Saturday, March 14, 2015

the wedding ceremony of Abby Leigh Butler and Jens Micah Herman

Wedding of Abby Butler and Jens Herman

Prelude 6:45-7:10

Procession 7:10 AM

Emily & Jens- enter from the right

Seating of the mothers

Inge, escorted by Bjorn, Su Ann, escorted by Judge & Kyle

Bridal Processional 7:13 AM

- Abby & Dad

Welcome

Let us give thanks to the Lord, for he is good.

His steadfast love endures forever.

What a gift to be together on the beach this morning for this glorious celebration!

(Please be seated)

Welcome to this service celebrating the marriage of Abby Leigh Butler and Jens Micah Herman, these two we treasure for the beauty they add to the world, for the way they point to hope for all of us, for their authentic kindness, for their playful spirits, and for their true grit, depth and love. (My list could go on and on.)

Those who follow after Christ believe that marriage is a joyful gift of the Lord himself. And it’s Jens and Abby’s desire that this day be a day of worship, a day that celebrates and delights in the Lord. It’s their desire that first their wedding and then their life together bear witness to something far bigger than themselves: that is

-to the One who lived unto death for us,

-to the One whose love teaches us what it means to love.

So they come before the Lord to be married, to be made one in Christ.

But they don’t come alone.

They come before God to be married as persons who have known the encouragement and challenge and nurture of friends, family, and church.

They have gathered together their favorite people in the world and those who have seen them through so much of their journey:

-you who have rocked them to sleep and taught them to drive and seen them grow in faith

-you who have cared for them and encouraged them;

-you who have prayed for them and held them up in challenging times and pointed them to the deep well of God’s love for them;

-you who have shared the story of their love for each other.

... They come before the Lord together with you who will love them still when marriage gets hard and they’re in need of laughter and perspective and the refreshment of God’s Word spoken to them.

Abby and Jens are so grateful to have all of you stand by them in their marriage— and they invite you to stand now to make that promise today... (Invite everyone to stand. Abby & Jens turn to see everyone standing)

—that you would commit yourselves to stand by them in plenty and in want, in sickness and in health, in joy and in sorrow your whole lives long.

Will you do that? If so, let them hear you say “We will.” [We will.] (Say it again: Will you?)

And so we as a community of faith are gathered in the presence of God to give thanks for the gift of marriage, to witness the joining together of Abby and Jens, and to surround them with our prayers and love.

(audience remain standing through opening prayer, Abby and Jens stay facing them through that)

Opening Prayer

Let’s pray:

Gracious God,

We do give you thanks for Abby and Jens. We thank you for the goodness and grace you have lavished upon them and for all that overflows our hearts because they have loved us. And we thank you for the joy they have found in each other. Fill them with your hope, Father. Give their relationship a deep center and a high calling grounded in Jesus’ Story. Let your Holy Spirit rest upon them so that with steadfast love they may honor the promises they make this day, through Christ we pray, Amen.

(invite everyone to be seated , Abby & Jens turn back around.)

Declaration of Intent

Jens, hearing a call to marriage, understanding your relationship with Christ to be the grace-giving center of your life with Abby, and forsaking all other women, do you affirm your desire to enter this covenant of forever love with her and with the Lord? Do you? [I do.]

Abby, hearing a call to marriage, understanding your relationship with Christ to be the grace-giving center of your life with Jens, and forsaking all other men, do you affirm your desire to enter this covenant of forever love with him and with the Lord? Do you? [I do.] //

Scripture Reading The Scripture passage Abby and Jens have chosen for their wedding comes from the book of Colossians 3.12-17.

(Jason reads)

12 Since God chose you to be the holy people he loves, you must clothe yourselves with tenderhearted mercy, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience. 13 Make allowance for each other’s faults, and forgive anyone who offends you. Remember, the Lord forgave you, so you must forgive others. 14 Above all, clothe yourselves with love, which binds us all together in perfect harmony. 15 And let the peace that comes from Christ rule in your hearts. For as members of one body you are called to live in peace. And always be thankful. 16 Let the message about Christ, in all its richness, fill your lives. Teach and counsel each other with all the wisdom he gives. Sing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs to God with thankful hearts. 17 And whatever you do or say, do it as a representative of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks through him to God the Father. Colossians 3:12-17 New Living Translation

Wedding Message

(see earlier blog post this morning for the text of the message)

Exchange of Wedding Vows

Jens, Abby

I now want to invite you to turn to one another, to join hands,

and with promises

before God and the family of faith,

be bound together as husband and wife.

