Sunday 9th September 2007

George Eliot’s classic novel Adam Bede has a simply wonderful ending. After enduring tragedy and sorrow Adam falls desperately in love with the novel’s heroine Dinah. He finally finds the courage to declare his love for her and discovers that she is equally in love with him. Dinah however is a deeply committed itinerant Methodist preacher who believes that she must devote her whole life to God. She says that to give way to her love for Adam would be to live for her own delight, to become enslaved to earthly affection such that she could no more be a selfless disciple of Jesus Christ. And so she goes away, leaving the village where Adam lived, to continue her preaching ministry.

After two months Adam can bear it no more and goes to see her on a Sunday afternoon. They meet as she walks home from church and she falls into his arms and then says, “Adam, it is the Divine Will. My soul is so knit to yours that it is but a divided life I live without you. And this moment, now you are with me, and I feel that our hearts are filled with the same love. I have a fullness of strength to bear and do our heavenly Father’s Will that I had lost before.” The chapter ends: ‘What greater thing is there for two human souls than to feel that they are joined for life – to strengthen each other in all labour, to rest on each other in all sorrow, to minister to each other in all pain, to be one with each other in silent unspeakable memories at the moment of last parting.’

In these few paragraphs George Eliot moves from the delight and excitement of falling in love to the strength of the bond between two people that marriage can bring. I’m sure many of us can remember the joyful early days of being in love with the person we married. But no one pretends that this initial passion lasts forever – as someone quipped ‘Marriage is like a bath – once you’ve been in it for a while it’s not so hot’. In giving thanks for marriage today we will, I hope, rekindle some of the very happy memories we have of wedding days past. And be reminded of the extraordinary God given gift of love that knits us together.

Dinah has a dramatic turnaround, from rejecting Adam in favour of her vocation, to seeing her life as being fulfilled by her marrying him. It comes about because she realises that human love is part of God’s purpose – ‘It is the Divine will’ she says. Exactly the same message emerges from our readings. In the first letter of John the evangelist writes ‘everyone who loves is born of God and knows God’. When we truly love each other in the selfless and generous way in which Jesus loved all whom he cared for, then we reflect the nature of God. We become like Jesus, we become Christlike. This way of loving is not reserved for those who fall in love and marry. It is a way of loving that should be the inspiration and model for all of our human relationships. A way of loving that characterises all our lives as Christians. “By this everyone shall know you are my disciples – if you love one another”, said Jesus.

The relationship of a man and woman in marriage is distinctive in that the couple’s vows bind them together. It is a covenant relationship intended to mirror the relationship of Jesus with his people. Hence the preface to the Marriage Service says that husband and wife are united in heart, body and mind, as Christ is united with his bride, the Church. This appears a rather strange analogy. What it tells us is that our relationship with Christ should be one of interdependence – the relationship that develops over time for couples.

The Church’s purpose is to be the living body of Christ – his continuing presence in the world. Without Christ the Church has no purpose. And likewise Christ is dependent upon the Church. For without the Church, Christ’s presence in the world is not possible. There is a tremendous sense of peace and purpose in allowing this interdependence with Christ to grow. And it is God’s will that as a couple, over time, are increasingly united in heart, body and mind, through the constant expression of love, they become similarly interdependent. Of course it does require patience and tolerance. You may remember Percy and Florence Arrowsmith who celebrated their 80th wedding anniversary two years ago. Interviewed on his anniversary, Mr Arrowsmith revealed that the secret of their long and happy marriage could be summed up in two words: "Yes dear."

Speaking to a couple planning their daughter’s wedding last week I was told that the average cost of a wedding today is £20,000. The church fees in this frightening sum amount to about £600 – around 3% of the cost. I sometimes think that, rather ironically, this reflects the significance people place on God and the Church in their marriages. And I admit that when we celebrate our wedding anniversary we tend to go to a restaurant rather than to a church. Which is why I think this service is such a good idea. Because it draws us back to the source of our love and it reminds us that those of us who have been called to marriage are fulfilling God’s purposes for us. Jesus was present not just at the wedding at Cana in Galilee, but was and is, through the Holy Spirit, present in all our marriages and relationships. Through the Holy Spirit that is the energy and shape of true love. And it is when we are aware of that source of love and try as best we can to mirror God’s perfect expression of it, that our lives are as rich as wine and not bland and tasteless like water.

Marriage is not always easy and for lots of people marriage is not possible or the way of life. But we are all called to support married couples and their children. As I have mentioned in my introduction to this service, the text of the Marriage Service reminds us that marriage ‘enriches society and strengthens community’. When a couple are married the congregation promises to support and uphold them in their marriage in the years to come. Many of us know that there are times when marriage can be extremely difficult for all sorts of reasons. And at such times the love and support we receive from family and friends can be the only things that holds us together.

But sometimes the right solution is for a marriage to end. In times such as this I tend to think of Jesus with the Samaritan woman at the well who had had five husbands and was living with a sixth man who was not her husband. Her disastrous personal history did not exclude her from Jesus’ radical love – instead of condemning or rejecting her, his message to her was to try and find a new way of living that was closer to his teaching. This woman unwittingly became his disciple and evangelist. No one is excluded from Jesus’ love and forgiveness if they, like the woman at the well, turn to him in faith.

In a moment I am going to invite all who are married here with their partners to turn to face each other and renew the sacred and precious vows they made at their wedding. If you are not married, or your husband or wife is not with you, please use the time to re-commit yourself as a member of the Church to Jesus Christ. We turn to our partners knowing that there may have been times when we have struggled to hold firm to our marriage vows. But the joy is in our knowledge that, as with Dinah and Adam, it is but divided lives we would live without each other.

© Robert Jenkins 2007