The Bride

I got to thinking about how God looks at the Church as his bride. His bride! Do you get that? There is that moment that you focus so intently on every detail. That moment when your groom sees you for the first time. The doors swing open as the groom takes this giant breath and a smile of approval spreads across his face. All the preparing you have worked on is about to pay off. Your hair, your makeup, your fingernails, your toenails, your jewelry, your flowers and even your underwear. Every detail has been given elaborate thought. Do we do that for Jesus? Do we focus on every aspect of preparation for Him?

Seriously, would we be late for our groom? Would we show up with no makeup and a baseball cap at our wedding or would we wear a mask to disguise ourselves? Would we say something better came up so I couldn't make it? Would we say we are too busy? Would we say we didn't invite anyone because it really wasn't doing to be a big deal?

Some say they believe and love God but don’t need church to be a part of that. WRONG. It would be like somebody saying “Ridley, I want to be your friend but I want nothing to do with your bride, Lisa”. In a way, that must be how God feels when we don’t give the church our best. Or better yet, when people say, “this church isn’t going to work for me” and they leave to be alone at home every Sunday.

I relate this to how marriage and divorce is in our society. “This wife or husband doesn't work for me anymore” so go try to find another. Church is a lot like marriage. You take the good and the bad and you wake up every day with a commitment to do your very best. There shouldn't be finger pointing in our churches. “It's all your fault or you messed up here or you didn’t meet this need of mine.”

As the bride, we should turn our thoughts inward and see how we can mature, how we can make it better, how we can prevent growing weary, and how we have to do our part to make the bride radiant. We can choose to pick offense or grace, forgiveness or bitterness, selfishness or service.

As my thoughts are focused on Easter this week, I think about how Jesus was preparing and getting ready for His bride. His attention to detail is beautiful! He deserves the most radiant and beautiful bride we can be.