Jens, repeat after me:

I, Jens Micah, take you, Abby Leigh, to be my wife. I promise before God to be your loving and faithful husband. I promise to cherish, honor, and love you, in every season:

In tears and in laughter

In trials and in celebration

In sickness and in health

In sorrow and in joy

All of my days

Now Abby:

I, Abby Leigh, take you, Jens Micah, to be my husband. I promise before God to be your loving and faithful wife. I promise to cherish, honor, and love you, in every season:

In tears and in laughter

In trials and in celebration

In sickness and in health

In sorrow and in joy

All of my days

Exchange of Rings

May I have the Bride’s ring?

The wedding ring is an unending circle. It’s a visible symbol of God’s unending love and faithfulness, and the unending love and faithfulness you promise each other today.

Wear your rings as a reminder of God’s steadfast love and forgiveness, his circle of grace, so that you might be free to be grace-givers to each other.

Jens repeat after me:

Abby, with this ring, I thee wed.

I give it as a sign of our covenant;

and a token of my love;

a love that knows its beginning and end

in the extravagant and gracious love of God;

in the name of the Father;

and of the Son;

and of the Holy Spirit.

Now Abby:

Jens, with this ring, I thee wed.

I give it as a sign of our covenant;

and a token of my love;

a love that knows its beginning and end

in the extravagant and gracious love of God;

in the name of the Father;

and of the Son;

and of the Holy Spirit.

Wedding Prayer:

Let’s pray:

Loving God,

We pray that you might pour out your Spirit upon Abby and Jens so that, in their belonging to you, they might belong to each other all their days. We pray that day by day and decision by decision their marriage might become more and more a reflection of your self-sacrificial love. Be always at the center of their marriage. Give them strength when the road seems too long, and give them flexibility, perseverance and laughter in times of disappointment. Bless them with a deep well of hope and joy as they enter into this new chapter. Build them up in areas that are weak and help them to love each other well. Surround them with friends, family and church to cheer them on. Bless these two-become-one, Lord, and guide them by your Word to serve you all of their days. Through Jesus Christ our Lord, Amen.

Declaration of Marriage

Before God and in the presence of their friends and family, Abby and Jens have made their promises to one another and confirmed those promises by the giving and receiving of rings. Therefore, I now pronounce them husband and wife, in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. As Jesus said: “What God has joined together, let no one separate.”

You may kiss the bride.

Benediction

(turn toward the congregation)

Abby and Jens, Brothers and Sisters, Friends:

I pray that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God. Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen. Ephesians 3:16-21

Presentation of Couple

I would now like to present to you for the first time as a married couple:

Abby Butler and Jens Herman

Recessional

Recessional- Abby & Jens

Song

Emily then announces

1. As you know, Abby & Jens have requested an "all guest" photo, so stay where you are and listen to Sara, the photographer's directions.

2. Following that, the group photos will begin, so listen for your group number/name for your photo with the couple.

3. We invite you to enjoy coffee, OJ, and donuts poolside. You will find a schedule of events there for the day, as well as the guest book. Feel free to take yours to go or stay. Please note that the house will "close" at 8:30.

3-14-15

With 100% chance of rain this morning and a few sprinkles while we were putting up the flowers up outside, it looked like it was going to be a wet ceremony. The prayer, "Thank you for disappointments that lead us to depend on You truly" was one that I thought about this morning when we were gathering at the house getting ready. The pitter patter of rain gave us all a chance to rise to the occasion and to be flexible. And then, prayers were answered and God gave us the gift of morning glory with the rain that stopped, the fog that held off and the sun that began peeking through the clouds.... Amazing grace indeed....

In many ways, the morning felt like a race morning with all of us running on little sleep and a lot of adrenaline pumping through us to get to the start line... And what a fabulous race it was with cheers all around at the finish line...

below is the message shared on the beach this glorious morning:

"Abby & Jens, I want to say what a gift it is to be a part of this day of celebration with the two of you. It’s so special to be here with all of the people you consider to be your home team. And it fills my heart with such joy to get to stand with you to celebrate the gift God is giving to each of you in the other.

Little did you know the adventure the next five years would hold for you both and how you would experience the wonder and wildness of life together.

Today is an extraordinary day indeed. And on this day, it is hard to imagine the beautiful, life-altering, soul-shaping things ahead of you. This is just the beginning.

