Kaleo San Diego Church > Articles

Hollow Vows

Taylor Rahne
Jun 1, 2004
Series: Other

“And may life’s possibilities fill you with joy…”

Chew on that inane piece of worse-than-Hallmark drivel for a moment… realizing how puff-daddy pathetic and utterly shallow it is, how little substance it holds, and ultimately how depressed the meaningless platitude makes you. If someone said this to me, I’d be furious; I mean honestly, why should I give a flying fig about possibilities? I’d prefer that reality fill me with joy, thank you very much. Yet apparently “possibilities” are the only thing destined to bring me delight… implying that life’s realities will doubtless bite me in the ass like the next-door neighbor’s pit-bull. If someone used this as the final pronouncement at my wedding, of all places… I’d probably deck the uninspired wretch for trying to invoke a curse upon my covenant.

Saturday, however, I endured my first… ahem… pagan wedding (well, I have to call a spade a spade, don’t I?) since God forcibly removed the wacky-world contact lenses from these elected eyes. Now stick with me here… I’m not your usual “guy”… in the wedding sense of the term. I enjoy weddings, and no—I’m not gay. When a Christian realizes what marriage means, what it symbolizes—a union of intimacy foreshadowing the believer’s spiritual relationship with his Savior in eternal intimacy—well, it tends to make one look past the redundancy with a great expectation of (as H.G. Wells put it so succinctly) “things to come”.

Have I lost you yet?

So I sit down in a chair at this lakeside community center (the first sign of trouble… great view, though) and prepare myself for something wonderful. I’m checking out the other attendees, sitting with my wife, and feeling like something’s missing. However, it’s not until the wedding actually begins (late, but that’s typical) and I realize what—more accurately who—isn’t here. The groom is here, the bride is here, and the female “pastor”, or judge, or whatever she was, were all present… but the most important member of the wedding party didn’t get an invitation.

It seems nobody put God on the guest list.

The groomsmen waltzed in one by one and—curiously—one of them looked suspiciously female, despite the tux and haircut. Next came the obligatory bridesmaids and little children, descending a spiral staircase to a lower level of hell. They all assembled in front of an oddly shaped, lighted, potted plant, and then the plump, jovial woman stepped up to begin the ceremony.

With a little callus, it can be quite amusing to hear the string of platitudes and empty promises that pad out a ritual devoid of meaning or depth, when placed outside of God’s realm of covenant. This couple, it turns out, has been living together already for more than a year. They have already professed to be exclusive and committed to one another. So—except for a tax write-off, why the hell do they need to go through some archaic tradition related to religion? There is no mention in these nuptials of Genesis 2, about God’s inspired pairing of head and helpmate… no mention of Adam’s poetic response to seeing his wife for the first time… no mention of the function, form, or symbolism of Christ and the church inextricably tied to this union. Marriage here, it seems, is—like turning twenty-one—just another excuse on the tired laundry list of reasons to have a party and act goofy. How romantic…

The atheist and her boyfriend sitting next to me at the wedding are moving in together soon, and they have no intention of ever getting “married”, because it’s a useless exercise of old religious and cultural practices. I can appreciate the consistency of their worldview. The blasé, greeting-card hogwash we observe together is spread thick in some desperate attempt to justify the expense of flowers, caterers, dresses, tuxedoes and community hall… all for a lousy, redundant document about how they feel for one another, and a relationship which—statistically speaking—has more than a fifty-percent failure rate. It’s little wonder that so many high-profile Hollywood celebs are refraining from marriage and simply co-habitating with a partner, saying “why would we want to ruin the relationship by getting married?”

Outside of Christianity, they have a damn good point.

And the band played on—badly—as the ceremony transitioned into a “poignant” reading. Next, one of the groomsmen read poetic nonsense that made me grab my wife’s hand a little too hard, trying to stifle my need to choke, or laugh, or just scowl so much that my face (as mother warned) might stick that way. This guy starts reminding the bride and groom that they are getting married, but emphasizes that “they are still two…” (insert vomit here).

"Stand together, but not too close, for the pillars holding up a temple are wisely spaced apart. For the mighty Oak and Cyprus grow tall and strong, yet do not grow in each other's shadows.”

Does anyone need a turn at the barf bag? This warbling geek spends five full minutes lambasting God’s pronouncement that “the two shall become one”, right in the middle of what should have been the celebration of that fusion. So they’re still “two” individuals, just sharing a house and each other’s bodies, inking a “nice deal” to exchange goods and services and procreate… if or until one of them gets fed up with the other. I mean, there’s always alimony and child support, right?

Let’s be “realistic” here. From a human perspective, marriage is stupid. Marriage is dangerous. That’s why we civilized—and especially wealthy—folks have the “pre-nup”, right? We’ve stacked myriad laws and regulations on it, and continue to do so, because foundationally it just doesn’t hold up to human logic and rationale. Marriage is hard work, and messy, and I suspect any non-believer who engages in it is a culturally brainwashed fool. Or perhaps they sense—with the God-given conscience given them according to Romans—that it’s part of their intelligent design… but ultimately that’s still putting the cart before the horse. They’re the “tween” jumping behind the wheel of a Ferrari without an instructor… the three-year old along in the house who finds a shoebox and a shiny, black-handled item inside, with a tempting trigger and a curious hole to peek into. That’s why it’s more tragic than amusing, and ultimately insulting… to see ignorant people mishandling (and debasing) one of the most sacred symbols established by a sovereign God.

