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On February 13, 2023 By In Culture, Film

Reacting to the Reaction of Ben Shapiro. The Last of Us, Episode 3

As I was saying, The Last of Us, episode three, has garnered mounds of ire and frustration. Purists have trumpeted their disapproval for how the episode deviated from the game, while others have raised cries of alarm over the evident wokeism.

As for representatives of the second camp, Ben Shapiro leads the charge. At the time of my writing this, over half a million people have clicked on his review. You can find it here. In terms of my own sensibilities, he and I tend to harbor similar movie tastes, and because of that, along with his sharp wit and sense of humor, I try to keep tabs on him.

Granting this happy commendation, I must say that I was left wanting more in this instance.

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On February 13, 2023 By In Culture

The Two Liturgies of the Superbowl

The Superbowl last night was a clear display of two liturgies. Stapleton’s magnificent rendition of “The Star Spangled Banner” was an ode to a nation. It is incredible what the power of a liturgy can do to stir imagination and patriotism. Stapleton didn’t seek to regurgitate old norms for the sake of the norms, but his interpretation of the national anthem brought out the emotional respect one should have for country. The tears were not manufactured–they were the response of a grateful people.

America is not simply an ideal; it is a palpable reality that demands thanksgiving. The national liturgies of a country–done in their proper context–accentuate a nation’s health and create an environment for the common good to blossom.

On the other hand, you saw a separate liturgy. Rihanna wasn’t simply dabbling in the profane; she was the embodiment of the profane. Her pregnancy, which ought to be a celebration of life, was contradicted by a homage to death itself.

The choreography was a perfectly exercised liturgy to entertain demons. Honor is not fitting for a fool (Prov. 26:1), and the creativity of wickedness causes the masses to lose respect for institutions and countries.

Liturgies matter.

What we saw last night was a clear display of conflicting worlds. One liturgy sought to re-energize love for a common tradition, and the other sought to make one after their own image.

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On February 9, 2023 By In Culture, Film

Wokeback Zombie Mountain? The Last of Us, Episode Three: A Review

The new HBO series The Last of Us is shaping up to be a solid cinematic experience. Based on the wildly popular video game—one which thoroughly captivated this seasoned gamer’s imagination—and which felt like a superb movie experience in its own right—The Last of Us has largely risen above the sad list of failed game-to-movie adaptations.

The opening collapse of society is tense, the main characters are believable, and the one hundred million dollar budget offers up strong visuals. This isn’t to say that there aren’t a few missteps here and there, but on balance, it’s a quivering, but relatively stable thumbs up—assuming, of course, that episode three remains a rainbow anomaly.

You may or may not have heard (depending on how closely you follow the movie nerd sphere) that episode three is either the greatest thing to ever have occurred in the history of the world, or it is a woke dumpster fire causing grunting men to gnash their teeth in fury and agitation.

Here’s a simple breakdown in case you missed it.

A lone survivalist named Bill creates a little utopian outpost in a post apocalyptic world. Years of prepping has paid off—big time. He has a massive generator, enough guns to arm a small country, high grade defenses, and stores of tasty delicacies. Several years pass. Then Frank shows up. He’s a congenial, jovial, good-natured fellow who, after fleeing a dire situation, falls into one of Bill’s zombie-catching pits.

Fast forward to a formal dinner, a soulful piano playing moment, and then, you guessed it, sex. As the years pass in romance, they pick strawberries together, fend off a group of bandits (well, one of them does), grow old, and eventually commit suicide together, due to Frank having contracted some kind of life degenerating disease. They both drink wine loaded with enough Vicodin to drop an elephant. Then they lay in bed waiting for death.

Setting aside the fact that all this clearly agenda driven, it’s a fairly well-crafted tale. Various virtues are exhibited throughout: sacrifice, faithfulness, courage, love. It makes sense why some find it compelling.