From this day on, you will cry together, laugh together, pray together, wash dishes and move furniture together. You will learn and unlearn things, make a home together, hurt each other’s feelings without meaning to, and sometimes even on purpose. You will learn over time that the heart of marriage is forgiveness. You will learn how much forgiveness the other requires, and then you will also realize just how much forgiveness you yourself need.

Today is about the promise of the future and all the great moments of the past and, indeed, this beautiful present where you stand together, surrounded by people who love you and who are praying that your marriage is one of the great ones. It can be-- if you work hard and forgive often, and get over yourself and your selfishness over and over again. It can be one of the stories people tell, when they want to believe in love’s power and life’s richness.

Abby, when I asked you to share what you love about Jens, you said

“I love Jens for the way that he is patient and always listens- to me and the world- with all that he has, with openness, and with grace. He believes the best in people, and aspires to always act with love and kindness and to give the best to people- to me, to the kids he served in Americorps to his friends and to his medical staff. I love Jens because he believes there's good in me and there's something worth learning from me as we learn and grow together. He makes every day fun, and I am so thankful I get to call him my best friend and to spend forever together.

Jens, when I asked you what you love about Abby, you said:

“I love that she hasn't given up on me. Clearly, I come with plenty of obstacles, but she has stuck with me. I love her kindness towards people and her devotion to each of her students. ...the way she laughs at her own jokes (even if I'm not) or when she can't contain her laughter to the point it turns to tears....when she lets go and just acts silly....that she likes to learn or try new things-she's usually up for a new adventure...that she enjoys sports, at least enough to deal with me. She makes things fun and keeps me going on tough days.”

You love each other. And you are each so very grateful to discover in the other someone who longs to live into the Story centered around God’s Never Stopping, Never Giving-Up, Unbreaking, Always and Forever Love.

That is where this extraordinary passage of Scripture you’ve chosen for your marriage begins and ends, with the extravagant and amazing love of God.

As those God chooses and sets apart as beloved, clothe yourselves with his compassion, kindness, patience. Bear with one another. Forgive each other as the Lord forgives you. Above all, clothe yourselves with love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony.

The day of your wedding is a fitting day to speak of putting on new attire—of starting fresh, of clothing yourselves every day with the qualities that make marriage lasting and beautiful.

There are a couple truths from this Scripture I want to hold up today,

1. It’s Jesus who reveals to us what love truly is. If we’re to see the clothing we were created to wear, the life that fits us well, we’re meant to look to Him

2. When we put on the love of Christ, we become part of what God is doing to redress the world (part of the whole new tapestry he is stitching across the earth)

We must recognize that we’re living in a world where there’s so much shallowness that masquerades as love.

Love is portrayed as a mere feeling. An emotion. A gushy romantic sentimentality. It’s so often conditional - on youth, attractiveness, money, health, convenience, success.

It lasts until feelings fade and things get hard. Until disappointment comes.

But, God’s affirmation in Colossians is that conditional notions of love are not the clothing of love at all. That they’re only costumes pretending to be the real thing.

Rather, if we’re to know what real love looks like—if we’re to know how to clothe ourselves with love—we look to Jesus– to how he lived for us.

And Jesus…

--befriended outcasts

--touched lepers

--washed feet

--cried with those who were grieving

--celebrated w/ those who were celebrating

--spoke truth in love

--forgave & forgave & forgave until…

--his body was broken/his blood poured out

--came back to forgive even those who had driven nails

This is what the love of God looks like. Compassionate. Patient. Kind. Self-sacrificial. Unconditional. Unto death.

Not merely a feeling, but a forever promise. Fitting clothing. Costly clothing. The very stuff we were made for!

So when we clothe ourselves with Christ for one another, we make real love known to the world and transformation is manifest.

Caterpillars have to die to themselves in order to put on the spectacular colors of the butterfly. It turns out that even before this transformation from death to new life, even as caterpillars, they have butterfly parts within them. They have wings waiting to happen.

And we, too are made for transformation from self-seeking to self-giving. We were meant to wear the spectacular clothing of Christ from the beginning. We were meant to fly. But to wear those colors, to truly fly, means dying to ourselves.

