Sunday, March 29, 2009

An Organic Wedding

This coming June our son is going to get married. This is not going to be your average wedding. Why do I say that? Well there are many reasons but we can start by saying that Leah had a dream of her wedding with children around her dressed in white and tossing it seems white flowers towards her and her groom. At this point she and Jaron were friends but they had not communicated verbally any feelings toward each other. Incorporating children into the wedding party dressed in white however is not the only reason this is going to be an unusual wedding. It is going to take place at Leah’s folk’s house on a point on a lake in a clearing in the midst of a group of tall pine trees.

The fathers Dean and I are the officiates whatever that will entail for as yet we have not got that far into the story. Hopefully we will get there soon, we have had some marriage counseling take place with Jaron and Leah but it has been far from the ordinary as it has taken place organically in group settings usually with Leah’s parents and Pam and I. These were not times specifically set up for counseling it occurred naturally within our fellowship times. I was actually amazed at how much ground got covered and how many of the “normal” counseling topics got covered.

Jaron and Leah met very naturally within the small fellowship we have between our two families and a few other families. To get the background on how their relationship grew see their story here: http://www.mywedding.com/jaronandleah/index.html and click on “our story”

Have just recently finished reading Frank Viola’s new book “From Eternity to Here”. If you get a chance get a copy of this book you won’t regret it. One of the main points Frank brings out is the eternal purpose of God to have a marriage partner for the son Jesus. The understanding that marriage is a type of this eternal relationship is a very awakening experience in one’s spirit. Oh I know we all seem to have a mental knowledge of this biblical principal but to have it come from the heart / spirit is an altogether matter. As John Eldridge so often says in order to understand the story we have fallen into it is important to understand the context. Well one of the main contexts of story you and I have fallen into is that God has created us for fellowship. Not just fellowship but a very intimate and purposeful relationship best depicted in our rather shallow ability to understand by the marriage relationship. The church corporately is the bride.

When fellow Christians think of the ripening of the fig tree in Mt. 24 before the coming of Jesus Christ they think of physical Israel. This is good and right but Israel is a type of something much more than what is represented by physical Israel. To actually understand what is in the mind and heart of God regarding this we need to have a grasp of the bigger picture/ context and that includes the bride of Christ.

Son 2:12-13 The flowers appear on the earth; The time of the singing of birds is come, And the voice of the turtle-dove is heard in our land; The fig-tree ripeneth her green figs, And the vines are in blossom; They give forth their fragrance. Arise, my love, my fair one, and come away.

Actually it is the bride that is the fulfillment of the type represented by Israel. This is a people not represented by Jewish or gentile roots but by their relationship to the bridegroom. And it appears the voice of the turtle-dove is heard. This is a dove that migrates south in the winter and so isn’t heard until spring. It seems to represent the awakening of the bride to the wooing of the bridegroom. There is much blooming and fresh awakening here depicted showing the response and time of love to be very close at hand.

One doesn’t have to be prophetic to see this happening with the body of Christ as there are so many that are coming into a fuller understanding of the love of God and a fresh understanding of what the ecclesia is today.