty, and continually learning about each other. I promise to always seek after these things in our marriage.

I promise to remain by your side in the pressure of the present and to never leave you. I promise to remain faithful to you in the face of an uncertain future. I promise I will strive to be more like Christ each day. I promise to always consider you before myself and to exhibit sacrifice in my love for you.

I look forward to all the messiness of love with you in a world that spends more of its day searching for the next best thing. So lastly, I promise that my searching is over. There will be problems to work through, but my heart's desire is depth with you, not the shallow facade of perfection.

I love you, my Mary. I love you with all of my heart. I am not going anywhere because I am yours.

Dear Mark,

I love you because you have PIZZAZZ and you make me laugh until my face hurts.

I respect you because you lay down your pride for our relationship, even when I don't do the same.

I admire you because you never stop chasing after the heart of God and what it REALLY means to be a man.

I trust you because you consistently ARE who you say you are.

I want to marry you today because of all these things.

My Mark, I want to know you and be with you FOREVER. I want our marriage to be a safe place for us to experience God's refinement - because we each know that the other person will always show acceptance, grace, and forgiveness.

So I promise to never, EVER give up - to never walk away from you, whether physically or emotionally - no matter what.

I promise to remain faithful as your partner. I promise to always work toward being more FORGIVING, more GRACIOUS, more PATIENT, more RESPECTFUL, more LOVING and more KIND to you.

Above all, I promise to encourage you in your own walk with our God, pushing you toward Him and smoothing the path that He has planned for your life.

And I know that no matter what arrows might come flying at us, we will be OK because we will be ONE.

And if our God is FOR us, then who can be AGAINST us?

So I give myself to you today because I trust you completely, for the rest of my life.

PART ONE

[Esther]
C.S. Lewis
To love at all is to be vulnerable.
Love anything, and your heart will certainly be wrung and possibly broken.
If you want to make sure of keeping it in tact,
You must give your heart to no one, not even an animal.
Wrap it carefully round with Hobbies and little luxuries;
Avoid all entanglements;
Lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness.
But in that casket – safe, dark, motionless, airless – it will change.
It will not be broken; it will become

[Both]

unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable.
The only place outside of Heaven where you can be
Perfectly safe from all the dangers of love –
Is Hell.

[Scot]
C.S. Lewis
"We feasted on love; every mode of it,
solemn and merry, romantic and realistic,
sometimes as dramatic as a thunderstorm,
sometimes comfortable and unemphatic as putting on your soft slippers.
She was my pupil and my teacher, my subject and my sovereign,
my trusty comrade, friend, shipmate, fellow-soldier.
My mistress, but at the same time all that any man friend has ever been to me."

[Esther]
Anonymous 16th century bishop
Marriage has less beauty but more safety than the single life.
It’s full of sorrows and full of joys.
It lies under more burdens, but it is supported by all the strengths of love.
And those burdens are delightful.

[Scot]
Bill Cosby
"For two people in a marriage to live together day after day is unquestionably the one miracle the Vatican has overlooked."

[pause]

[Scot]
10,000 Maniacs
Disturb me with all your cares and your worries.
Trouble me on the days you feel spent.
Why let your shoulders bend underneath this burden
when my back is sturdy and strong?

[Esther]
Speak to me, don’t mislead me,
the calm I feel means a storm is swelling;
There’s no telling where it starts or where it ends.
Speak to me, why are you building this thick brick wall to defend me
when your silence is my greatest fear?
Why let your shoulders bend underneath this burden
When my back is sturdy and strong?

[Scot]
Speak to me.
Let me have a look inside these eyes while I’m learning.
Please don’t hide them just because of tears.
Let me send you off to sleep with a
“There, there, now stop your turning and tossing.”
Let me know where the hurt is and how to heal.
Spare me? Don’t spare me anything troubling.
Trouble me, disturb me With all your cares and worries.

[Esther]
Speak to me and let our worlds
Build a shelter from the storm.
Lastly, let me know what I can mend.
There’s more, honestly, than my sweet friend, you can see.
Trust is what I’m offering if you trouble me.

[Scot]
Anonymous
They say a wife and husband, bit by bit,
Can rear between their lives a mighty wall,
So thick they cannot talk with ease through it,
Nor can they see across, It stands so tall!

[Esther]
The nearness frightens them
But each alone is powerless to tear its bulk away,
And each, dejected, wishes he had known for such a wall,
Some magic thing to say.

[Scot]
So let us build with master art, my dear,
a bridge of faith
Between your life and mine,
A bridge of tenderness and very near,

[Esther]
A bridge of understanding, strong and fine,
Till we have formed so many lovely ties
There never will be room for walls to rise.

PART TWO

[Scot]
Henri J.M. Nouwen
"Would they be able to face together a world
in which there is so little support for a lasting relationship?
Where would the strength come from to remain faithful to one another in times of conflict, economic pressure, deep grief, illness, and necessary separations?
What would it mean for this man and this woman
to love one another as husband and wife until death?
The more I reflected on this, the more I felt that marriage is foremost a vocation.
Two people are called together to fulfill the mission that God has given them.

[Esther]
Marriage is a spiritual reality.
That is to say, a man and a woman come together for life,
not just because they experience deep love for each other,
but because they believe that God loves each of them with an infinite love
and has called them to each other to be living witnesses of that love.
To love is to embody God's infinite love in a faithful communion with another human being."

[Scot]
Unknown
We are not called out of the world
Into safe Christian enclaves where we exist only In and for ourselves.
We are called together to prepare for going out,
For leaving the stability of known relationships,
the safety of situations we know we can handle,
the ease of tasks we have done before.
We are to take up the tough job of living out kingdom values
where kingdom values are ridiculed…
Where taking time with God, instead of partying at night
and sleeping-in in the morning is thought to be madness
Where taking the right job for the kingdom is
taking the lowest paying job on the market.

[Esther]
Where living near the poverty level,
when you could be on your way to a penthouse,
loses you your place in the societal sun
Where entering a medical field puts you in danger of losing your life to AIDS
Where choosing to live a lifestyle that challenges the values of your neighborhood
causes your children to begin to wonder, “what’s wrong with you?”
Where raising your children to honor the sovereignty of God makes life tough for them too…

[Scot]
John 13:36
Therefore, Jesus said: “My Kingdom is not of this world.”

[pause]

[Scot]
Archbishop of Canterbury,
on the marriage of Queen Elizabeth II
"Marriage is first of all a new creation for the partners themselves
... But any marriage which is turned in upon itself,
in which the bride and groom simply gaze obsessively at one another,
goes sour after a time.
A marriage which really works is one which works for others ...

[Esther]
If we solved all our economic problems and failed to build loving families,
it would profit us nothing,
because the family is the place where the future is created good and full of love—or deformed. Those who are married live happily ever after the wedding day
if they persevere in the real adventure,
which is the royal task of creating each other and creating a more loving world."