Rachael (daughter) and Jonathan got married this past weekend–It was a divine blessing! The reception was here on our farm, it was AMAZING! Fairytale’s are created from story’s like theirs! More photo’s and story soon! Photo credit: http://www.pinwheelcollective.com/
“Homes are the springs among the hills, whose many streamlets, uniting, form like great rivers society, the community, the nation, the Church. If the springs run low the rivers waste; if they pour out bounteous currents the rivers are full. If the springs are pure the rivers are clear like crystal; if they are foul the rivers are defiled. A curse upon homes sends a poisoning blight everywhere; a blessing sends healing and new life into every channel.
Homes are the divinely ordained fountains of life. The human race began in a family, and Eden was a home. The divine blessing has ever rested upon nations and communities just in the measure in which they have added to these original institutions and have kept marriage and the home pure and holy. . .
In the tale of medieval English life a maiden goes before the bridal party on their way to the church, strewing flowers in their path. This was meant to signify that their wedding life should be one of joy and prosperity. Almost universally, wedding ceremonies and festivities have some feature of similar significance, implying that the occasion is one of gladness. In some countries flowers are worn as bridal wreaths. In some they are woven into garlands for the waist, the tying of the ends being part of the ritual. In others bouquets in carried in hand. Music comes in also, always joyous music, implying that the ceremony is one of peculiar gladness. In some places too, wedding bells are rung, their peals being merry and gladsome.
All these and similar bridal customs indicate that the world regards the wedding as a crowning day of life, and marriage as an event of the highest felicity, an occasion for the most enthusiastic congratulations. Yet not always are these happy prophecies fulfilled. Sometimes the flowers wither and the music grows discordant and the wedding peals die away into a memory only of gladness. It ought not to be so. It is not so when the marriage is true, and when the wedded life is ruled by love. Then the bridal wreath remains fresh and fragrant till it is laid upon the coffin by the loving hands of the one who survives to close the eyes of the other; and the wedding music and peals of the bells continue to echo in tones of gladness and peace until hushed in the sobbings of sorrow when the singers sing in dirges and the bells toll out the number of the finished years.
Marriage is intended to bring joy.. . The causes of failure may lie back to the marriage altar, for many are united in matrimony who never should have entered upon such a union; or they may lie in the life after marriage, for many who might attain to the very highest happiness in wedded life, fail, to do so because they have not learned the secret of living happily together.”*
Marriage is a divine ordinance. The married life is meant to be happy, full, pure and rich. I pray for each of our daughter’s that they will learn the secrets to living happily ever after with their husbands and I pray for others who struggle in their marriage.
Next week I’m hosting a marriage conference call on May 30 at 8:00PM EST.I‘ll talk about the secrets to living happily ever after. I would love to have you on the call! You can sign up for it through Proverbs 31 ministries. It only cost $10. If you can’t make the call it will be recorded and available to those who paid for the call, so you can listen to it at your convenience. Maybe you could sign someone up who needs the call!
Stay tuned for Rachael and Jonathan’s wedding day photo’s and story!
*Homemaking by J.R. Miller