The following message contains references to Isaiah 61:10-11, Ephesians 5:22-33, and Revelation 19:6-9. Their full text is at the bottom of this document. It also references the worship songs All Praise to Him and All of Our Tomorrows by Sovereign Grace and There is One Gospel by City Alight.
Look at them. Aren’t Kaela and Aden beautiful? And it’s right that they should be beautiful, isn’t it. It would be wrong if Kaela came down the aisle dressed in blue jeans. Somehow, we just know that weddings are a time for dressing up, for going beyond anything that we’d ordinarily wear in daily life.
This awareness isn’t new to us, either. If we go back almost two thousand years, to the time when the passage that was just read from the book of Revelation was written, we find that in the marriage of the Lamb, the bride is dressed in fine linen, bright and pure. And if we go even farther back, to the time of Isaiah the prophet, we read about a bridegroom decked out like a priest with a beautiful headdress and a bride adorned with jewels. Somehow, we’ve always known that when a man and a woman get married, they should get dressed up in magnificent clothing. And there’s a reason for this that goes beyond just the fun of dressing up. Weddings are symbolic of deep truths about who we are and who God is, and the clothing that the bride and groom wear is part of the story about ourselves that weddings are meant to tell.
That story begins at the beginning of the Bible in chapter 1 of the book of Genesis. There we are told that God created human beings in his image, male and female. We are made to look like God and to be his representatives in caring for the world. Up to that point in the process of creation, God had pronounced his work to have been good, but with the creation of men and women, it became not merely good, but very good. In chapter 2 of Genesis the focus shifts to human beings, and we are told that Adam was created first and began his work of caring for creation alone. His solitude was the first thing in creation to be described as “not good”, so God made Eve to be a partner for Adam in his labors. Turning what was “not good” into what was very good, God brought Eve to Adam, and he received her with joy.
We are told that this is the first wedding when Genesis tells us, “Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh.” Today’s ceremony is patterned after this event, for just as God brought Eve to Adam, so Kaela’s father brought Kaela to Aden, and like Adam, Aden received his bride with joy.
However, it wasn’t simply Adam’s joy at receiving Eve that made creation very good. The creation of Eve completed the picture that God was making of himself in humanity. Adam and Eve were not divine in and of themselves, any more than a picture of a person is a living person, but like a photograph they presented to the world a true portrayal of God. Furthermore, Adam and Eve were, in their marriage, a true image of how God relates to his people.
We see this in other places in the Bible as well. In several places in the Old Testament God called himself a husband to his people. In the New Testament, in the passage from the apostle Paul’s Letter to the Ephesians that was read for us a few moments ago, Paul told husbands and wives that they are to relate to each other as the Son of God, Jesus Christ, relates to his church. And at the end of the last book of the Bible, the book of Revelation, at the culmination of human history, is the description of the wedding supper of the Lamb that was also read for us. Had we read a little farther in that account, we would have found out that the Lamb is Jesus Christ, and his bride is the church. So if we are to understand how God relates to us, a good place to begin is by looking at weddings and marriages.
Since weddings and marriages are pictures of God and his relationship to us, we want to do them right, the way that God gave them to us, so people will see a true picture of God in them. We see this in the vows that Aden and Kaela will make to each other. In marriage as God designed it, the bride and groom make vows of lifelong fidelity to one another because God’s relationship with his people is one of unbroken fidelity. A marriage that could be broken whenever it became convenient fails in its purpose to display a true image of God.
And to do a wedding right, it should point to the splendor and joy of the wedding between Christ and his church. So not only do Aden and Kaela represent Adam and Eve, they also represent Christ and his church. Aden represents Jesus Christ as he receives his bride, and Kaela represents the church, her beauty hinting at the beauty that the church will have at the wedding supper of the Lamb. The beauty and joy of this ceremony and the celebration to follow, are intended to point us to the surpassing joy and beauty that awaits God’s people in the celebration of the fulfillment of God’s purpose for humanity in Jesus Christ.
It is an awesome undertaking to attempt to portray God and his relationship with us. Indeed, on our own, it is utterly beyond us. Our own efforts are simply not good enough to do justice to the beauty, love, holiness, and grace of the God who created us. From our birth we are sinners, broken and rebellious people who can’t and won’t adequately display the character of the sinless Son of God, Jesus Christ.
The brokenness and sin that plague humanity find their source in that same beautiful garden where Adam and Eve were married. Not long after that first joyful wedding Satan appeared the garden, and in a clever evil conversation he got them to break their relationship with God. When Satan was finished, Adam and Eve didn’t trust God and didn’t trust each other. Rejecting their place in God’s family, they lost their place in the beautiful garden that had been their home and became part of Satan’s family instead, spiritually dead and consigned to a difficult life of blood, sweat and tears.
