This week instead of writing something new for Contact, I’m going to publish the homily I preached at my sister’s wedding in Mendocino last Saturday. I’m doing this both because I’m still on a high from the loveliness of the day and because the homily itself is a product of our congregation’s participation in the Faith Trio, and, as such, I think it is an example of how interfaith dialogue can inform our spiritual lives as individuals as a congregation.
Before preaching the homily I read from the story of the Exodus, where Moses leads the Israelites out of Egypt into the wilderness.
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Gwyneth and Sklyer, I should begin by admitting to you that the story I’ve just read to you is not particularly romantic. It’s not the kind of story anyone reads at a wedding. The story of Moses lifting his staff over the sea, causing it to split in two so that a large band of escaped slaves could pass through the water as if on dry land, is a great story about liberation and about God’s concern for the poor and downtrodden. The story was a source of hope and comfort for those freeing slavery in the American South; Martin Luther King, Oscar Romero, and Desmond Tutu all looked to this passage for inspiration as they worked to make a better, more just and peaceable word for all God’s Children, which is lovely, but what does it have to do with a wedding?
To answer that question, I’m going to make another confession: and that is I’m not going to deliver a traditional Presbyterian wedding homily. When I was in seminary I learned that a proper Presbyterian sermon or homily begins by reading the Bible and then it looks for how the words contained therein might have meaning for us today, which is what I do just about every Sunday, but for your wedding I’m not really looking for meaning in this story, at least not directly. Rather, this homily’s central metaphor comes from a Jewish tradition about this story, a midrash to which a rabbi friend of mine introduced me about ten days ago. To preach from a story not found in the Bible about a story that is found in the Bible is not exactly playing according to Hoyle (at least not for a Presbyterian), but we’re a long way from Princeton Theological Seminary, and it won’t be the first time a member of our family has dealt out hands from an offbeat, somewhat heretical deck of playing cards.
Anyway, according to this tradition, when Moses stood on the shore of the Sea of Reeds and lifted up his staff, and, expecting a miracle, commanded the waters to part, nothing happened at first… which must have been a little bit awkward. But then, according to this tradition, a man by the name of Nashon ben Aminadav walked into the sea anyway, and still nothing happened. He walked deeper and deeper and the waters stayed put until the waters reached Nashon ben Aminadav’s nose. Then the waters parted.
This, it seems to me, is a good metaphor for marriage. The wedding ceremony functions a lot like a Moses holding up his staff. There are vows, and an exchange of rings; there’s a sacred kiss and a proclamation of marriage. These are symbols that mark the next leg of your journey together, but there is no miracle, and no waters part, until you take the first step, and probably it will take several steps, and you may need to go down clear up to your nose before anything happens – but if you trust the love that has brought you to this place, and if you have confidence in the grace that makes you strong, then you can walk forward out of bondage and into freedom.
And make no mistake here. By getting married you are walking into freedom. Far too many people speak of marriage as an end to freedom, and I know that for some people marriage is a form of bondage, but it doesn’t have to be. The freed slaves who followed Nashon ben Aminadav into the sea didn’t emerge straight onto the shores of the Promised Land. It took time. They had to cross though a desert, where things were scary and often quite rough, but they also feasted on manna from heaven and they drank from springs of miraculous waters; and even when they finally did reach the Promised Land there were giants living there, and hostile neighbors. Freedom, it turns out, isn’t always easy, but it is good. Despite what you may have heard, freedom is far more than just another word for nothing left to lose.
Or at least it can be. Now I’m going to go back to being a Presbyterian and point out that in the Calvinist tradition, we understand that freedom comes in two forms. There is freedom from and freedom to. By walking away from slavery in Egypt, the children of Israel were freed from bondage, but that only got them down to the beach. By following Nashon ben Aminadav into the sea, and from there on to the Promised Land, the Children of Israel got the freedom to become a nation, freedom to live lives that nurtured the soul,
And I would say that by falling in love you have freed yourselves from the loneliness and uncertainty of single life; by walking boldly into marriage you are freeing yourselves to forge a life of mutual help and companionship together. You are freeing yourselves to build loving and nurturing home for your growing family. You are freeing yourselves to enter a grand adventure together. It’s not an easy adventure, but it is good. Manna and heavenly water await you along the way, and your destination is a promised land, but to get there you must hold hands and step into the water together, and as you do you are surrounded by our prayers, by our support and, more than anything else, by our love.
Ben