Allowing for these congenial concessions (and here I am still ignoring the five hundred pound gorilla in the room), it simply doesn’t make sense why so many critics think it is the greatest thing since sliced bread. But then again, maybe the sheer willingness to loudly applaud what is at best a side quest to the main storyline highlights a deep gravitational force at play in society.

Duh, right?

After listening to about ten reviews on YouTube, and after perusing a handful of online reviews, the amount of over-the-top gushing can scarcely be viewed as anything less than a deep gravitational pull.

Supercuts Delight proclaimed: “The Last of Us Episode 3 is HBO’s Magnum Opus.”

Forbes declared that it is a “Television Masterpiece.”

Add to such headlines various images of women weeping on their YouTube thumbnails, along with media outlets comparing episode three to the opening of Pixar’s Up, and you have what can only be described as a motivated desire to see glory in it. I say that, because, to stress again, and with as much objectivity as I can muster, it wasn’t that good (still ignoring the gorilla, folks). The acting and script was solid but not that compelling. If it was a heterosexual couple experiencing essentially the same things, would these reviewers have hailed it as a masterpiece? They’d likely note its quality and undoubtedly praise it, but to this extent?

Frankly, I doubt it.

Interestingly, the development of this love story was completely absent from the video game. It utilized Bill in a far more interesting manner, in my opinion. Therefore, its addition to the HBO series, which has very closely followed the game, reveals their true objective: they wanted to insert a gay love story because such things ought to be celebrated.

That’s the clear agenda.

Now here’s the thing. I actually don’t fault creators for pushing certain agendas. I do it. And I happen to believe that the Creator of all things has a capital A agenda as well.

So, no, there’s nothing wrong with advancing what one believes is beautiful and good. The central question that has to be answered is this: What is the true and the beautiful and the good? When we answer that question, the rest slides into place. We’ll then have a foundation from which to adequately judge what is true and right and good.

Worldview is everything.

This brings me to a few final thoughts.

When Hollywood produces a well-crafted story that also harbors elements of virtue, the Christian’s task of disentangling what is laudable (in the abstract) from what is not laudable can prove challenging when trying to explain such things to unbelievers. There are praiseworthy elements in the episode, and outsiders are correct to want to prize such things. But when said elements are couched in a sinful context, the virtue is soiled. Muslim terrorists, for example, exhibit tremendous courage and conviction at times. But their zeal is misplaced. Sex and love and faithfulness and courage and sacrifice are all beautiful things, but like all good things, they have to operate within certain confines, lest they bleed into unrighteousness.

Here I am reminded of a conversation between Joe Rogan and Ben Shapiro. Rogan couldn’t understand why Shapiro would insist on heterosexual unions when a segment of the population clearly experiences same sex-attraction.

“Why do you care so much?” asks Rogan. “How are they bothering you?”

Sadly, Shapiro didn’t have a good response. Neither did Matt Walsh.

Unless we back up and talk about our relationship to God as Creator and how it is an affront for humans to say “No, I don’t think what you’ve established is best, or most beautiful, or most fitting as a picture of greater realities,” then we’re not going to be able to disentangle what appears to be wholesome in the eyes of some. Human autonomy with all of its fateful consequences has to stand in the foreground, along with the Fall, and the groaning of creation, since only in the light of those truths can we make sense of disordered, sinful desires.

None of this, of course, guarantees that we’ll prove persuasive. But it ought not come at the expense of trying to provide a thoughtful, rational, and yes, persuasive explanation for why episode three of The Last of Us falls grievously short in what it tries to portray as beautiful.

