Audio transcript
Yesterday we talked about donating the physique to science, which is a pure query out of your article on cremation. Probably the most surprising follow-up query out of your cremation article is about weddings. Summer time from Minnesota asks: “Expensive Pastor John, In your latest article you wrote, 'Pastors ought to paved the way in cultivating a church ethos the place costly funerals (and weddings!) should not the norm.' That is one thing I hadn't thought a lot about earlier than and I actually appreciated it. Thanks! I hoped you can converse extra instantly on the subject of high-priced weddings. How can we design a 'Christ-glorifying, easy marriage ceremony'?”
Be counter-cultural
In a second, I’ll ask {couples} for the braveness to be countercultural on this regard, as a result of it would require it. However most of all, I’m asking the pastors on this article to take the initiative to show and preach and assist construct a tradition of simplicity within the church that makes the middle of the marriage celebrations of the Lord Jesus, the Christ exalting the significance of marriage. , the superb significance of vows, the rarity of individuals, lovers – and No the garments, the flowers, the placement, the music, the entire staging that makes the true act of God in marriage look like an off-the-cuff prelude to the large, fancy social gathering that follows. That's unhappy, I believe.
“Construct a tradition the place no one among modest means feels that an extraordinary marriage ceremony is much less honorable to God.”
However in fact this isn’t an assault on pleasure. Precisely reverse. It’s a plea to drink from the deepest swimming pools of pleasure, not from the marginal puddles of happiness. Godly poor persons are repeatedly happier than wealthy individuals. There is no such thing as a correlation between costly and joyful – none. If it's not this: dearer means extra trouble, extra stress, extra distraction – much less pleasure.
This can be a plea to leaders to domesticate an expectation of simplicity in order that no one among modest means—and that's lots of people—appears like a easy mint-and-nuts marriage ceremony—no meals, no dancing, simply pleasure—is in some way much less honoring to the Lord and the couple. That is tragic if we’ve cultivated such a state of affairs.
Come and see
Now here’s a primary world view. She requested why. A decisive turning level in redemptive historical past occurred when Jesus got here into the world. The Previous Testomony was largely a “come and see” faith, whereas the New Testomony is essentially a “refer and inform” faith. This is the reason there’s a massive expenditure on the temple within the Previous Testomony. Come and see from Egypt and from Ethiopia and from the ends of the earth, come and see this treasured temple that we’ve constructed. That’s the reason wealth was so repeatedly seen as an indication of God's blessing.
This modified radically with the approaching of the Son of Man, who had nowhere to put his head and advised us to go and threat our lives to make disciples of the nations (Matthew 8:20; 28:19). We don’t dwell in Previous Testomony instances. This isn’t faith coming to see. Christianity doesn’t also have a geographical heart. That is the go-tell faith.
So the revolution is in using our assets. What drives our way of life now could be attempting to point out that our treasure is in heaven and never on earth. What drives us is attempting to maximise our giving to finish the Nice Fee and love the struggling of the world. The New Testomony relentlessly pushes us towards simplicity and economic system for the dominion and away from luxurious and affluence and pageantry, together with fancy weddings.
Relentless simplicity
Simply to get a style of what I imply once I say it's relentless, take into account just a few Bible verses.
“Plan weddings with one-fourth the fee and one-fourth the stress—and twice the give attention to Christ's glory.”
- Luke 6:20, 24: “Blessed are the poor, for yours is the dominion of God. . . . Woe to you who’re wealthy, for you might have accepted your consolation.”
- Luke 8:14: “They’re choked with cares and riches and the pleasures of life.”
- Luke 9:58: “The son of man has nowhere to put his head.”
- Matthew 6:19: “Don’t lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, the place moth and rust destroy them.”
- Matthew 6:25: “I inform you, don’t worry about your life. . . . Life [is] greater than meals. . . and garments.”
- Luke 12:33: Promote your possessions and provides to the needy. Present your self with . . . treasure in heaven.”
- Luke 14:33: “Whoever doesn’t resign all that he has can’t be my disciple.”
- Luke 18:24: “How laborious it’s for individuals who have possessions to enter the dominion of God!”
- 2 Corinthians 6:10 Paul was “poor, but he grew to become wealthy.” He had “nothing but [possessed] all.”
- 1 Timothy 6:7-8: “We introduced nothing into the world, and we are able to take nothing out of the world. However so long as we’ve meals and garments, we are able to do it.”
- Hebrews 10:34: “You gladly accepted the plundering of your possessions, understanding that you simply yourselves have a greater and lasting possession.”
When Noel and I received married, she wore her mom's marriage ceremony gown. Free, to launch. No, she needed to make some changes – most likely just a few {dollars}. I used to be carrying my greatest and solely Sunday go well with. My greatest man did the identical. Her matron of honor wore a fairly Sunday gown. We had an open Bible and a cross on stage simply to point out what our values are. The church organ was performed. My father preached. The church hosted a reception that was within the fellowship corridor: no meals, no refreshments. There was a cake. I borrowed my father's automotive to go on my honeymoon—a seven-hour drive to St. Petersburg, Florida, the place we stayed in a one-story motel on the seaside.
It was all easy. It was all stuffed with pleasure. It was explosive with comfortable anticipation. No person borrowed any cash. The Lord, the Phrase, the guarantees, the lovers have been within the foreground and God was honored – and 47 years later we’re as married as anybody else. I believe it's a good suggestion.
A big day
Let me emphasize once more. PUSH Yippee place for specialty okay? Take heed to me. PUSH Yippee a spot for the particular: particular clothes, particular bills, particular magnificence within the simplicity of the Christian life. PUSH Yippee a spot for magnificence.
However what is going on within the evangelical church at the moment, it appears to me, is getting out of hand and somebody must put the brakes on it. So I’m asking pastors particularly. Let the principle factor be the service and the Phrase and guarantees and the Lord and love. There could also be no meals after the marriage. Consider me. Not there. There doesn't should be dancing. It doesn't should be in an costly lodge. There doesn't should be a paid quintet. Actually, they don't should.
Along with pastors main the best way, we’d like younger individuals with spine and radical Christian braveness to face as much as the tradition and present what fact and wonder and pleasure can appear to be at one-quarter the fee and one-quarter the nervousness and one-quarter the stress—and double the main focus for the glory of Christ and the event of his kingdom.
