LOOKING TOGETHER IN THE SAME DIRECTION
(1)
Elizabeth Barrett Browning,
that great poet of love,
once said to a man she admired
(Charles Kingsley):
What, sir, is the secret
of your life?
Tell me, that I may make
mine beautiful too!
And the man replied:
Madam, I had a friend!
(2)
Isn’t that a lovely thought?
It’s friends that make our lives
beautiful!
It’s friends that make our days
on earth meaningful!
It’s friends that give strength
and hope
to our passage through time!
(3) Today you are beautiful, _____________,
because you have a friend
sitting next to you.
Today you are the most handsome man in
the world, __________,
because you have a friend right
there with you.
Today is a beautiful day,
because of the friendship that
brings us all together.
When two people care
enough to give of themselves,
friendship
blossoms.
(4)
Today you look at each other,
and the song seems so right:
I only have eyes for you!
That’s what we usually think about at
weddings:
---a bride and groom,
who walk about
in a secret mist,
and only
see each other;
---lovers who sit next to one
another,
and steal secret
glances
out of
the corners of their eyes;
---marriage partners,
out on a
honeymoon
where no
one else even exists.
I only have eyes for you!
(5)
Is that what your marriage is all about?
I hope that’s part of it.
But I’d like to remind you that it’s whole lot more as well.
If marriage means: I only have eyes for you!
it can never last.
If marriage means:
I only have eyes for you!
then someday you won’t
look all that great anymore.
Even if I’m not looking for
anyone else,
as I look at
you,
I’ll see things I don’t
like:
---your body
isn’t what it used to be;
---your little
quirks
have
become nasty habits,
and
I don’t like them;
---you don’t
look back at me
with all
the fervor you once did.
If marriage means:
I only have have eyes for you!
then someday I’ll fall
asleep,
or I’ll get very
nearsighted,
or I’ll go
blind,
and I
won’t even care!
(6)
There’s another way of looking at marriage,
and I think it makes more sense,
more Biblical sense.
Someone has said:
Marriage means looking the same
way together!
Not just: I only have eyes for you!
But: Looking the same way together!
(7)
When you think of marriage like that,
at least three things come to mind.
The first is this:
If you’re looking the same way
together,
you’re starting at the same point in your
lives.
You’re not living in different worlds;
you’re not separated by oceans or continents;
you’re not parted by customs or superstitions.
You’re starting at the same
point.
In the laws of physics,
opposites
attract.
But in the laws of God
for marriage,
opposites
can never come together.
The Apostle Paul,
speaking for our
Lord,
gave
this word about marriage:
Do
not be unequally yoked.
Do not think,
he said,
that marriage can be good,
if you do not start together
with some basic commitments that you share.
He was speaking, first of all,
about faith,
about
our relationship with God.
You’ve got to have that
together,
he says,
or you will not
be looking the same way together.
You’ll be like
horses who pull in two
different directions,
and end up kicking each other.
If you can say together these words from
Romans 5,
then you have a wonderful start
to your marriage.
---we have been justified
. . .
---we have peace with God
. . .
---we rejoice in the hope
of the glory of God . . .
---God has poured out his love
into our hearts . . . .
Then you’re standing at the same point in your lives.
Then you can look the same way together.
(8)
There’s a second thing that marriage is all about,
when you see it as looking the same way together,
and that’s this:
If you’re looking the
same way together,
then you have
the same goals in mind.
What are your hopes and dreams?
Certainly one is to get settled
together
and in a place
of your own.
Another must be to take care of
each other,
from here to
eternity.
You’ve got little hopes and
dreams:
like enjoying yourselves
tonight,
and on
your honeymoon.
And you’ve got big visions:
like providing a secure
environment
for the
future.
You’re looking the same way together.
But how far are you looking?
How high care you looking?
Can all the rest of your
dreams
and
hopes
and
visions
come
together in this vision:
We rejoice in the hope of the glory of
God!?
Today you say you love each other,
you vow your love for one another,
you confess your desire to love each other.
The great Christian writer C. S. Lewis,
commenting on a
poem by Ralph Waldo Emerson,
said that the question:
Do you
love me?
is really the same thing
as the question:
Do you
see the same truth?
He said some people are really
lonely,
and they desperately
want friends.