As though He were a hungry dog in the corner, they threw the good Lord a bone once or twice in the ceremony, when the pastor/judge/woman lapsed into rote ceremony and included his name in a line or two. And then they were “married”… huzzah!!!… though they’d already co-habitated and consummated; it was like watching a pair of vacationers throwing their car in reverse to back up awkwardly, realizing they’d left one of the kids standing outside the house.

Let’s break down the basics for those now thoroughly pissed at my lack of decorum: God exists. He created man. He created woman. He has this thing we call “foreknowledge” or “omniscience” (which is just a fancy way of saying he knows every little thing past, present, and future). From his brilliant and beautiful perspective he destines his son, Christ—God incarnate—to woo, court, and claim some of us sinners, regenerating us within the context of an intimate relationship. At the end of the world, we celebrate in a tremendous feast, as he comes in glory like a conqueror and claims his spiritual “bride” to dwell with him for eternity in a New Kingdom. You got all that?

Now, since God is the master of storytelling and a great lover of foreshadowing, he plants—at the foundation of our world, the beginning of the story—a symbolic glimpse of that passion, pursuit, and courtship by establishing “marriage”. Chronologically, the celebration of Christ and the church appears at the end of the book, but make no mistake; the marriage of man and woman stemming from Genesis—like the covenants of the old testament—are mere shadow and prelude to ultimate fulfillment in Christ. While some would shrink back at this notion, as though this “diminishes” their marriage in concept—“so it’s just a model, just a symbol, just a rehearsal?”—it achieves quite the opposite… even though all those complaints ring with truth.

Your happiness is not the primary issue in marriage. That’s the first bitter pill to swallow. Your spouse’s happiness is not the primary factor either. It has little to do with comparing and contrasting both of your individual abilities and seeing how they best fit together. God and His glory—as in every facet of existence—is primary. In true, God-given marriage, you have been asked to engage in something larger than the both of you, greater than your extended families, more important than your household and community. You aspire to model perfection… to participate in gorgeous, divine symbolism on a practical, daily basis. You are agreeing to perform in a role that—in Christ—has no equal, to imitate what will be the most lavish, cherished relationship in all of human history.

Yes, I use the word “role”—that’s why scripture says the man is to be like Christ unto the church in headship, and the woman to submit to her husband as the church does to Christ. One’s current desires, skills, and modus operandi are unimportant. The man has a role, and the woman has a role; if you are appointed to play the part of Hamlet, you don’t get to read Ophelia’s lines, or vice-versa. You might even find the other role easier, or more natural, but this is not the point. This is not about putting your heads together, comparing strengths and weaknesses, and setting the relationship-compass appropriately. This is not your model, or your story, or merely your own personal relationship. The Sovereign director appointed the marriage roles to depict a portrait of Christ and the church; you are challenged to perform to the best of your ability, disciplining counter-traits and developing appropriate ones, and trusting that the Spirit will make that picture more of a reality each day.

That is true marriage… a covenant rather than contract, an unbreakable bond representative of the character of an unchanging God. This is why it doesn’t make sense by human law or logic, why it requires devotion and dedication and zeal that we find often falls beyond our ken. We are called to be method actors… to dive so deeply into our role that it overwhelms us, consumes us, until (by the Spirit) we become like our characters… the character of Christ and his perfected bride, a living, breathing portent of things to come. To witness this symbol being trivialized, then… to see it’s very purpose torn out, its heart surgically removed while something mechanical and artificial is put in its place, is a horrifying thing to behold. Like Dr. Victor Frankenstein, looking at the soulless abomination he created and realizing his folly, I stared at this godless marriage before me in disgust and wished I could escape.

And then came the reception… with food, and sweets, and champagne… the expensive whitewash for the tomb. The female groomsman I spied earlier hooked up with her female partner—two churches being intimate, with no Christ in sight—but, considering the surroundings, this seemed oddly appropriate. As I stood by the atheist couple on the terrace, watching the bride and groom dance to gratingly cheesy country music, it seemed we were—sadly—nearly of like mind.

They sensed that a wedding—and concurrently marriage—was meaningless.

I knew that in this particular case, it certainly was.

Some Christians rejoice when their non-believing friends (who are living together and fornicating) decide to get married. “It’s a step in the right direction,” they say, or “they may not believe in God, but at least they’re getting married,” as though somehow it’s halfway to salvation. I’m sorry, but I cannot agree. Trampling all over these sacred symbols is a lot like inviting non-Christians to participate in communion devoid of conviction or repentance, but rather “just for a light snack”. Hey, at least they’re going through the motions, right? Performing this divine ceremony without giving credit to, or even acknowledging, the author of it, is not only copyright infringement, it’s tantamount to blasphemy.

Some non-Christians will respond to this with “well, that’s YOUR definition of a wedding.” Poppycock. If I was given free, godless reign to design my own definition of marriage, I don’t know what it would look like. It would probably be tailored to all my current desires, still flawed and in the midst of conformation. This has nothing to do with MY definition or YOUR definition. This is about God’s definition, because His is the only one that’s NOT worth a damn. Think about that.

I’m not sure a pagan wedding reception is the best time to be vocal about this… but then again, I wouldn’t lie about how much it rankled me, this mockery of marriage—a mockery of Christ, and His church—that is undeniably an offense to God. My believing friend says he won’t attend non-Christian weddings, and—though I’m not sure that’s the answer—I’m beginning to understand why. I’m assuming the bride, groom, and most everyone else wanted a cheerful, happy reception. In that case, they’re lucky no one asked me what I thought of the wedding.