Wedding Joy!

 

Your throne, O God, is forever and ever. The scepter of your kingdom is a scepter of uprightness; you have loved righteousness and hated wickedness. Therefore God, your God, has anointed you with the oil of gladness beyond your companions; your robes are all fragrant with myrrh and aloes and cassia. From ivory palaces stringed instruments make you glad; daughters of kings are among your ladies of honor; at your right hand stands the queen in gold of Ophir. (Psalm 45:6-9 ESV).

 

As I was reading today’s Scripture, I was taken back to our wedding day over 52 years ago. All of the scheduled events were well-planned and choreographed. There was the anxious wait for the ceremony to begin; the pageantry of the march into the church by the wedding party; the arrival of the bride on her father’s arm; the recitation of vows and exchange of rings; and, the quicker exit to the festivities of the reception. Of course, we cut the cakes, removed the traditional garter to throw to the prospective grooms, and lined up the hopeful ladies for the toss of the bridal bouquet. Finally, after all of the pictures were taken we dressed for our “going away” and to be showered with the traditional rice throwing (pictured here). It was a long and wonderful day.

 

It was full of joy! I wonder if we would have known the challenges that awaited us through these five decades of life if we would have had our joy dampened. I would hope not, since there has been so much more joy than sorrow. Our spiritual lives ought to be like that.

 

Our reading today has been called a king’s wedding song. It brims with royal pageantry and wedding imagery. The bridegroom it the psalm is a king of God’s people preparing to marry the one he loves. This psalm was probably used at many royal weddings in ancient Israel. Later in Israel’s history this psalm came to be seen as a picture of the promised Messiah-King, who would come to deliver and unite with God’s people. And in the New Testament God’s people recognize Jesus as the Messiah-Savior and see the church (God’s people) as his bride, based on teachings about a wedding feast in the kingdom of heaven (cf. Matthew 22:2; 25:1; Revelation 19:7; 21:2).

 

The psalmist talks about being anointed with “the oil of joy.” And yet we are often distracted by worries and troubles in this world, forgetting the amazing blessings and potential we have as Christ’s anointed ones. Weddings are joyous events; though life can be interrupted with challenges to that joy. As you deal with those struggles today, allow yourself to be transported to the celebration awaiting you when you will be with him in the coming kingdom. It will be worth it all!