They Tied That Knot

Kaylee, Keegan, Zoe, Cole, Lisa, Blake (the groom), Madison (the bride), Dennis, Kamise and Meseret

The first I’d heard that she desired her momma to walk her down the sandy aisle in addition to her dad was at the rehearsal the day before her wedding. This was one of those unexpected gifts that took my breath away. As the wedding party rehearsed processing down the sand dune on Atlantic Beach, my dear friend, who’d agreed to coordinate the festivities throughout the weekend, exclaimed, “They’re a hot mess!” and ran down to make straight the chaos as Madison and I laughed out loud. Grateful for the chaos which brings joy because often it doesn’t.

And then it was our turn to practice. With her dad on her left and her momma on her right—as we walked too quickly down the sandy aisle—she leaned over to me and said something like, “It didn’t make sense to only have dad escort me down the aisle for you were always there with me…and I wanted to push back on patriarchy.” 

“That’s my girl,” I said as we giggled and slowed our steps, responding to the corrective rebuke of others.

She’d melted down the day before as 30 friends and family gathered for lunch and dinner at the beach houses our dear friend provided for the week. Weddings can be hard for introverts who don’t pleasure in being the center of attention. Grateful for the time to be with her, to love her in her tears and terror, and assure her there is a party happening that isn’t dependent upon her being at the center all of the time. It was a gift to provide the shelter she needed to restore and move back into community.

And then came Sunday, December 8, the morning we would give our girl away to Blake. The one into whom I had poured everything I had to offer these past 23 years had found the one to whom she desired to leave and cleave and lay down her life for the rest of her life. She was the one who always said, “No, I’m not interested in any guys…they’re all stupid.” She was the one who I thought might be the last to marry. And she was the one who took my breath away as I walked into the white room where she sat as my sister designed her hair.

“It’s a blustery day, “ I said. “Probably the perfect day for my Eeyore to marry.” She smiled and agreed. She was calm and happy this day—ready to speak her homemade vows into her man. She’s one who’s been able to hold in tension that darkness and light, brokenness and beauty, crucifixion and resurrection are always in an intimate embrace. And she was ready to intertwine herself with Blake, trusting him to shelter her and allowing her to shelter him throughout this life. 

A RISKY LOVER

Marriage is risky. I wonder how many times this came to God’s mind as He designed His church to be His bride. What kind of wild God would come up with that design? A design in which His love would be betrayed a trillion times over and again, in which his bride would daily prostitute herself to lesser loves which serve to strip her of the fulness He longs for her to enjoy, a marriage of a faithfully loving bridegroom and a somewhat faithful bride who doesn’t often see Him as the lover He is. Marriage demands a million little deaths to the self to survive. 

And in His perfection, the consummate bridegroom, who’d loved perfectly, stumbled under evil and betrayal and then died countless deaths as He hung on the cross, crucifying evil and the selfishness which curves us in on ourselves. There, the consummate bridegroom set us free to a life of imaging Him as the lover He is in this world. He set us free to incarnate Him

As her dad and I escorted her over the dune, we were greeted with 100 radiant faces of dear ones there to witness Madison and Blake’s consecration to one another. They washed each other’s feet, they read their homemade vows, and they kissed like they meant it. We encountered the incarnation everywhere over the weekend—in feasting, in tears, in stress, in creativity, in laughter, in play, in beauty, in vows, in dancing and in the embrace each another.

I wonder in what unexpected spaces and faces are you experiencing the incarnate Jesus during this advent season?