Justin, Max: Welcome to your wedding.
The very first thing we should do is recognize how beautiful this moment is. Here we are, fresh from airplanes and taxis and shuttles, in a different country, a beautiful city, to practice and witness love. We practice the love we have for Justin and Max. Love that carried us thousands of miles from our front doors. The love of parents that raised a boy to a man, a girl to a woman. The love of siblings that helped shape these two human beings into the beautiful people they are today. The love of friendship that was there when past relationships failed, and when Justin and Max were lovers with broken hearts. And we who love are here to witness love: love between two people we love; love, between Justin and Max, that has been tested and proven true, love that in some ways is just beginning, love that is deep and barely explored. The love between a Georgia boy who somehow found a California girl, growing up over two thousand miles apart. Let us first give a hand to love, and to Justin and Max.
To Audience: Hey everyone. I’ve been to a lot of weddings. But I’ve never been here, where I’m standing now; I’ve always been where you are – and so I identify as you. Except for once when I was standing where Justin stands, I always sit where you now sit. You and I are together. And we’ve learned a lot from those seats in which you sit. The primary thing: This is our least favorite part of every wedding. The part where the officiate – in this case, me – stands between the two soon to be wedded, makes a couple of jokes that are a little too practiced (like they’re written to sound as though they’re off the cuff, but they’re very obviously just written down), he may get a little too religious to the point where he actually invites you to his church and that’s just a little too desperate like he’s some sort of Jesus salesman who needs to hit his quota; and worst of all, he goes on and on about stuff that’s seemingly not even related to the event at hand and all you want him to do is shut up so you can begin drinking and eating and dancing and taking selfies.
I understand. I am with you. Completely. And so I promise to keep this short, sweet, and to the point.
Sing: “Five hundred, twenty-five thousand, six hundred minutes.” Come on, let’s sing it together. You know it. “Five hundred, twenty-five thousand, six hundred minutes.” Again, “Five hundred, twenty-five thousand, six hundred minutes.” Just you now: “Five hundred, twenty-five thousand, six hundred minutes.” That’s how long it takes for America to experience 700,000 divorces. I’m sorry. But yeah, one year, and over one divorce per minute. That’s 1.4 million human beings doing literally the exact opposite of what we’re here to do and witness today.
And yet here we stand – sit; I’m sorry, I promise I’m one of you; here we sit and stand – to watch an incredibly smart woman (refer to Max) and Justin choose to spend the rest of their lives together.
This is an incredibly important moment. A moment that has been earned and is deserved. A beautiful moment between two beautiful people who have sacrificed so much to promise to one another that they’ll love each other forever.
Forever.
But there I think is the primary problem. The problem and reason why 1.4 million once-wedded Americans experienced divorce last year.
I remember as a boy trying to understand infinity. I’m the son of a pastor, and so God was one of my first subjects, and infinity was the first thing I found interesting about God. I’d lie in bed, just trying to think as far as I could. Infinity covers spatial distance, infinity covers time. And no matter which route I took, I always had the same problem. My human brain in my human body is too limited.
That was probably twenty-five-ish years ago. For me, a lifetime ago. And yet not much has changed in the Jacob-Tries-to-Understand-Infinity department. If I’m lucky, I’ve got sixty more years to try to figure it out. I know I’ll fail. I’ll still be human.
We humans are too finite to comprehend the infinite. We’re too limited to understand the limitless. We’re too human to understand the divine.
And so forever is not how long I’ll ask you to love one another. I can’t even understand the question. I won’t even ask you something as general as will you love one another for the rest of your lives, because truthfully, I don’t think we can even understand that.
I don’t mean to spoil the end of this little spiel, but what I will ask you both, Justin and Max, is this: Will you promise to always love one another – more than you love yourselves – right now?
The problem with so many marriages these days, I believe, is we believe marriage itself is somehow going to work itself out. I think we put marriage on too high of a pedestal and we think somehow time is going to make it better. Time won’t make it better. Time will test it. And once tested, the marriage will either pass or fail.
