Today is my 11th year anniversary of my marriage with Lauren. We have been blissfully married all this time!
Wedding Ceremony and Vows
God’s Purpose for Marriage
1.) It is not good for man to be alone: God has therefore joined him with his wife to be one flesh.
2.) The purpose of becoming one flesh is to produce Godly offspring.
3.) The purpose of producing Godly offspring is to pass the memory of God’s great deeds down from generation to generation for his glory.
Then the LORD God said, “It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him a helper fit for him.” Genesis 2:18
Jesus replied. “But at the beginning of creation God ‘made them male and female.’ ‘For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh.’ So they are no longer two, but one. Therefore what God has joined together, let man not separate.” Mark 10:6-9
Did he not make them one, with a portion of the Spirit in their union? And what was the one God seeking? Godly offspring. So guard yourselves in your spirit, and let none of you be faithless to the wife of your youth.” Malachi 2:13-15
Great is the LORD and most worthy of praise; his greatness no one can fathom. One generation will commend your works to another; they will tell of your mighty acts. Psalm 145:3-4
God’s expectation for Marriage
1.) We are to submit to one another out of reverence for Christ. We submit to the Lord because we love him with all our hearts and minds and souls and strength; and we are then to love each other as ourselves.
2.) Wives are to submit to their husband as to the Lord.
3.) Husbands are to love their wives by giving themselves up for her so she may stand holy and blameless before God.
Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ.
Wives, submit to your husbands as to the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church, his body, of which he is the Savior.
Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the word, and to present her to himself as a radiant church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless. Ephesians 5:21-23,25-27
And one of the scribes came up and heard them disputing with one another, and seeing that he answered them well, asked him, “Which commandment is the most important of all?” Jesus answered, “The most important is, ‘Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’ The second is this: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no other commandment greater than these.” Mark 12:28-31
God’s promises for Marriage
1.) Marriage is like the parable of the talents: the reward is to enter into the joy of our Master. God owns marriage and children and he entrusts them to us to see what we make of them.
2.) In marriage, expanding the talents = Godly marriage, Godly offspring – they start off only as potential.
Behold, children are an allotment from the LORD; the fruit of the belly is a reward. Psalm 127:3
“For it will be like a man going on a journey, who called his servants and entrusted to them his property.To one he gave five talents, to another two, to another one, to each according to his ability.
And he who had received the five talents came forward, bringing five talents more, saying, ‘Master, you delivered to me five talents; here I have made five talents more.’ His master said to him, ‘Well done, good and faithful servant. You have been faithful over a little; I will set you over much. Enter into the joy of your master.’ Matthew 25:14-15, 20-21
Our Vows
Benjamin's Vows:
My beloved Lauren, standing in the sight of God and before these witnesses I, Benjamin, take you to be my wife until my last breath.
I promise to love you with a love which endures all things, a perfect love which casts out fear
only possible by the Holy Spirit of God.
I promise to tend you like a beautiful tree
so that I may be a husband to you tending, pruning, and watering that you will bear good fruit for the glory of God.
I promise to honor you, lead you, provide for you, and be faithful to you so that I may present you blameless before our God and Savior.
This ring is a symbol and a seal of this covenant
that we remember our bond together all the days of our lives.
Lauren’s Vows:
My Dearest Benjamin, today before our God and these witnesses, I accept you as my lawful husband for as long as we're both still alive.
As your wife, these are the things I’m promising to always do no matter what the circumstances: I will honor you, cherish you, obey you, be faithful to you in all things, follow you and help you the way I was created to.
And I will love you, with the kind of love that isn’t proud and doesn’t boast and doesn’t even notice when someone does it wrong; but it's kind and it's gentle and it always hopes, and always trusts, and always perseveres: because that kind of love doesn't fail.
I’m not promising these things by my own strength, but by the power of God's Spirit that lives inside me and who lives inside you. I would like you take this ring and wear it as a sign and a seal on your body of this covenant, so that whenever you see it you remember what I’ve promised you today.
Bless the Most High!
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