This life of conflict and suffering is our inheritance from Adam and Eve and is the reason why we struggle to make marriages that truly reflect God. Every broken vow, every imprudent union, every mistreated family member and every unsatisfied longing is the fruit of Adam and Eve’s rebellion and sin. Only if our relationship with God is restored and our brokenness is healed will we be able enjoy weddings and marriages that display the goodness and beauty of God as he intends.
The great good news that God makes this restoration and healing possible for those who want it. As the songs that Aden and Kaela chose for us so abundantly testify, God did this by sending the man whom he promised to Adam and Eve, the son of a woman who would defeat Satan. God sent
the Servant KingWho left behind His glorious throneTo pay the ransom for His ownAll praise to Him Who humbly cameTo bear our sorrow, sin, and shameWho lived to die, Who died to riseThe all-sufficient sacrifice
This Servant King is Jesus Christ, the Son of God whose wedding with the church is celebrates in Revelation. But before there could be a wedding, Jesus would have to fight for his bride. He would have to rescue his people from the grip of Satan, pay the penalty that we owed for our rebellion against God, and restore the spiritual life that we lost as a result of Adam and Eve’s disobedience. He accomplished all this not by mobilizing a vast army of angels to fight Satan’s forces, but by dying on the cross and rising back to a newer and richer life a few days later.
It’s a great story. Our glorious hero, the magnificent Son of God, through whom the entire universe and everything in it was created, set aside his glory to be born of a virgin in a poor town on a tiny planet in the unthinkably vast universe to rescue his filthy, battered, rebellious, and spiritually dead church, and gave his life that she might be cleansed, healed, restored, and reconciled. The hero then rose from death to a new life of power, love, and majesty. He then takes the church, now dressed in splendor, as his bride in a wedding of unimaginable beauty and joy. What better story could we imagine? And best of all, it’s true. This is no Marvel Cinematic universe made by actors and CGI; this is the real universe, our world, made by the God who created it all.
The most astonishing thing about this story is that we are invited to be a part of it. It doesn’t matter that we’re filthy, battered, rebellious, and spiritually dead; if we allow Jesus to rescue us, he will make us beneficiaries of his sacrifice and resurrection. We too will be cleansed, healed, restored, and reconciled, and we too will be able to look forward with anticipation and joy to the wedding supper of the Lamb, in which we will be participants as members of Jesus’ bride, the church.
But that wedding has not yet come. Jesus’ church is engaged to be married to him, but the wedding is still in the future. Unlike Aden and Kaela’s engagement, this is a long engagement, nearly two thousand years so far. There has been lots of time for Jesus to send out invitations to his wedding, and all of you are invited as well. If you have any questions about what would be involved in accepting Jesus’ invitation, Aden, Kaela, or I would love to talk more with you about this. For those like Aden and Kaela who have accepted Jesus’ invitation, we have a job to do, for we are appointed to be Jesus’ messengers to get the invitation out to everyone we can.
But what kind of invitation can we give for Jesus’ wedding? It should reflect the significance, beauty, and joy of the event, and ideally have an attractive picture of the couple who are getting married on it, like the invitation that Aden and Kaela sent out for this wedding. How would we create such an invitation to the wedding of Jesus and the church?
The answer is here right in front of us. It’s Aden and Kaela themselves. Aden represents Jesus and Kaela represents the church. They make an excellent picture for us of Jesus and the church. But that only works if Aden looks like Jesus and Kaela looks like the church. It isn’t necessary for Aden to grow a beard, though. The resemblance to Christ and the church that Aden and Kaela need to display in order for them to be a good invitation to Jesus’ wedding goes deeper than that. A description of what is needed from them is in the passage from Paul’s letter to the Ephesian church that was read for us a little earlier.
Aden, as Paul told us, for you to be a good picture of Jesus, you must love Kaela as Christ loved the church, and to give yourself up for her that she might fully become the woman that God intends for her to be. Anything that lies in your power to give Kaela that will help her to live the life that God intends for he, you should gladly give her, whatever it may cost you. Never quit praying for Kaela. She should be second only to Jesus in your affections and concerns, and she should never have a reason to doubt your love for her or your loyalty to her. Commit yourself first to knowing, loving, and following Jesus better, but after that never quit studying Kaela so that you might know her better and so love her better and serve her better. However much you care for yourself, you should care for Kaela just as much, or even more. By loving Kaela in this way, you will be showing us truly how Christ loves his people.