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On February 9, 2023 By In Culture, Discipleship, Theology, Wisdom

Collateral Damage

Debt makes the world go ‘round. At least it does now. Somewhere along the way in American and global history, our economic systems have moved from debt being a part of the system to debt being their foundation. If all the debt was paid off tomorrow, our system would collapse. (For a simple explanation of this, read this article.) In the spirit of keeping things moving, our government is accumulating debt at a record pace. As of February 2023, we are $31.5 trillion in debt, most held by the American government along with Japan and China holding significant amounts of our debt to prop up their currency. American citizens have joined the spending spree. Credit card debt has soared to almost $1 trillion. With citizens unwillingly (for the most part) being guarantors for the government and credit card companies encouraging borrowing while only paying the interest, borrowers feel free to spend prodigally. This is not sustainable forever, and those who back these loans willingly or unwillingly will feel the effects eventually.

On several occasions in Proverbs, Solomon warns his son, the king-in-waiting, about the foolishness of becoming surety for someone else’s debts (Pr 6.1-5; 11.15; 17.18; 20.16; 22.26-27; 27.13). Becoming surety is not loaning, borrowing, or investing money. In each of those cases, there is a possibility of a return on investment. Surety is securing someone else’s debt in a way that you take all the risk with no possibility of financial reward. Your friend wants to borrow money, doesn’t have the collateral to back up the loan, and you and your assets become collateral for the loan, the guarantee to the creditor that he will receive his money. If the friend falls on hard times or bails on his responsibility, you are left holding the bag … an empty bag.

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On February 9, 2023 By In Church, Culture

The Demise of Religious Liberalism

My friend, Dr. Daniel Strand, writes,

“…that Protestant mainline churches used to dominate American life. They ruled the Ivies and produced brilliant and influential public intellectuals. Now we can’t name a single mainline churchman. Oh, how the mighty have fallen.”

I recently addressed this topic and concluded:

“The mainline consisting of PCUSA, ELCA, American Baptists in the USA, United Methodists, etc., have taken trajectories of death throughout. They have sought to bestow power on inclusivism and anointed corrupt priests to lead the way, and to hell, they led.”

This was confirmed just a few hours ago as the Church of England reached a crescendo of filth “approving blessings for gay couples for the first time.” The Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby, and the Archbishop of York, Stephen Cottrell, said in a joint statement:

“For the first time, the Church of England will publicly, unreservedly and joyfully welcome same-sex couples in church. The Church continues to have deep differences on these questions which go to the heart of our human identity.”

My exhortation is to fellow conservative pastors: prepare yourselves to absorb thousands of refugees. Conservative ecclesial bodies must invest in catechetical discipleship and build a reservoir of resistance against liberalizing forces without and battle locally and nationally against such forces that seek to crawl their way into the midst of the assembly. People are hungry for ordinary worship, biblical preaching, and a conservative backbone.

But while mainline churches have been precipices of disdain for righteousness, there are additional signs that contemporary conservative bodies are headed toward such ends as well. Forthcoming decisions at ecclesiastical gatherings need to be firm, sustaining the biblical rationale for sexual ethics in all it entails without reservations. There should be no more tolerance for biblical embarrassment among conservative denominations.

The first sign of a failing corpus is the over-explanatory nature by which they undertake to excuse themselves for believing certain principles and affirmations. Therefore, they explain away texts which make them look deranged or unfriendly towards the woke cause. Such signs within these bodies are prequels to well-developed franchises.

The great exodus is already occurring. It’s time to add more chairs to our tables.

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On February 2, 2023 By In Culture

Hansel, Gretel, and God’s Grace in Prayer

How does God’s grace work in our prayer?

I attended my first opera last week, “Hansel and Gretel” by Engelbert Humperdinck. 

You may know the Grimm fairy tale by the same name: scarcity of food leaves a brother and sister abandoned in the woods, where they come across a witch who wants to eat them, but they manage to defeat the witch and all is well. 

But as I was flipping through the playbill before the performance, an article about the content of the opera struck me. According to the critic, the children’s defeat of the witch is a triumph of humanism: “[H]eaven has played no part in the rescue of Hansel and Gretel or the awakening of the spellbound children. They are saved by their own wits.”

So I watched the performance with great interest in how this theme might actually play out. This critic was convinced that Humperdinck’s opera had no space for God’s providence in the salvation of the characters. Was he right? 

