Rev. John Wynburne - Wedding Readings and Musical Ideas

First published in Great Britain in 2003 by W. Foulsham & Co. Ltd
Copyright 2003 John Wynburne and Alison Gibbs
A CIP record for this book is available from the British Library
The moral right of the authors has been asserted
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Epub ISBN 9780572040345 Kindle ISBN 9780572040994 Book ISBN 9780572028619
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In particular, since laws change from time to time, it is vital that each individual checks relevant legal details for themselves.
W. Foulsham & Co. Ltd Capital Point, 33 Bath Road Slough, Berkshire SL1 3UF, England www.foulsham.com

A wedding is a very important event: it marks one of the most significant decisions of your life. As well as having a serious purpose, it is also a day of celebration, a day of fun and festivity, a day to cherish and a day that you will want to look back on again and again. Organising a wedding is a daunting task.

A great deal of time and money, not to mention hopes and dreams, are usually invested in the planning, with everyone involved wanting to enjoy the day to the full and make it a special and unforgettable experience. The responsibility for the organisers can, at times, seem overwhelming and it is not always easy to source the myriad talents and depth of knowledge that are required. This book is designed to help with two vital aspects of your wedding: the readings and the music. Whether it takes place in a sacred building, a register office or in another licensed location, some elements of a wedding remain reassuringly constant: the choice of words used for the vows and the order of events are familiar to most of us. However, it is possible to add personal touches of style to the ceremony itself by the use of readings and music that accompany the event. An appropriate piece of poetry or prose can often express what we are feeling at a given moment far more eloquently than we could ourselves and there is no doubt that music is the perfect way to create the atmosphere you want.

Unfortunately, although most of us can quote a few verses from the Bible or a phrase from a favourite poem, or hum a few bars of a familiar piece of music, we may have no idea of where to find the whole work, what it was called or who the author or composer was. This collection is designed to make the task of finding and choosing the readings and music easier for you. We have, in the first sections of the book, brought together a variety of written extracts, both prose and poetry, as well as short readings from the New Revised Standard Version of the Bible. (You can, of course, use a different version if you prefer.) Somewhere in these pages, we hope that you will find a passage that puts into words what you feel most deeply, or helps you and those with you to focus on the meaning and importance of the occasion. Most of the items we have chosen are quite brief many can be read in less than a minute and the longer ones may be shortened by cutting out sections if you prefer. The style and language vary from the simplest and most contemporary to the very traditional.

Some are humorous, some are thought-provoking, but all are chosen to match in some way the emotions and intentions that surround a marriage. We have also put together a selection of musical compositions to be performed during the wedding. We have organised them into groups, each designed to establish a mood and enhance the atmosphere at a particular stage of the ceremony. All you have to do is pick out the pieces that you feel match the style of your own individual wedding ceremony. We hope that, whilst making your choice, you will enjoy reading and listening to the passages and compositions we have suggested and that, once your wedding is over, you will want to keep this book as a reminder of your special, memorable day.

Love Is the River of Life Love is the river of life in this world.

Think not that ye know it who stand at the little tinkling rill, the first small fountain. Not until you have gone through the rocky gorges and not lost the stream; not until you have gone through the meadow, and the stream has widened and deepened until fleets could ride on its bosom; not until beyond the meadow you have come to the unfathomable ocean, and poured your treasure into its depths not until then can you know what love is. Henry Ward Beecher (18131887) Marriage Is a Commitment Marriage is a commitment to take that joy deep, deeper than happiness, deep into the discovery of who you most truly are. It is a commitment to a spiritual journey, to a life of becoming in which joy can comprehend despair; running through rivers of pain into joy again. Thus marriage is even deeper than commitment. It is a covenant a covenant that says: I love you I trust you I will be here for you when you are hurting, and when I am hurting I will not leave.

It is a covenant intended not to provide a haven from pain or anger or sorrow. Life offers no such haven. Instead, marriage is intended to provide a sanctuary safe enough to risk loving; to risk living and sharing from the centre of oneself. This is worth everything. Anonymous The Voyage of Commitment The voyage of commitment is never made alone; we cannot, then, be committed only to ourselves or we will die. We must ask whether we can give ourselves to another, or to others not knowing the changes that time, bad luck, and sickness may work on them ...

You have to give more than this in real love, and be ready to move into darkness, illness, and loss of beauty, if you care at all about someone else. We stand on sacred ground when we stand close enough to another to give ourselves without strings, conditions, or codicils written into our commitments. Are such commitments possible? How can we tell unless we have given ourselves to another, made our heart vulnerable, in order to achieve a sense of life which is deeper than the trembling moment and its dreadful ticking uncertainties. E. Kennedy Marriage Is One Long Conversation Marriage is one long conversation, chequered by disputes. The disputes are valueless; they but ingrain the difference; the heroic heart of woman prompting her at once to nail her colours to the mast.

But in the intervals, almost unconsciously, and with no desire to shine, the whole material of life is turned over and over, ideas are struck out and shared, the two persons more and more adapt their notions one to suit the other, and in the process of time, without sound of trumpet, they conduct each other into new worlds of thought. Robert Louis Stevenson (18501894)