Posts tagged ‘Elvis’
Saving Marriage from the Heartbreak Hotel
Credit: Viator.com
It seems as though declining marriage rates are not just changing our society sociologically, but are stressing the wedding capital of the world, Las Vegas, economically. In an article for Bloomberg, Jeanna Smialek explains how:
Roland August has officiated at thousands of weddings in Las Vegas, the self-proclaimed capital of “I do.”
But these days August – who often presides dressed as Elvis Presley – has a rare vantage point from which to observe the nation’s long shift toward “I don’t.” …
The wedding chapels where August works have seen business dwindle, he said, and Vegas is pushing to reverse the decline in an industry that generates as much as $3 billion in economic activity annually. In 2015 the surrounding county introduced a $14 surcharge on marriage licenses to pay for marketing, and local business leaders helped start a Wedding Chamber of Commerce last year.
A drop in weddings, it seems, amounts to a drop in revenue for a city that is known as being flush with cash. Of course, this is all part of a broader nationwide trend. The Pew Research Center reports that, whereas 72% of adults 18 years of age or older were married in 1960, now, only 50% are. But, if the graph published by Bloomberg is any indication, the nationwide decline in marriage has hit Nevada especially hard.
In one way, none of this is particularly surprising. For all the fun and levity, which are not bad things in and of themselves, that I’m sure Mr. August brings to the weddings he performs, vows taken without things like spiritual guidance from a pastor or other religious mentor, serious prior consideration of all the things marriage entails, a commitment to make marriage alone the sacred space for sex, and, often, even a baseline of sobriety do little more than to cheapen and make a mockery out of the whole institution. And when something becomes cheap, it inevitably becomes expendable. After all, if Britney Spears can drunkenly marry her childhood friend in Las Vegas and then have their marriage annulled 55 hours later, one has to wonder: why bother with marriage in the first place?
They key to reversing the decline in marriage and the denigration of marriage is not to try to repristinate the marriage-saturated days of 1960, hoping that, somehow, marriage rates will soar again if we just yell enough at the cultural forces that have damaged the institution. No, the key to a deeper appreciation of and desire for marriage is to consider what marriage is really meant to reflect. So here are three things that we can say, as Christians, marriage reflects.
Marriage reflects community in Christ.
One of the great mysteries of Christian teaching is that of the Trinity – that God is one, yet, at the same time, He is also three persons: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Thus, God is in community, in some sense, with Himself. For centuries, professional theologians and Sunday School teachers alike have tried to explain this mystery in a way that is comprehensible. My Sunday School teacher, for instance, mused that the Trinity is like an apple. There is the peel, the flesh, and the core. These are three parts, and yet they are all part of one apple. The problem with this illustration, however, is that God is indivisible. He cannot be divided like an apple. He is not made up of three parts, but actually is three persons.
Thankfully, the Bible presents us with its own object lesson to help us understand the Trinity. What is this object lesson? Marriage. When marriage is given by God, He explains that it is meant to be when “a man leaves his father and mother and is united to his wife, and they become one flesh” (Genesis 2:24). In marriage, there are two persons, and yet they are one flesh, even as in God, there are three persons, yet He is one God. Moreover, throughout this life, a husband and wife ought to be indivisible, as is God. This is why Jesus says divorce is so damaging – not only because it hurts the people involved, but because it tarnishes the very reflection of God! Thus, community in marriage, even if it is broken by sin, is meant to reflect the perfect community of the Trinity.
Marriage reflects the sacrifice of Christ.
As anyone who has been married for any amount of time will tell you, marriage requires sacrifice. It requires laying down your own wants, needs, and desires for the sake of another. The apostle Paul eloquently explains the sacrificial nature of marriage when he writes:
Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave Himself up for her to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the word, and to present her to Himself as a radiant church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless. (Ephesians 5:25-27)
Paul notes that the sacrifice a husband makes for his wife ought to reflect the sacrifice that Christ made for His church, even if that sacrifice includes laying down his very life, as it did for Christ. Thus, at the same time marriage gives a community that reflects the Trinity, it also eats away at our proclivity toward selfishness. Marriage is fundamentally centered not on yourself, but on your spouse, even as God is fundamentally centered on us and on our salvation.
Marriage reflects eternity with Christ.
The best marriage is not the one you celebrate once a year on your anniversary. The best marriage is the one that is still to come:
I heard what sounded like the roar of a great multitude in heaven shouting: “Hallelujah! For our Lord God Almighty reigns. Let us rejoice and be glad and give Him glory! For the wedding of the Lamb has come, and His bride has made herself ready.” (Revelation 19:1, 6-7)
When the apostle John gets a window into eternity, he sees that every wedding on earth between a husband and wife is ultimately meant to reflect a perfect wedding in heaven between Christ and His people. Marriage in this age, then, however wonderful it can be, is not an end in and of itself. It is a sign pointing to something even greater. This is why Jesus, when He is questioned by the religious leaders about marriage in eternity, says, “At the resurrection people will neither marry nor be given in marriage” (Matthew 22:30). Marriage between people till death do them part is meant to point to perfect communion with God where death no longer reigns. Marriage, then, at the same time it fills a longing, should also create a longing. It should create a longing for a deeper community that not even your spouse can meet. It should create a longing for a deeper community that only Christ can fill in His wedding feast.
This is what marriage is meant to reflect. It cannot be reduced, then, to a Vegas jag, or, for that matter, a well-planned out and exorbitantly expensive ceremony and reception. These things are not necessarily bad on their own terms, but if they become the things of marriage, they reduce marriage to something that is entertaining, cheap, and contrived. But marriage cannot stand if it is this. Marriage must stand as a gift from God that gives you community, costs you your very self, and points you to the One who gave Himself for you so that, on the Last Day, He can walk you down His eternal aisle.
No neon or Elvis costumes needed.
Pastor Zach's Blog 