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On January 31, 2023 By In Culture

We Need to Rethink the Relationship Between the Church and the State. Start by Remembering that the Church Wins.

By William Wolfe

“The Church wins. The Church lasts. The Church is forever. The Church of Christ is the eschatological reality, the final hope, and the eternal, enduring institution. The Church will far outlast any and all earthly governments and their petty mandates, ultimately triumphing over the state in the end.”

WILLIAM WOLFE

The Church in America Just Got Punched in the Mouth

When boxer Mike Tyson was asked by a reporter about an upcoming fight and whether he was concerned about his opponent’s strategy, he shot back with the now-famous answer: “Everyone has a plan until they get punched in the mouth.”

He’s right. Everything sounds good in our heads, but when we get rocked with unexpected circumstances, plans can fall apart. Plans for how to live as Christians, and gather as churches, in America, for example.

Which is exactly what happened in the spring of 2020. The Church in America got punched in the mouth.

As COVID-19 hit the country in March and April that year, governors and mayors all across the nation issued indefinite “lockdown orders” (liquor stores, casinos, and abortion clinics exempted, of course). All of a sudden, churches had to figure out what they were going to do: Stay open or close? And for how long: Indefinitely or until they came to a different conclusion? It has been decades since the debate about what it means to “render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and to God the things that are God’s” (Matt 22:21) had broken out so fiercely in America, and in live-time.

The time-tested plan that the Church had always followed — continue to gather regularly, in obedience to God’s Word and in free exercise of religion, as protected by the First Amendment — took a haymaker right to the head.

To say that governing officials were overreaching when they told churches not to gather would be an understatement. At the most basic level, it was a gross violation of the First Amendment, which guarantees us as U.S. citizens that “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.” Some churches that ultimately defied the lockdowns were later vindicated in court, like Grace Community Church, which won its legal battle with the state of California and Los Angeles County “after the governments agreed to pay $400,000 each as part of a settlement for violating the Church’s religious liberty during the COVID-19 pandemic.”

While most churches are back to normal, many of us still find our heads spinning as we consider how so many churches just completely rolled over for the government. Elsewhere, I have written about how statism is one of the great threats to the Church in America. What happened during COVID shows us exactly why and how that is the case.

If we want to have better operating plans for churches going forward — plans that survive a few shots from the commies — it means we must first rightly understand the power and the purpose of the Church. In other words, we must get our bearings and begin walking at least in the general direction of understanding what God has said about the nature of the relationship between the Church and the state.

In order to do that, you should meet Abraham Kuyper.

Kuyper’s Concern: The Sovereignty of God and the Certain Triumph of the Church

One man who thought and wrote about this important question of the relationship between the Church and the state, was Abraham Kuyper. Kuyper served as the prime minister of the Netherlands from 1901 to 1905 and was also an influential theologian and journalist. He had an expansive vision of the sovereignty of God over all of life and unapologetically sought to influence the fallen world with Christian virtues and values. He famously exclaimed that “There is not a square inch in the whole domain of our human existence over which Christ, who is Sovereign over all, does not cry: ‘Mine!’” (1).

Christ as King over all, both seen and unseen, both spiritual and physical, both the Church and the state. This was a dominant theme in all of Kuyper’s theology and political reasoning.  So, the purpose of this piece is to briefly reflect on this wonderful yet easily forgotten truth: The Church wins. This was something that Kuyper understood deep down in his bones: The Church ultimately triumphs over the state — forever.

A series of Kuyper’s collected works, On the Church, contains a beautiful and resounding description of how it is the Church — and not the state — that lasts into eternity. It is the Church, and not the state, that is the true Kingdom of God. The Church doesn’t exist within the state as much as the Church is slowly but surely conquering and replacing the state.