Kaela, for you to be a good picture of the church, you must submit to Aden’s leadership as you would to Jesus. You are to follow his lead like you would on a dance floor with him, not passively but trusting his guidance. You should be actively seeking to receive the good that he intends to give you and to give the best you have to help him lead well. Like Eve, you are Aden’s first assistant in life, and you should be fully committed to helping him succeed in the purposes the Lord has given him. Aden should be second only to Jesus in your affections and concerns, and he should never have a reason to doubt your respect for him or your loyalty to him. Commit yourself first to knowing, loving, and following Jesus better, but after that never quit studying Aden so that you might know him better and so love him better and serve him better. By loving Aden this way, you will be showing us truly how the church submits to Jesus.
Aden and Kaela, by living in marriage this way, you will model for us the love Christ has for his church and the respect the church has for Christ. On your own, this would be a daunting challenge, but God has not left you to your own resources for living this life. God has promised to give you his Holy Spirit, who will supply with what you need to love and serve each other this way. This is why we sang earlier about the Holy Spirit:
All praise to Him whose pow’r imparts
The love of God within our hearts
The Spirit of all truth and peaceThe fount of joy and holiness
It is as the Spirit imparts the love, truth, peace, joy, and holiness that only God can give that you will find yourselves able to do all that he requires for each other.
Beyond that, you have the help of God’s people. We in this room have committed to do whatever we can to uphold you in your marriage, encouraging and equipping you as far as we are able to live out your vows faithfully and joyfully together. If you need prayer, we will pray. If you need strength and encouragement for tough times, we will support you as we can. While the world may try to tear you down or encourage you to break your vows, our goal will always be to uphold you in your marriage and help you live out your vows faithfully and joyfully together.
Cultivate joy in your marriage. Let the Spirit teach you how to take delight in helping one another to thrive. Look for the good things that your spouse does for you and say, “thank you”. Say it often, and in creative ways. Have fun together. Study the Song of Solomon together and learn how to delight each other in the ways that are so richly displayed for us there. As God enables, have children and strive to raise them well, for that will set you squarely against the culture of death that darkens our society. And if children don’t come right away, keep trying – these things take practice. Lives lived like this will adorn your testimony about Jesus and enable you to be a beautiful invitation to the wedding supper of the Lamb.
I said at the beginning that weddings tell a story that is symbolic of deep truths about who we are and who God is. This is that story. It can be summarized in the words of John 3:16 - “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.” This is the true story that your wedding and all weddings and marriages are meant to tell. It is a huge story, one that you will spend your lifetimes learning how to tell well. Keep learning how to tell it better, Aden and Kaela, for we need to hear it. Tell it with all your heart, that we might see in your marriage the truth and beauty of God’s love for us in Jesus Christ and learn again how to respond in love and joy to the love he has for us. Tell the story well, Aden and Kaela, that we might learn from you how to tell the story of God’s love in our own marriages and in our lives, that God might be glorified and we might be blessed in him.
Isaiah 61:10-11
10 I will greatly rejoice in the Lord;my soul shall exult in my God,for he has clothed me with the garments of salvation;he has covered me with the robe of righteousness,as a bridegroom decks himself like a priest with a beautiful headdress,and as a bride adorns herself with her jewels.11 For as the earth brings forth its sprouts,and as a garden causes what is sown in it to sprout up,so the Lord God will cause righteousness and praiseto sprout up before all the nations.
22 Wives, submit to your own husbands, as to the Lord. 23 For the husband is the head of the wife even as Christ is the head of the church, his body, and is himself its Savior. 24 Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit in everything to their husbands.
25 Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, 26 that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, 27 so that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish. 28 In the same way husbands should love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. 29 For no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ does the church, 30 because we are members of his body. 31 Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh. 32 This mystery is profound, and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the church. 33 However, let each one of you love his wife as himself, and let the wife see that she respects her husband.
6 Then I heard what seemed to be the voice of a great multitude, like the roar of many waters and like the sound of mighty peals of thunder, crying out,
Hallelujah!For the Lord our Godthe Almighty reigns.7 Let us rejoice and exultand give him the glory,for the marriage of the Lamb has come,and his Bride has made herself ready;8 it was granted her to clothe herselfwith fine linen, bright and pure—for the fine linen is the righteous deeds of the saints.9 And the angel said to me, Write this: Blessed are those who are invited to the marriage supper of the Lamb. And he said to me, These are the true words of God.
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