Geoff and I took communion during our wedding service. Through all the preparations on the day, the ‘supplies’ somehow got forgotten. We made use of the church’s port and sent an Uncle down to get some bread rolls. He grabbed the first bag of rolls and raced back through the checkout asking the girl to hurry up because he was in the middle of a wedding, she told him to just take them and run! Thank you Mr. Safeway (or Coles or whatever) for the free bread… that’s supposedly how it goes.
I’ve written about communion before. I find it’s a interesting thing. I’m aware somewhat of the attitude you should be in when having communion but is there a place in forcing it? Is it that important? I cannot afterall ever be completely in mindset-perfection when coming to communion – as selfish as it sounds, I just think that it is realistic.
My head was all over the place during the wedding, mostly full of excitement/adrenalin. I was, and am, incredibly grateful to God for who he is and what he has done, and I pushed to acknowledge that in my thoughts when we were taking it, but it was honestly a little bit of a stretch. Concentration low. This does however play into my still highly shaky understanding of what actually takes place at communion. What more goes on?
I am glad that God sees and celebrates with and most of all understands us.
There is too much emphasis on just look and feel and constraining to comfort levels of individuals at weddings. We did choose not to do communion as a group/invitees etc. as there were enough people there to whom it wouldn’t be relevant or true (and the logistics would’ve been horrendous) and our actions were explained to onlookers.
I’m perfectly content and okay with how we approached doing communion – to elevate the importance of God above our relationship and to demonstrate in some small way that it’s a three way thing not just the two of us in this marriage.
“The God who made the world and everything in it is the Lord of heaven and earth and does not live in temples built by hands. And he is not served by human hands, as if he needed anything, because he himself gives all men life and breath and everything else. From one man he made every nation of men, that they should inhabit the whole earth; and he determined the times set for them and the exact places where they should live. God did this so that men would seek him and perhaps reach out for him and find him, though he is not far from each one of us. ‘For in him we live and move and have our being.’ As some of your own poets have said, ‘We are his offspring.’ ” – Acts 17:24-28
I struggle with the communion thing too. I do think there’s a place for “forcing it”, but I’m not sure where the line is between doing something because “it’s good for you”, and then doing things for that reason so often that it becomes an empty ritual.
I know my head was all over the place during our ceremony. When I’m overwhelmed, I tend to just zone out/go blank – I don’t recall feeling much at all, although the photos tell a different story. I can’t even remember the words of our wedding vows, even though we wrote them ourselves…!!