I think this is important for Christians to consider, wrestle with, and ultimately believe. Why? Because so much of the conversation about what the Church should do during COVID made it sound as if the Church was some sort of servant of the government. The dialogue seemed to imply that the Church only exists because the government allows it to exist. That is not just false but nothing could be further from the truth.

If you only read one thing from this article, read this quote. Read it closely. And read it twice. Kuyper explains:

“The church does not function in a human society that is by nature governed by the state, but she carries within herself the germ of the all-encompassing worldwide kingdom, which will one day replace every state and assume its function.

It is therefore decidedly incorrect to honor the state as the palace in which the church is assigned no more than a side wing.

Rather, the state is little more than scaffolding erected on the building site where the church is busy laying the foundation for the palace in which Christ will one day establish his royal throne.

When the battle is over, the state will disappear forever. The dawn of the eternal existence of the nations will rise out of the church, not the state” (2).

Have you ever thought about it like that? Far from the Church needing to come, hat in hand, begging for the state to let it worship God, the Church can and should stand tall by the authority granted to it from Christ. The Church can be confident that it will be the final institution left standing, as all earthly governments dissolve at the return of Christ, and blow away into the wind like chaff. In other words, in the end, the Church wins. So, we should act like it now.

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On January 19, 2023 By In Culture, Discipleship, Theology, Wisdom

Authority & Authorities

“Divination is upon the lips of the king; in his judgment he does not act unfaithfully with his mouth.”

~Proverb 16.10

When I say “authority,” what images come to your mind? Those images have a great deal to do with how you have related to authorities throughout your life. If authorities in your life abused their authority, your reaction will be negative. Any time someone exercises authority, you will connect that with the abuses of the past.  If your authorities were negligent, you will believe that authorities can’t be trusted. If you have had good relationships with authorities, you will tend to trust people … maybe even too much.

Though our thinking is inevitably and understandably shaped by our experiences, all of our thinking about authority and authorities must be shaped by the Scriptures.

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On January 16, 2023 By In Culture

In Defense of Nihilistic Films and a Movie Pick: Nightcrawler

Nihilism is a blackness of night without so much as a pinprick of light. Meaning and pleasure take whatever shape a man chooses. There are no good guys, there are no bad guys. There is no dawn of justice waiting to break on the horizon. Evil is merely one shade of gray lost in an infinite spectrum of grays. Life is utterly relative.

In view of this, one might ask whether or not a film has any merit if it is drenched in nihilistic themes. Or, to state the matter more provocatively, should a Christian dare enjoy a nihilistic film?

It’s a fair question, and not a little tricky.

Here I should make a candid confession. As a lover of stories, I naturally and readily find all types of tales, even more nihilistic ones, if done well, compelling, even enjoyable. Naturally, my fear is that I am betraying something of a sadistic mind with this admission. This stems, in part, from my firm belief that all good things come from the Father of lights (James 1:17). Conversely, one might say that all bad things crawl out of the vile wellspring of sin. Nihilism is a very bad thing, therefore nihilistic movies must be very bad things.

The above logic harbors an alluring simplicity. Yet for all its apparent force, I would argue that there is a place for nihilistic films—that there can be value in watching them.

Sometimes a shard of light is seen to shine more brightly against a very dark canvas. This is more than evident in God’s Story. The very fabric of our world has been doused in sin, and as a result, some among us embrace the darkness, ultimately and finally, suffering destruction. This is to say that their life is radically tragic. There is no happy ending. There is no bright light of hope and redemption for them.

When set in the larger framework of God’s dealings, such instances of bitter tragedy nevertheless prove meaningful. History is a stage whereby we are obtaining the knowledge of good and evil. God is demonstrating that sin in all its awful variety purchases misery and ruin. In so doing, He is using such evil to more greatly magnify His glory (Romans 9:22-24; Acts 2:23). One might say that our world is exhibit A (Eph 3:10). None of this, of course, justifies our enjoyment of nihilistic films as a kind of rejoicing in evil; but it does mean that they can serve as powerful tools for impressing upon us the bitter outcome of sin, whatever its peculiar blend. They can serve a larger purpose—much like God’s own utilization of sin in pressing upon us its utter bankruptcy (Romans 6:21).

