The Wedding Day "Wow!"

Wives love to get their husbands to weddings. Hopefully, the love-feast will jumpstart a little romance in the old boy's soul. I saw a lot of hand-holding and sitting close last weekend when Jimmy and Tanya got married. It works, girls!

I had a ringside seat on it all. Actually, a ringside stand. I was doing the honors, marrying a young couple I think the world of. My "Kodak moment" was watching that googly-eyed groom as he watched his beautiful bride coming down the aisle.

It was beautiful. Touching. Jimmy's a happy guy, but I saw a glow in those moments that I've never seen in him before. It's hard to describe. Wonder. Amazement. Unmistakable, unconcealable, unrestrained affection.

I guess I'd call it the "wow!" factor.

It took me back to a prayer I prayed during our wedding many years ago. "Lord, may I never lose that breathless wonder that exclaims, 'Out of all this world, you have chosen me!'" As every married couple knows, it's all too easy to lose that wonder in the accumulated storms and hurts and hassles and wonder-eroding familiarity of the years.

But the wonder isn't meant to just be for the wedding. It should be - it can be - for life. Always amazed at the treasure you have in the person who trusted their life into your hands. Asking "the Lord who is acting as the witness between you" (Malachi 2:14) to rekindle the flame. Because "love comes from God...God is love" (1 John 4:7-8).

I know what it is to suddenly face the prospect that I might not see my bride alive again. I so thank God that He gave her back to me. He gave me a chance to re-treasure this one-of-a-kind, exceedingly precious gift He entrusted to me. But re-treasuring is a choice that shouldn't require a crisis.

Sometimes, marriages - like ships - accumulate barnacles that encumber them. Resentment. Stuffed anger. Wounding words. Stubborn unforgiveness. A heart turned cold or hard. But your lifetime love is too priceless to lose to any of the dark forces that would steal it away.

The good news is that the Jesus who chose a wedding to do His first miracle is still in the marriage miracle business. He "binds up the brokenhearted"...He replaces "ashes" with a "crown of beauty" (Isaiah 61:1, 3)...He restores "the years that the locusts have eaten" (Joel 2:25)...He will "remove from you a heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh" (Ezekiel 36:26). He "makes all things new" (Revelation 21:5). Jesus can rekindle love where love has dimmed - with love from His great heart.

As I saw that adoring look on that young groom's face, my mind suddenly was thinking Jesus. Looking adoringly at what the Bible describes as His "Bride." That's what He has chosen to call those He died for, those who belong to Him through faith in Him.

Jesus called Himself "the bridegroom," and He said, "The bride belongs to the bridegroom" (John 3:29). We have chosen to give ourselves to Him because He loves us like nobody loves us. "This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down His life for us" (1 John 3:16). As hard as it is to imagine, He looks at us sinners and fools and says, "I'd rather die than lose you."

It's a love I could not and will not ignore. And at a wedding I saw a picture of how He feels about me and all those who are His - unmistakable, unconcealable, unrestrained love. And I saw, symbolized in that young bride, the response to that love - committing yourself to this One who has proven - in blood - that you can trust Him with your life.

I'm overwhelmed.