From the Book of Order, Presbyterian Church (USA)

Marriage From the Book of Order, Presbyterian Church (USA)

Marriage is a gift God has given to all humankind for the well-being of the entire human family. Marriage involves a unique commitment between two people, traditionally a man and a woman, to love and support each other for the rest of their lives. The sacrificial love that unites the couple sustains them as faithful and responsible members of the church and the wider community.

In civil law, marriage is a contract that recognizes the rights and obligations of the married couple in society. In the Reformed tradition, marriage is also a covenant in which God has an active part, and which the community of faith publicly witnesses and acknowledges.

In preparation for the marriage service, the minister will discuss with the couple the following: 1. The nature of their Christian commitment, assuring that at least one is a professing Christian. 2. The legal requirements of the state. 3. The privileges and responsibilities of Christian marriage. 4. The nature and form of the marriage service. 5. The vows and commitments they will be asked to make. 6. The relationship of these commitments to their lives of discipleship. 7. The resources of the faith and the Christian community to assist them in

fulfilling their marriage commitments.

Christian marriage should be celebrated in the place where the community gathers for worship. As a service of Christian worship, the marriage service is under the direction of the minister. The marriage ordinarily takes place in a special service which focuses upon marriage as a gift of God and as an expression of the Christian life.

The service begins with scriptural sentences and a brief statement of purpose. The couple shall declare their intention to enter into Christian marriage and shall exchange vows of love and faithfulness. The service includes appropriate passages of Scripture, which may be interpreted in various forms of proclamation. Prayers shall be offered for the couple, for the communities which support them in this new dimension of discipleship, and for all who seek to live in faithfulness. In the name of the triune God the minister shall declare publicly that the couple are now joined in marriage. A charge may be given. The service concludes with a benediction.

Music suitable for the marriage service directs attention to God and expresses the faith of the church. The congregation may join in hymns and other musical forms of praise and prayer. Flowers, decorations, and other appointments should be appropriate to the place of worship, enhance the worshipers’ consciousness of the reality of God, and reflect the integrity and simplicity of Christian life. The Date of Your Wedding

Generally, weddings are conducted on days other than Sunday, Christmas Eve, Christmas Day, or during Holy Week (Palm Sunday through Easter). Whereas most couples today prefer a separate service for their wedding, it is interesting to note that there is a long tradition of incorporating the service of marriage of church members in the Service for the Lord’s Day, that is, in Sunday morning worship.

Naturally, members of this church have priority in using the church for a wedding. Any member can exercise this privilege twelve months in advance of the actual date of the wedding. For example, if a non-member contacts the church in June of this year, to schedule a wedding on August 1 of next year, the church will schedule the wedding upon receipt of the specified deposit, but the date cannot be confirmed until August 1 of this year, twelve months in advance of the actual date. This is rarely a problem, though please maintain some flexibility in your schedule until the church confirms the date of your wedding.

On occasions when two or more weddings occur on a given day, a minimum of three hours must separate the individual services. This is to assure that everyone has adequate time for all of the details surrounding the wedding service, and for the church to be readied for the next service.

Your Service Leader and Advocate

Pastor Mark conducts every wedding. In certain instances, non-Presbyterian clergy may participate in a wedding service at the invitation of the pastor.

Please plan to meet privately with the pastor three times. The purpose of the meetings is outlined in MARRIAGE, the first article in this wedding guide. Obviously, detailed plans must be made for your individual wedding service and for any particular arrangements that may be required. The first of these meetings should be held at least two months before your wedding day.

Please call the church office to schedule a meeting with the pastor. Appointments can be made either during the day or in the evening. Phone numbers and office hours are posted at the end of this wedding guide under the heading Church Staff. Your Wedding Rehearsal and Wedding Service

During your first consultation with the pastor you will learn about the wedding service we use in this church. A service of Christian marriage is a service of worship before God and is usually conducted in the church.

Your wedding rehearsal and wedding service are under the direction of the pastor. A wedding assistant is always on hand to help you and your wedding party, the pastor, guests, and providers of services from outside the church such as florists or photographers.

The rehearsal involves important preparation for your wedding. It is a time when each participant practices their part so that they will be fully prepared to carry out the important role that you have invited them to perform. All members of the wedding party should plan not only to participate in the rehearsal, but to be on time. Timeliness is especially important when two or more wedding rehearsals take place on a given evening. Not being prompt can sacrifice critical practice time from your rehearsal. Please ensure that all participants come to the rehearsal and that they are on time!

