Proper 17 (A)

September 1, 2002

After the Shouting

Romans 12:9-21

September is such a lovely time to get married. The weather often so perfect. There are always lots of anniversaries to celebrate in this month. I have a vivid memory of a stunning September wedding some years ago now. It was a Jewish-Protestant wedding in a synagogue. Everything about it was beautiful. The people, the setting, the words, music -- all reminded me of Snow White and her prince on their wedding day.

The groom even crushed anything that might mar the beauty of their marriage by stomping on the wine glass. Then the final Hebrew blessing and English blessing and they were coming down the aisle beaming. Someone whispered quietly to me, "Well, it's all over now, but the shouting!"

His sarcastic play on words started me out of my story book spell, back into the reality that we had just witnessed the last scene in Snow White's tale. Our fairy tales never begin with the wedding. They always end there. Perhaps because people have felt for centuries that in a sense the most beautiful and exciting days of their lives end at that point. After that comes "the shouting", or so they say.

When things get rough we say, "Well, the honeymoon's over." The time when love comes easily is passed. Then what? Then the story fades out. The movies and magazines just replay the story up to that point, again and again. We repeat over and over in our books and films and dramas the beautiful beginning of a love story and when the hero and heroine finally get together the love story ends!

Oh, some other story may go on, like the classic "I Love Lucy" shows or TV soap operas in which we see mainly struggles between the men and women; they're trying to trick each other, be one up on the other, fighting, hurting, shouting at each other. Somehow all that shouting between Lucy and Ricky never seemed very funny to me. I always wondered why they couldn't just get together and live in peace.

Paul said, in so far as it is in your control, live peaceably with all. As a child, I often wondered why married couples and the closest relatives and friends always seemed to be the ones on TV who were fighting with each other. I remember being amazed to learn as a child that most murders are committed within families. This is still true today. The people who are closest to each other have the strongest feelings about each other, both good and bad. We have wonderful ceremonies to celebrate the good feelings. But not a lot of help dealing with the bad ones. The divorce court is a lonely place.

I like weddings because they're so full of hope. But the hope has to be in the kind of "working" love, that goes into action when the easy love's prelude stops and the more "advanced" music comes on, for which we must labor to learn the difficult dance of patience, perseverence and prayer. The harmony of this more and more sophisticated music demands humility, nobility and grace under pressure. It requires that if someone steps on your foot, you don't kick them; rather, you help them to learn the steps by continuing steadfast in them yourself. You teach them a lesson by reaching for the Spirit power of "second wind" and get your inspiration to act in grace, rather than in kind.