This was my prayer at the wedding of two young people whom my wife and I knew well. by Bill & Roberta Taylor

This was my prayer at the wedding of two young people whom my wife and I knew well. Bill Taylor 7/29/22

It may give you some ideas. Our father, as we gather here in Your presence to witness as this man and this woman are joined in Holy Matrimony, we thank You for Your undeserved and unmerited gift of salvation through which we glorify You and enjoy You forever in the life to come. We also thank You for Your undeserved and unmerited gift of marriage through which we glorify You and enjoy each other in this life. We have heard their testimony. Both this man and this woman have died to their former sinful lives and been born again into a new life in Christ. They belong to You, Father, so they should be OK with Your desire to give them to belong to each other. Father, as this couple leaves our assembly as man and wife, we pray that You will work on their hearts so that they will gladly die to their former individual selves and be no more twain, but one flesh as our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ commanded. Draw them, Father, so that they daily serve You by serving each other and daily glorify You by glorifying and appreciating each other. May they draw closer to each other as they draw closer to You. May they lean on each other and depend on each other as they lean more and more on You. We know, Father, that it is Your will that, as they grow as stewards of Your manifold grace, as they minister Your love, grace, and forgiveness one to another, that their light will shine before men. As those who do not know You see their selfless love and forgiveness, they will seek a portion of Your grace for themselves. We plead this in the name of Your only son, our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

God Demonstrates His Love and His Holiness in a way Everyone Sees! Bill Taylor 7/29/22