Normally the wedding rehearsal takes place in the late afternoon or evening immediately preceding your wedding day. If you are planning a rehearsal dinner, you should schedule it at least one hour after the rehearsal begins because the rehearsal normally takes about an hour to complete.

Please note well: Your marriage license must be given to the pastor at your wedding rehearsal.

Though it is often a challenge in our fast-paced society, it’s a good idea to give yourselves and everyone else in your wedding plenty of time. Your wedding service will probably last about half an hour; it will be over before you know it. So take time to savor the experience. Let everyone have ample time to fully enjoy your very special day. Your Wedding Music

The director of music of the church will be happy to work with you in the selection of processional (walking in) and recessional (walking out) music and to discuss other music that is appropriate for your wedding service. Hymns for congregational singing may be selected and a soloist, choir, instrumentalist or instrumental ensemble may perform music that is appropriate to the occasion. All music and musicians must be approved by the director of music.

The marriage rite is a service of worship before God, consequently your wedding music should hold the same high standards as the music used in the Service for the Lord’s Day. Wedding music is strong spiritual music that emphasizes God as the source of love. Music that emphasizes romance or that consists of sentimental metaphors of romantic love is not fitting to the dignity of the marriage service. This church also discourages what is often referred to as “contemporary” Christian music because it is borrowed directly from the secular idiom. Everybody likes and enjoys popular music--it just has no place in a worship service. Also, taped or recorded music is normally inappropriate for worship settings and is discouraged.

An issue that often arises is that of having the couple’s favorite popular song, “their” song, featured in their wedding service. Really, the ideal place for the performance of “your” song is your wedding reception, a setting in which everyone can enjoy it fully and where it can even be repeated several times throughout the festivities. A simple test of appropriate music is, “Is it directed to God?”

One other word about music: The director of music has had a long and seasoned career as a service organist. Over the years he has played accompaniments for the solos of favorite aunts of the bride, for a friend of the groom’s sister who is an enthusiastic soloist but who has had no musical training, and for all manner of well-intentioned individuals, sometimes with pretty good results, other times with pretty bad results. Don’t take music too lightly or casually! It can add immeasurable to the beauty of your wedding, or it can virtually make a laughingstock out of the occasion.

If you’re looking for a special job for a special person, there are many unique ways in which relatives and friends can serve at a wedding. The music is usually best left to professionals or well-trained amateurs. The director of music will be happy to assist you in engaging soloists or ensembles who will make a superb musical contribution to your wedding service.

Picture Perfect!

Short of tripping over your wedding gown or having the best man faint, there are few things more awkward or distracting than the popping of flash cameras during your wedding service. Worse still is someone with a roaming video camera who is out to preserve every aspect of your wedding day for posterity. Such practices distract grossly from the dignity, propriety and beauty of your wedding and challenge the powers of concentration of your relatives and invited guests. They simply are out of place.

To remedy this potential problem, we prohibit the use of walk-about videography or the use of flash or floodlights for still or motion pictures. Flash pictures, however, may be taken during your processional and recessional. Videography during your wedding is acceptable so long as the videographer and video equipment do not present a distraction. Your wedding assistant will be happy to help with appropriate placement of your videographer and video recording equipment.

It is the responsibility of the bride and groom to inform their photographer, videographer, and ushers of these guidelines before the wedding. The ushers should explain this to camera- carrying guests as they enter the church.

Park Here, Not There!

Please use public street parking around the church, or the church parking lot. The entrance is located on the north side of Richland Eye Care, just a couple of doors north of the church on 32nd Street. Two sidewalks provide access to the church from that rather large parking lot.

Please do not use the parking lots of local merchants or certain vehicles may come up missing during your wedding service--the objects of tow trucks. Be sure your guests know about this. You are welcome to photocopy this map for enclosure with your wedding invitations.

Your Marriage License

The state of Michigan has numerous requirements regarding the application for a marriage license. Appropriate fees, verification of age, and a normal three-day waiting period will apply. If you are a resident of Michigan you must obtain your license from the county in which you live or in which your spouse-to-be lives. If both bride and groom are non-residents, application must be made in the county where the wedding will take place, in this case Kalamazoo County.

Remember! Bring your marriage license to your wedding rehearsal.

