You’ve seen the famous picture. A golden candelabra stands on a long table draped with a white tablecloth. Fine china settings and crystal goblets line each side, and seem to run forever to a vanishing point over Jerusalem. Beyond the exquisite table and carved chairs, lay the dawn of a brand new day. Countless artists have attempted to capture the picture-perfect Marriage Feast.

We’ve all been to weddings. I am always amazed at the creativity and expense people go to for nuances of symbolism. They work to exhaustion so that everything will be perfect. The bride wearing a white dress arrives in a carriage drawn by a white horse. Two doves are released. A unity candle is lit.

Ministers carefully craft wedding ceremonies, in the hope that a better description of marriage will help young couples have better marriages. Eager grooms and starry-eyed brides invite family and friends to witness as they make promises, only to find out later that they didn’t have a clue what they were promising.

 I’ve noticed there is something conspicuously missing in the famous painting of the Marriage Feast (besides the food, of course). It seems they forgot to include napkins. An oversight? I hardly think so. One of the things that will make heaven, heaven is that we won’t need napkins. In heaven we will all be perfect. No spills, no reaching for the butter and having your elbow hit a glass of milk.  No nice cabernet all over the tablecloth and on your spouse’s lap. No exclamations coming out of your mouth before you realize it.

Someday everything will be perfect…in heaven. In the meantime, husbands and wives are two imperfect people making a life in an imperfect world; two people in need of grace. Grace is unearned and undeserved favor that God gives to us. Life and marriage will be more like heaven as we learn to give grace to one another.

Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. ~ Romans 1:7