I had the great honor of officiating a wedding yesterday, the first wedding that I have done here at Keawala’i Congregational Church.
(I have had MANY vow renewals here, a slew of them, and they are sources of great joy. One day, we had three generation’s of men who came to renew vows with their brides. So, grandpa, his son, and the son’s son, six people squeezed up on the chancel. About 80 years of marriage, total. And I made the mistake beforehand of asking each of them to think of one word that seemed to capture the journey so far, one word that for them summarized the state of their marriage, and no sooner had I asked, when blurted out her answer, and I am not going to tell you what it was, lol. Because– boy howdy, I was not expecting THAT.)
OK– I just threw that story in there to see if anyone was reading. Back to yesterday’s wedding. So the groom was this great guy –let’s call him Reginald, about six foot six, built like a linebacker, and his bride, let’s call her Charlotte, was sweet and intense and very thoughtful about her responses to the question I ask everyone in the pre-wedding session: why do you folks want to get married?
Turns out, they had been together about sixteen years, and had two gorgeous boy, teenagers, both over six feet tall.
But Channa said something interesting in our pre-meeting: she shared that there had been a break in their relationship. They split up for a bunch of years, lived separate lives. But then, more recently, it was like, God somehow drew them back together. And not they wanted to marry.
So yesterday, at the wedding, the StillSpeaking Goad had been asking me to say a word about their relationship, to “personalize” the wedding ceremony for them, but also to address their breakup, since it seemed to be a source of some anxiety for them. There was obviously deep emotion there, but we hadn’t touched it in the pre-meeting. It was in the room, unseen and unremarked.
The bride walked down the aisle to the Leonard Cohen’s song, Hallelujah, played by our friend Tarvin Makia, who had told me he had never played that song at a wedding before! (I told him that I had–once–at a memorable wedding which I will tell you all about sometime, the wedding of Courtney & Scott. It’s a story I include in the memoir I am writing, titled Four Earthquakes.) When it came time for the bride and groom to come up onto the chancel for the exchange of vows and rings, Charlotte hesitated. She tried to pull off her shoes, but she was wearing a gorgeous wedding dress with a long train, clutching her bouquet of roses, and she couldn’t manage the shoes herself. So Reginald saw what was happening, and went to her–right in the middle of the ceremony–this big guy sat on the steps in his tuxedo and helped his bride take off her shoes.
I read 1 Corinthians 13, Paul’s beautiful meditation on the meaning of love, and then, after about a minute, I said something like, “Whatever happened that drove you apart, I want you to know that the fact that you are here right now standing in this church means that God has brought you back together. And whatever may have happened back then caused pain and distress for all four of you. But you mustn’t let it hold you back, because the past is past. It can never be retrieved. It’s gone. And whatever you may have done or not done, that may have caused you pain, it’s gone, too. Forgiven! In the name of Jesus Christ and by his authority alone, I tell you that you are forgiven. That was the past. Don’t dwell there. This marriage is a new covenant. God is a God of second chances. Keep God at the center of your marriage, and at the center of your family, at the center of your home. The former things are passed away. Behold, God is making all things new!”
And I happened to catch a glimpse of Reginald, and he was grinning, ear to ear. And Charlotte had a lovely shy smile.
Reader, they married each other. Earlene rang the bells.
But afterwards, as I was headed back to the office, Reginald stopped me. He shook my hand, looked me right in the eye and said, “Thanks man.” And I told him and his bride and the boys that were welcome to come back to Keawala’i anytime.
I drove home, happy. The Yankees won their playoff game.
A day to remember.