Here I should hasten to add a sharp qualification. This is not a justification for watching pornography or anything of the like. There are plenty of things we should not “learn” about through film. Let the Word of God be a firm guide here. My point is that there is a place for bleak, largely hopeless films that powerfully portray the folly of sin. These types of productions, if done well, will not only evoke a sense of thankfulness to God for salvation, but they can also serve to instruct and sharpen the light, even if that light is not given direct space to shine on screen. We bring an overarching narrative to the film and digest it in view of that larger panorama. Thus, one might say that dark movies can function as a kind of fable, if you will, portraying some bit of wisdom or insight, providing a cautionary tale.

You would be correct, for example, to be disgusted by the mother in The Florida Project. But such disgust provides a fertile context for a reflective conversation about motherhood, life, choices, evil and its effects on children.

Consider this part of my rationale for recommending certain nihilistic films. If you demur, I respect that, having no interest at all in changing your mind. Life has enough darkness to instruct; movies and novels are not required.

If you are still with me, consider the movie Nightcrawler. To this list could be added such films as No Country for Old Men, or Oslo August 31st, or Joker, or There Will Be Blood. But my guess is that many of you are familiar with at least some of those picks. In the case of Nightcrawler, it tended to fly under the radar of moviegoers.

In this gritty tale of unbridled ambition, Louis Bloom (played brilliantly by Jake Gyllenhaal) scavenges the darker corners of Los Angeles with a camcorder, hoping to capture the next tantalizing scene of suffering, whether it be gruesome accidents or disturbing crimes. Willing to do anything for the “next great shot,” we watch him crawl his way into the good graces of a local news outlet and grow in deviancy.

It’s a powerful exposé of depravity, conjuring as much intrigue as it does horror throughout the film. One need only watch a handful of Mark Laita’s soul-crushing interviews on YouTube (see “Soft White Underbelly”) to know that such broken figures exist in our world. Or, sadly, like most of us, we’re aware of such depravity because it’s found in the branches of our family tree—or the branches of our own hearts.

Whatever the case, if your constitution is sufficiently robust, and you don’t mind dipping a toe in the dark of nihilism to catch something of its terrible vision, Nightcrawler is a movie I would recommend for your consideration, especially if you have a spouse or group of friends to discuss it with afterward.

“Happy” watching.

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On January 9, 2023 By In Culture

A Wedding Homily: Jesus Makes the Best Wine (John 2:1-11)

There’s no such thing as a perfect wedding. Something always, inevitably, goes wrong. Most of the time it’s not anything major. At the first wedding I officiated, I dismissed the congregation to the reception in the middle of the recessional. Oops. Somehow the marriage survived. Nowadays if the imperfection is entertaining enough, you can look forward to seeing it preserved forever on YouTube.

At the marriage in Cana, either someone miscalculated what was needed, or the caterers missed a couple of cases when they unloaded their van, or the drunk uncle imbibed more than was expected, but somehow, they ran out of wine. Jesus was not there to perform a miracle. He was simply attending the wedding. But when the need arose, Mary knew who to call on. And the Lord not only made more wine, he made the very best wine, and an abundance of it.

This isn’t the place to expound the significance of this manifestation of the Lord’s glory in the first wonder our Savior performed, but it is an appropriate time and place to point out the importance of Christ’s presence and participation at that wedding. When Jesus came into the Temple, he rebuked that he saw. He flipped over tables, cursed the moneychangers, and made quite a scene driving out the animals. But he didn’t do that at this wedding. Instead, he gave it his blessing, he exercised his power to enlarge and improve the provisions for it. Rather than promoting asceticism, he increased the celebration. Those who went to the Temple ought to have mourned in repentance over the evil found there, but those who came to the wedding were to rejoice and give thanks for the blessing of God on this new household.

