The Bride Complex

"So The Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall upon the man, and while he slept took one of his ribs and closed up its place with flesh; and the rib which The Lord God had taken from the man he made into a woman and brought her to the man. Then the man said, "This at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man." (Genesis 2:21-23 RSV)

So I'm engaged and of course I'm excited to be planning my wedding. However, there have been a few things along the way that I'm not so very fond of right now. For example, why is it that the worldly view of weddings is that the main focus is on the bride? Even the song which plays "here comes the bride" makes everyone focus on the bride. All these television shows say yes to the dress and other things. They all make it seem like the whole wedding day is "just" to make the "bride" happy. Whatever happened to the idea that weddings symbolize a bigger picture. Think of the bride of Christ? We are going to be taken with Him in unity!!! As the bride of Christ we are His helpmates... that is our responsibility. We don't focus all our attention on ourselves as the bride of Christ and Christ doesn't focus all of the attention on Him either. It's about relationship our relationship with Him for God's glory.

The body of Christ makes up the bride of Christ. We need to look at our relationships also as the body of Christ. Yes the man is suppose to be the spiritual head. Why not? He was created first and women have a tendency to be ran by their emotions and not so much by their logic. It's just God's smart way of doing it. However we are important too in the body of Christ. We as women have qualities that men do not possess that they need help with and men have qualities that women posses that they need. I believe the important thing is that even though the man is the the relationship t we don't forget that we have a function also. We aren't bound with rope we are able to help. Being a helpmate is a great responsibility and is very important for the relationship to keep it strong. Both a man and a woman are needed to make a marriage work to glorify God. Therefore, let's celebrate that!

The same is for our spouse. Our identity was originally created from him. We were made from man so that we know that we together are "complete".

The following is something that I came across many years ago:

Woman was created from the rib of man.
She was not created from his head to be above him
Nor was she created from his foot to be trampled by him
She was taken from his side to be his equal,
From beneath his arm to be protected by him,
From near his heart to be loved by him.

This is exactly why we need to realize that our wedding should be about our unity. It is not just about the bride it is about two people coming together with a purpose ordained by God. Marriage is a ministry it is not something to be just a show for people it requires intense work and dedication but most of all it requires commitment and unity of the heart.

I hope the next time you look at the man you want to marry you will realize what it's really about and refocus your marriage on Him together.

“Two are better off than one, because
they can work more effectively. If one of
them falls down, the other can help him
up…Two people can resist an attack that
defeats one person alone. A rope made
up of three cords is hard to break”
(Ecclesiastes 4:9,12)