They
say they would do anything,
just to
have a good companion.
But when someone comes along,
and the friendship
flares like a rocket in the sky,
it dies just as
quickly,
because
it goes nowhere.
Friendship has to be about something,
or it dies.
It can’t just sit there,
holding hands;
it has to be on the road
to somewhere,
looking for some
truth,
searching for
some value,
seeing some
vision.
Says Lewis:
Those who have nothing can share
nothing;
those who are going nowhere can
have no fellow travelers.
Where are you going?
What are you looking for?
What vision beckons you from the future?
What goal drives you on?
If your marriage means: Looking the same
way together,
then it is only the vision of
God.
and the hope of his
glory in your lives
that can keep you going,
hand in
hand.
Right now,
the things you share as common
ground,
keep you together,
and put love in your
eyes.
But what will happen when new sufferings
come to you?
What will happen when things
don’t go so well?
What will happen when you get tired of the struggles of life?
Listen again to these words of Paul
We rejoice in our sufferings,
because we know that
suffering produces perseverance;
perseverance,
character;
and
character, hope.
And hope does not disappoint us,
because God has poured
out his love into our hearts.
Looking the same way together
means you can see beyond the
moments of crisis,
and catch a vision of
the larger things God is doing in your lives.
(9)
Looking the same way together means,
starting at the same point
together,
and having the same goals in
mind.
And it means one more thing:
Looking
the same way together means:
walking next to each
other.
Charlie Shedd once told the story of creation.
The male version, he says,
sees Adam created first,
and assumes he’s
better than Eve.
But the female version goes this
way:
God created Adam,
and then he took
a good look at him
and he thought
for a minute
and he said to
himself:
I
can do better than that!
And so he made
Eve!
So much of our lives is competition.
We’ve got to dominate.
We’ve got to get ahead.
We’ve got to be better than so-and-so.
And it happens in
marriage just as often as anywhere else.
The early Church fathers had a
wonderful interpretation about Genesis 2.
They said God did not make Eve from Adam’s foot,
or he would
trample on her.
And God did not make Eve from Adam’s hair,
or she would
rule over him.
God made Eve from Adam’s rib,
next to his heart,
so that they
would walk side by side together.
When you look in the same direction
together,
you walk side by side,
hand in hand,
soul to soul.
You start from the same point together;
you see the same vision of the glory of God that leads you on
together;
and you walk next to each other.
You don’t need to compete.
You don’t need to dominate.
In Shakespeare’s play
The Taming of the Shrew,
Petruchio marries
Katharina,
and he says:
I will
be master of what is mine own:
She
is my goods, . . . !
Not so for you two!
It is Christ who owns you.
And you are companions in
marriage,
partners in the
walk of life.
(10)
The American philosopher George Santayana
once summarized a marriage he knew like this:
He liked to walk alone;
she liked to walk alone;
so they got married,
and walked alone
together!
What a tragedy!
He liked to walk alone;
she liked to walk alone;
so they got married,
and walked alone
together!
May that never be true of you!
You will lose the excitement of this
moment.
There will come a time when you no longer sing:
I only have eyes
for you!
But may your marriage never become a
lonely walk
of
lonely individuals.
Rather,
may you find marriage the
excitement
of looking together in
the same direction,
and then enjoying together the
walk that leads you there.
The word companion really says it
best.
The prefix “com” means “with.”
And all of us who have ever
tried to read the french
on bread
wrappers
know that “pan” means
bread.
A “companion”
is someone we eat bread
with,
someone we sit at table with,
someone who shares our provisions,
and
carries our loads down the path.
Your friendship makes you companions.
Your marriage pledges your companionship.
Those who look together in the same
direction
enjoy each other’s company,
companionship,
as they
move along in life.
(11)
So you speak your vows today.
So we come together as your witnesses.
So God seals the commitments of love that make you husband and wife.
May He take all of your pasts,
and bind them together in His
healing graces,
so that you may start
together at the same point,
seek together at the same vision of His
glory,
and travel together as friends
and
companions.
May all your friends and relatives
help you to put the past behind,
and rejoice in what God
is doing with your future.
May this church be the stronger for your
participation
in its ministry in the
Name of Christ.
And may God be glorified in your marriage.