A marriage is an occasion of celebration, a time for giving thanks and rejoicing in God’s goodness. But there will be no rejoicing in the wedding or in the home that results from it unless Jesus is present and also provides his blessing. We have seen the sad result when one or both parties in a marriage exclude the Lord and his counsel. They insist that it is their marriage, their life, their happiness, and their right to seek it however and wherever it may be found. Rather than turning to the Lord for help that all of us need, they rely on themselves, and inevitably, they run out of wine. The joy is gone and so too are the means of rejoicing.

Unless the LORD builds the house, they labor in vain who build it. So says the Spirit in Psalm 127, and it is true. If you build a marriage on anything other than the Lord, if you decide that you are able to create and sustain it on your own by your own strength and wisdom, then you will inevitably fail. Eventually, you will run out of wine. Over time, love and desires change, satisfaction and shared interests deteriorate, the things that were once cute and attractive are now aggravating and repulsive, and no one is having any fun anymore.

I don’t remember much of what was said at my wedding 23 years ago, and in many ways I am not the same man that stood there holding his bride’s hand and making vows before the Lord. I have changed in a lot of ways, and so has my wife, but what has not changed is the presence of Christ in our marriage. In fact, he is not only still present, he plays a much, much larger role than he ever did before. We’ve run out of wine many times in the last quarter century, and it wasn’t any fun. The party seemed to be over. And every time, when we looked to the Lord, he not only provided what was lacking, he gave us more and better than anything we’d had before.

Ben and Ellen Beth, both of you have grown up in Christian families. You’ve heard sermons every week for your whole life. You’ve attended Sunday School and participated in Bible studies. You’ve memorized verses of Scripture. You’ve learned to pray and sing and been taught to live a godly, moral life. But you are about to embark on the most challenging exercise in sanctification either of you have ever experienced. You’re about to have to apply the Christianity you’ve learned and grown up with in a way you never had to before. Sure you’ve been tested in various ways. You have suffered and been tempted. But marriage is a laboratory for sanctification. It challenges, stretches, encourages, and exasperates. It will test your limits. It will expose sin that you never knew was there. Marriage will place constraints on you that you’ve never known, and when you get squeezed, you find out what is inside. What you discover isn’t always what you expected or as pretty  as you hoped it would be.

Marriage is also the place where you will see Christ’s glory and goodness in a way you’ve never yet known it. Your relationship is already a picture of grace—we’ve all seen it—and we all are looking forward to seeing how you will grow in that grace and love in the years and decades to come. We all are praying for you, and for your children, and we are excited about what the Lord has in store for you. The fact that it will be hard sometimes is a good thing. If we never ran out of wine, we would never get to see the glory of the Lord when he replenishes it or taste the goodness which he provides.

You can be sure that in twenty years both of you will have changed in a number of ways, and you may not remember much of what was said here today. But you should resolve now that whenever you run out of wine, you will look to Christ. You will desire, welcome, and plead for his presence and blessing, not just at your wedding but in your life together, in your home, and every day from this day forward so long as you both shall live. So long as Christ is there, there will be reason for rejoicing. You will see his glory and taste his goodness in ways that surpass anything you have ever known or ever could know outside of your marriage.

The Lord has called you both to marriage. Here it is. There’s no turning back now. You can’t say this was a mistake. You can’t decide you’ve changed your mind. You can’t return or replace what you’ve now signed up for. The Lord has called you into covenant, and not just with one another but also with him. And in calling you to marriage, he has called you to joy. We do not fast at a wedding; we feast. We do not mourn; we rejoice. We do not joke about balls and chains; we shout and sing about blessed intimacy and beautiful children. God did not give you to each other in order to make you miserable. He gave you to each other in order to make you more like Jesus and to help you see his glory and taste his goodness. Never despair. Always rejoice. Jesus makes more and better wine than you ever had before. Amen.

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