Marriage is nothing but a promise made between two people. The more detailed and exact that promise, the more attentive the two people are to that promise, the more likely that promise will last another day. But it’s still just a promise.
Marriage is not magical. Neither is love. In their prime, they may feel magical. But unattended, both, marriage and love, will do as everything else in this world does: fade and die.
I’ve been married seven and a half years. Not nearly long enough to be up here acting like I know what I’m talking about. I love my marriage. I can genuinely say it’s been great. It’s the best thing I’ve ever done. But it hasn’t been an act of magic; it’s been hard work put in by two people who each day – each moment – have to choose to love the other person more than they love themselves. Each moment, we are given the choice to love ourselves more or our spouse more. My wife and I have failed moments. But, thank God, most moments, we have won.
Marriages succeed not because of an empty promise to love one another forever or even for the rest of our lives; marriages succeed because of what each spouse chooses to do in each and every moment.
This, right now, is a special moment. It’s a beautiful moment. It’s an important moment. But it’s an easy moment.
In your lives, you’ll have many much different moments than this one.
You’ll have moments of hardships. You’ll have sick moments. You’ll have hurt moments. You’ll have moments on a Tuesday that are just boring and gray. You’ll have moments dealing with death. Moments of joy. Moments covered up with work and dirty bathrooms and laundry piles and bills and car problems. You’ll have moments where one spouse loves him or herself more than you. You’ll have moments of not speaking, moments of intimacy, moments of deep connection, moments of feeling deserted, moments of feeling supported, moments of supporting. You’ll have moments of darkness, you’ll have moments of light.
And each one of those moments is equally as important as this one we breathe. And in each of those moments, you’ll be given the same question I’m asking you today – the question that breaks or makes a marriage: Will I love this person – more than I love myself – right now?
I don’t know each of your religions, but I know my own, and so I will speak from it briefly.
In the occult, we believe – I don’t mean to poke fun at anyone, but that’d be a twist, right?
The Bible is filled with miracles. It’s filled with miraculous moments. But there is one, I believe, greater than all the rest. Greater than the sea being divided, greater than water being turned into wine, greater than a loaf of bread feeding 5,000, greater than death becoming life.
It’s the miracle of a human being choosing to love before he is loved. It’s the miracle of a human being choosing to love even when he’s hated. And yet that very same human tells us we have the same power within us to continue that miracle. And he goes on to say, we will do even greater things than he has done. And by God, a good marriage is one great miracle.
But how do we do it? We return to infinity.
The book of Genesis says each one of us was made in the image of God. The book of John tells us were made in Christ, through Christ, and with Christ. You, both of you, and all of us, have the Christ DNA in our very veins. We are made up of infinity.
It may feel like a very small amount of infinity at times. Trust me, I know myself. Short-tempered, impatient, selfish, insecure. But even when I’m at my smallest, even when we are at our worst, we have the power of Infinite Divinity within us.
People, a math question for you.
What is infinity divided by two?
Infinity.
What is infinity divided by ten? Infinity divided by one hundred? Infinity divided by one thousand? Infinity divided by one million? Infinity divided by 7.888 billion?
You – Justin, Max – are two human beings who have been made through the infinite Christ, with infinity running through your veins in every moment you will ever live.
You, Justin and Max, are two paradoxical creations. Infinite souls living in finite bodies. You are forever firmly planted in the Now who, with awakened awareness focused on Christ, can continue humanity’s greatest miracle.
And so, in the power of Christ, through the power of Christ, and with the power of Christ, I have one question for each of you.
Justin, take your bride’s hands in your own.
Justin, do you promise to always love Max – more than yourself – right now?
To signify your promise, Justin, please place Max’s ring on her finger.
Max, do you promise to always love Justin – more than yourself – right now?
To signify your promise, Max, please place Justin’s ring on his finger.
Justin, you may kiss your bride.
Ladies and gentlemen, right now and for the rest of theirs nows, I present to you, Justin and Maxine House.