God arranged for me to be born in a house where my mother taught me the best-known Bible verse in all the world: For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. John 3:16 Lost people sometimes tell me God couldn’t possibly love them because of all their sins. They know the difference between right and wrong, they “shew the work of the law written in their hearts, their conscience also bearing witness (Ro. 2:15).” The Bible teaches that such people need to be persuaded that God loves them enough to forgive them because they already know that their sins have violated His holiness: Keep yourselves in the love of God, looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life. 22And of some have compassion, making a difference: 23And others save with fear, pulling them out of the fire; hating even the garment spotted by the flesh. Jude 1:21-23 Once they understand God’s love enough to truly love Him, they’ll follow His commands because they want to please Him. As the Apostle Paul put it, “For the love of Christ constraineth us: (2 Cor. 5:14).” Some people are saved by being told about Hell, others by being shown that God loves them. We’ll discuss God’s love first because “keeping ourselves in the love of God” is the foundation of marriage. If wife and husband both bathe themselves in God’s love, it’s easier for them to love each other and everyone else in the church. That’s how we show the world that we belong to Jesus: By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another. John 13:35 To be fair to people who doubt God’s love, it is hard to understand how a Holy, perfect God can love wretched sinners like you and me (Ps. 8:4, Heb. 2:6). God knew that, so He not only told us in His Word that He loves us, He gave us mothers to show every one of us how His unconditional love works. I understood sin because my mother objected when I disobeyed. I learned forgiveness because my mother loved me enough to forgive me. I understood confession and repentance (2 Jn. 1:9) because life went better when I admitted my wrongs and tried not to do it again. Mom and Dad taught me what I needed to know to accept Christ as my Savior when I was in 2nd grade. I loved Jesus because He loved me enough (Ro. 5:8) to accept the punishment for my sins – taking the punishment for my brothers’ sins was hard for me to think about. I didn’t realize that Jesus loved me FAR more than “just” being willing to take on the evil of all my sins and lose His close fellowship with His Father (Ps. 22:1, Mt. 27:46, Mk. 15:34). I thought that when Adam soiled himself through sin and a perfect God could no longer associate with polluted Adam, Jesus agreed that He would become sin for us so that we could be washed clean enough to be with God in Heaven. It was years before I realized that Jesus KNEW Adam would sin before He said “let there be light” to start creating the world. Rev. 13:8 speaks of “the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world.” Jesus knew He would have to die BEFORE HE EVEN CREATED Adam, yet He loved all of us enough to create us ANYWAY! It’s hard to understand loving us enough to die for us so God shows us. Before modern medicine, a woman had roughly 98.5% chance of surviving a pregnancy. That sounds like death in childbirth was unlikely, but without birth control, women had so many pregnancies that 1 woman in 8 died in childbirth. EVERY girl knew someone who had died in childbirth. EVERY girl knew that she would walk the valley of the shadow of death for each child (Ge. 35:18, 1 Sam. 4:20), yet women wanted to marry and bear children (Ge.30:1, Lk. 1:25) ANYWAY. Jesus knew He would weep when people He loved wouldn’t accept His offer of salvation (Is. 53:3, Mt. 23:37, Lk. 13:34) and that He would have to die to save us from our sins, yet He created the world which led to my birth ANYWAY. I was born before antibiotics came to fight childbed infections. My mother gladly risked her life to give me life and did it again and again for my brothers. That’s the woman’s part of Ge. 5:1-2 “in the likeness of God made he them,” and “he called THEIR name Adam” to include Eve. I thanked my mother for teaching me about God’s love for me and for SHOWING me HER love (Is. 49:15) so that I could believe in God’s love. I thanked her for feeding me and changing my diapers to keep me alive, but she died before I matured enough to thank her for risking her life to give me life. Let your mother know you appreciate her wanting YOU in spite of the peril and pain she’d bear giving birth to you (Pr. 31:28-29). Then thank Jesus for creating you in spite of knowing that He would have to DIE to take the punishment for YOUR sins (Jn. 15:3). Death in childbirth is less common than it was, but still happens. Your mother risked her life to give you life, shed her blood to birth you, then LABORED to keep you alive; Jesus died to give you more abundant life (Jn. 10:10) followed by life eternal (Mt 25:46, Jn. 4:36, 12:25, 17:3). Thank them both. What did you do to EARN Jesus’ giving His life and His blood (He. 9:12, 9:22) to pay the penalty for your sins and my sins? Nothing. There is NOTHING we can do to earn salvation (Is. 64:6, Ro. 3:10), it is an undeserved gift of God (Eph. 2:8-9) which He died to give us because He loves us (Ez. 33:11, Ro. 5:8). If someone gave you a birthday gift, would you hand over money to pay for it? That would refuse the gift. Trying to get to heaven by being good, being religious, going to church, tithing, doing good deeds, is not only impossible (Ro. 3:11), trying to earn your way into heaven blocks you from accepting Jesus’ free offer of salvation from your sins (Gal. 5:4). You’re trying to pay for a feely-offered gift whose price is FAR more than anyone could ever pay. What did you do to EARN your mother’s risking her life to give you life and then pouring her life into keeping you alive and teaching you how to behave as an adult? Nothing. She risked her life before she knew anything about you. She gave her life freely based on the emotional drives God put into her and looked forward eagerly to your birth as she felt God forming you within her womb (Is. 49:5). God’s love and God’s salvation are both undeserved gifts of God. He used mothers to show how His love works. We should love Him because He first loved us (Ro. 5:8). His love should drive us to serve Him as He requires of us (2 Cor. 5:14). God never bullies us into obedience; He always lets us choose (Joshua 24:25) whether to obey His commands or not. He yearns for obedience (De. 5:29, 30:10), but He never forces us. The choice is ours. Have you thanked your mother today for risking her life to give you life and then pouring her life into you? And thanked Jesus for dying to save you? The Apostle Paul pointed out that we do the work of spreading the Gospel because our love for Christ “constraineth us,” that is, makes us do it. We serve Him because our love for Him makes us want to please Him. For the love of Christ constraineth us; II Corinthians 5:14a In the same way, our love for our spouses should push us to do whatever we can to please him or her. If lost people see married Christians working to please each other out of love, they’ll often ask how we can handle the problems the other person causes. That gives us a chance to talk about God’s love and God’s forgiveness. God forgives us, so God expects us to forgive other people in the same way He forgave us (Mt. 6:15).

Bill Taylor 7/29/22

This was my prayer at the wedding of two young people whom my wife and I knew well. It may give you some ideas. Our father, as we gather here in Your presence to witness as this man and this woman are joined in Holy Matrimony, we thank You for Your undeserved and unmerited gift of salvation through which we glorify You and enjoy You forever in the life to come. We also thank You for Your undeserved and unmerited gift of marriage through which we glorify You and enjoy each other in this life. We have heard their testimony. Both this man and this woman have died to their former sinful lives and been born again into a new life in Christ. They belong to You, Father, so they should be OK with Your desire to give them to belong to each other. Father, as this couple leaves our assembly as man and wife, we pray that You will work on their hearts so that they will gladly die to their former individual selves and be no more twain, but one flesh as our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ commanded. Draw them, Father, so that they daily serve You by serving each other and daily glorify You by glorifying and appreciating each other. May they draw closer to each other as they draw closer to You. May they lean on each other and depend on each other as they lean more and more on You. We know, Father, that it is Your will that, as they grow as stewards of Your manifold grace, as they minister Your love, grace, and forgiveness one to another, that their light will shine before men. As those who do not know You see their selfless love and forgiveness, they will seek a portion of Your grace for themselves. We plead this in the name of Your only son, our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.