Other Things You Should Know

The seating capacity of the church is around 300 people. This is a level-of-comfort number.

To reiterate, three hours are generally allotted for your use of the church on your wedding day. When necessary, additional time can often be arranged. Three hours is usually more than adequate for decorating the church, delivery and placement of flowers, dressing, the wedding service itself, and a customary photo session afterward. We must observe this general three- hour time period more strictly when two or more weddings are being held on a given day.

Also ...

 You are responsible for any damage to church property.  Please arrange to remove all of your personal possessions from the church and church grounds before guests begin arriving.  Guests are encouraged to limit their movements within the church to the sanctuary and to the rest rooms through the doors at the north of the chancel. Children especially should be restrained from climbing on the balcony rail or playing on the steep staircases in the narthex (the front entrance vestibule).  Sometimes professional photographers have used the Gull Prairie Room (the large room at your right as you enter the courtyard) as a makeshift studio to photograph the wedding party prior to the wedding service. You are welcome to do this if the room is not in use, say, for a church rummage sale or other similar activity.  First Presbyterian Church is a barrier-free facility. Wheelchair access is via the central courtyard.  The church and grounds are smoke-free.  We respectfully request that all refrain from using alcohol or illegal substances in the church or on its grounds.  Please limit the consumption of food and beverages to the dressing rooms and kitchen.  The throwing of rice, birdseed or confetti is discouraged on church premises because of the potential liabilities or cleanup problems associated with these practices. (Rice can get into the eyes of guests, people can slip and fall on birdseed, and confetti is extremely difficult to clean up.) Consider bubbles instead, or heart-shaped cookies, or the ringing of the church’s bell. The wedding assistant or director of music can provide instructions about ringing the church bell. A specific individual should be designated to do this; a young teenager usually is strong enough to do the job.

Candles, Appointments and Decorations The church provides the candles for your wedding. We have two beautiful floor-standing candelabra, each of which holds seven candles. We also have two single-candle candlesticks and two additional seven-candle candelabra for use on the altar. You are welcome to use any of these, separately or in combination. We must ask that no flower arrangement or greenery be hung on the floor standing candelabra. Please allow the wedding assistant or other church staff member to handle these implements as they are expensive and easy to damage.

Flower petals may be strewn down the center aisle. The pews may be decorated with bows or flowers--please use the church’s plastic pew hangers for this purpose! Like the church itself, the pews date from 1861 so they are true antiques. Whereas they are extremely sturdy, we cannot risk having them defaced by metal hangers, clamps or pins. The church wedding assistant can help you or your florist with this.

The church is fully decorated with evergreens, wreaths and often two large Christmas trees throughout the Advent and Christmas seasons. Any additional decorations used at this time of year should be in keeping with Advent and Christmas decorations.

Please feel free to discuss any of these matters with your wedding assistant or the pastor.

Guest Book and Gifts

If you want people to sign your guest book at the church, we suggest that you arrange to have a particular person supervise it so that the signing goes smoothly. The guest book can become a real bottleneck as people arrive for your wedding. Likewise, should people bring gifts to the church you should arrange for someone to look after them as well.

Receiving Line

Consider how you want to greet your relatives and guests upon the completion of your wedding. You can do this in several different ways, either at the church or at your reception.

If you want to have a receiving line at the church, you, your wedding party and others in the line might stand in the narthex (front vestibule) and greet people as they depart. This is a particularly good plan if it is cold or rainy outside. If the weather is conducive, you might consider greeting people outside the church at the front entrance, or at the bow in the walk in the courtyard. Another approach is to give your ushers some time off and excuse your guests from the pews yourselves, greeting them in this very personal way.

Church Staff First Presbyterian Church 8047 Church Street Richland, MI 49083

Phone 269/629-4944 Fax 269/629-4945 E-mail [email protected] Website www.fpcrich.com

Church Office Hours Monday through Friday 8:30 am ~ 3:30 pm

Pastors The Reverend Doctor Mark W. Jennings

Director of Music & Organist Mr. Larry Myland

Wedding Assistants Ms. Meredith Alspach Ms. Judy Ruser

Custodian Ms. Connie Slater

Secretary Ms. Julie Pixley

Photo Credit The photograph on the front of this wedding guide is by Jim Thompson Photography 125 Crockett Street Portage, MI 49024 269/329-0351