And if anyone understands this deeper picture of love, it’s you two. The way you’ve given to each other in the last 5 years has been remarkable and is one that has inspired me to try breathe through a straw while running to try to understand what CF was like (I don’t recommend it) and you’ve inspired me to run – not one but two marathons in your honor. You did not know what you were saying yes to when you went on your first date, but God had in store for you much change, growth, discovery, and transformation, and He kept expanding your vision of what was possible. Through it all, He helped you to face the challenges at every step as you learned to breathe again. The sacrifice, the risk, the stepping out in faith, the stamina and strength through the journey of the transplant is something that has made your foundation incredibly strong. You two have an anchor that has holds.

Christian relationships are meant to be a parable of God’s love to the world. And when we love each other with the surprising love of Christ, with his dying to self, with his commitment through adversity, then people come to experience in us a taste of hope that God is truly alive, that they can forgive and endure, too. And the kingdom of God grows.

And that is what your story has shown to me and to all of us here…

The love of Christian marriage is the love of Christ’s self-sacrifice. His costly forgiveness. A life of giving of Himself over and over and over.

Your marriage will be a covenant, a sacred promise grounded in the love of God. Marriage is the avenue God teaches us to learn to love….

It will endure in joy & sorrow, sickness & health, plenty & want…

There will be times

--when you just wish he could read your mind

--when you just wish she could see how right you really are

--when you discover together again and again that what’s obvious to you, is obvious only to you

But in all the times when you’d like to throw in the towel, you have a choice to be the light and love of Christ to the other, to be bread and wine for the other…. To offer a life poured out over and over for the other….

You will find there is great joy in choosing to cheer your spouse on to risk becoming all that the Lord intends

In making a Christian marriage covenant, you’re promising something as huge as the heart of God: to love and forgive as the Lord loves and forgives you.

Then people will see your marriage as a reflection of something far larger than you.

Marriage is a path that teaches us to love ourselves and love someone else better … especially when it is most difficult to do. When we extend grace to ourselves and to our partner, we seek to understand instead of condemn and we learn to love. God’s shaping of our character is made manifest in this open hearted, courageous, vulnerable daily practice of love.

I believe in the way God knits two people together like this as you are standing before Him today on your wedding day. Something sacred is happening in this moment, something that will, with grace and intention and faith and hard work, build upon itself and grow in power and beauty and durability with each passing year.

It is our prayer that your marriage would be centered on Christ so that you might be dressed in his love for one another, that you would practice a costly life of forgiveness that requires you to die to yourself over and over again on behalf of taking flight with new beginnings, and that as you wear the clothing of Christ, your marriage might bear witness to God’s Never Stopping, Never Giving Up, Unbreaking, Always and Forever Love for which our world is desperate!

Bless you both as you walk together loving forth the image of God in each other.

Make your love story one worth telling. Make it one worth living, every day, as long as you both shall live."

Friday, March 13, 2015

it matters

We were all a bit jet lagged from our red eye on Wednesday night, but I rolled out of bed and decided to head out for a run. I started to head south on Folly Beach to see what I could find and went as far as I could go on the island that direction. I then turned around and headed as far as I could the other direction north. The route turned out to be a bit longer than I expected, but at least I knocked out my long run for the weekend. :)

where the sidewalk ends... (the end of Folly Island to the south)

wearing the same running shoes I wore in the marathon this summer- it seems so fitting as this weekend seems to have all sorts of running and race analogies tied up with it...

love the blue dot showing me where I was at the end of the island.

I came across a bunch of starfish at some point on my run and threw one back in the ocean for good measure in honor of this quote:

“Once upon a time, there was a wise man who used to go to the ocean to do his writing. He had a habit of walking on the beach before he began his work.

One day, as he was walking along the shore, he looked down the beach and saw a human figure moving like a dancer. He smiled to himself at the thought of someone who would dance to the day, and so, he walked faster to catch up.

As he got closer, he noticed that the figure was that of a young man, and that what he was doing was not dancing at all. The young man was reaching down to the shore, picking up small objects, and throwing them into the ocean.

He came closer still and called out "Good morning! May I ask what it is that you are doing?"

The young man paused, looked up, and replied "Throwing starfish into the ocean."

"I must ask, then, why are you throwing starfish into the ocean?" asked the somewhat startled wise man.

To this, the young man replied, "The sun is up and the tide is going out. If I don't throw them in, they'll die."

Upon hearing this, the wise man commented, "But, young man, do you not realize that there are miles and miles of beach and there are starfish all along every mile? You can't possibly make a difference!"

At this, the young man bent down, picked up yet another starfish, and threw it into the ocean. As it met the water, he said,
"It made a difference for that one.”
― Loren Eiseley