The Ceremony

To guests, Christian wedding ceremonies can often be long and dry, or they can be too short and hurried. The best way to share your love is to be expressive in every part of your ceremony, no matter what the length. Try to show to your guests who you are as a couple through the different parts of your ceremony. For Matt and I, this meant making the mood of our ceremony light and throwing in some twists on the traditional order of events.

For starters, we began our wedding at 2:22 PM. We thought this added some humor to our wedding, and if nothing else, was something for our guests to talk about and speculate on. Our wedding began with a welcome from the Pastor, followed by our declaration of intent. After we said our "I will's," he asked both of our parents to stand. They were then asked to give their blessing for our marriage. Next, he asked the whole congregation to stand and asked them if they pledged to uphold our marriage. Not, only did this keep them active, but it really made them a part of our marriage for that day and the years to come. Matt and I truly hope that they took this seriously and will hold us accountable to our marriage in the future, as they will probably be the people we turn to for encouragement when needed.

Next in our wedding day line-up, we had "Passing of the Peace". Many churches do this every Sunday morning, and my dad really enjoys it. So, while everyone was still standing, the Pastor asked them to greet one another with signs of peace. This was absolutely wonderful! All of the sudden, the whole sanctuary was a buzz as people shook hands and hugged. And wow(!) was it a tension breaker for Matt and I. We were able to hug each other and take a moment to just look at one another without worrying that everyone was staring at us.

After that, we got everyone to settle down again with the singing of a hymn. Then we had two readings. Our first reader read a poem we had found in, "The Language of Marriage" by Blue Mountain Arts Collections. The second reader read from the Bible. Now, I have nothing against 1 Corinthians 13:4-7, but wouldn't you agree that it is read at almost every wedding? To make our wedding a little different we had the Corinthian verses read and Philippians 2:1-4. In this way, we shared a bit more of the Bible with our guests that may not have experienced church except through weddings.

The next part was probably the most important of all, though - our vows. Matt and I had agonized over these. We wanted them to be very meaningful and reflective of our relationship. After many attempts, we based our vows on our scripture readings and "How Do I Love Thee?" - a poem we really like by Elizabeth Barrett Browning. Plus, Matt and I like to take walks, so in our vows we said "On our walk of life" and things like that. At our rehearsal, I turned around and was surprised to see that everyone (and I truly mean everyone) was in tears. That may be completely normal, but I thought it was pretty awesome. (If you would like some advice on how to write your vows, take a look at "writing your own vows".)

By including our guests in our ceremony, keeping them active, and making sure our wedding was slightly different from others, I think we were able to convey to our guests how important they are to us. And, by writing our own vows, I believe they experienced the love that Matt and I share. But that was not the end. We still had the reception to go!