God Speaking

“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 19:7)

We celebrated a joyous occasion this week with a family wedding. Weddings always are preceded with a flurry of preparations, weeks before, involving venues, food, invitations, and are also accompanied by pre-wedding worries. Will the weather cooperate? Here in Nth America we are in late summer, but the venue included a beautiful outside deck, what if it rains? The wedding party included a three year old little boy! Who could forecast what he would do? Parents of the bride are elderly, how will they cope? Dear little flower girl, will she be brave enough to be the first down the aisle? Truly, at the end of the day we were able to echo these words as the Lord richly blessed our day.

Let us rejoice and be glad and give him glory!

The Old Testament makes frequent references to the images of marriage and in the book of Isaiah we read how the Heavenly Father sees himself in the role of a bridegroom who rejoices over his bride. We, his people, are that bride and we are the recipients of that beautiful outpouring of his love which is a symbol of the most intimate of relationships which binds the Father and his beloveds together.

“…as a bridegroom rejoices over his bride, so will your God rejoice over you.” (Isaiah 62:5)

Again the prophet, Hosea, records how deep is the Fathers’ love for us in terms of marriage vows that will never be broken;

“I will betroth you to me forever; I will betroth you in righteousness and justice, in love and compassion, I will betroth you in faithfulness, and you will acknowledge the Lord.” (Hosea 2:19 – 20)

Jesus, Himself, chose the setting of a wedding celebration to perform his first miracle, a sign that the Heavenly Bridegroom had become one with his people. (John 2)

The most important wedding any of us will ever attend is yet to come and the Holy Spirit reveals this to the apostle, John, and commands him to write it down so the magnificence of this wedding will be etched on our minds and our hearts as we look forward to that glorious day;

“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. Fine linen, bright and clean, was given her to wear.” (Revelation 19:7 – 8)

Just like any earthly wedding, invitations will be sent out inviting God’s people to join in to this most awesome celebration;

“…Blessed are those who are invited to the wedding supper of the Lamb!” (Revelation 19:9)

Again, just like the earthly wedding, the invitation must be accepted and the recipient plan to be present. We sang a beautiful song in our Sunday service, entitled, WE ARE YOUR CHURCH and as our voices rose to a crescendo I felt we as a body of believers were answering, as the bride, accepting our Heavenly Bridegroom’s invitation to be his.

Who would ever want to miss out on that magnificent wedding supper?