Saturday, June 1, 2019
4:00 PM
Roby Hill Winery, Casa Real, Pleasanton, California
Prelude Air-Bach Harpist
Seating of Groom’s Parents: David Louie & Wendy Louie
Processional Moon River
Pastor Don Ng and Groom Justin Louie enter
Bridal Party: Lennon Macdonald & Jessica Lee
Max Shimshak & Mindy Tae
Joshua Stephenson & Aelin Kim
Joshua Arnaldo & Grace Song
Gabe Lowe & Jessica Louie
Ring Bearer: Lucas Arnaldo
Flower Boy: Asher Arnaldo & Mother Christine
Canon in D
Bride and Parents: Linda Lee, Ho Sung Lee and Kyung Ja (Sue) Lee
Welcome
In the beauty and splendor of this place, we gather as a community of family and friends. We are experiencing the excitement of a wedding and the happiness of new beginnings as we come to celebrate the marriage of Justin Louie and Linda Lee. God has created a world of harmony—dazzling flowers, soaring birds, refreshing fruits of the vine and the picturesque landscape of the hills and valleys—each unique, each in relationship and harmony with the others. Today we celebrate the same harmony discovered in the loving relationship that Justin and Linda have together. God made each person in God’s own image and then turning us toward one another to live in equality and mutual respect. Justin and Linda have come to affirm their love for each other and to enter into this sacred union.
Opening Prayer
Let us pray. Eternal and loving God, we gathered in this beautiful place to celebrate the marriage of Justin and Linda. We stand small in this display of your creation. It reminds us that we too, are part of your grand design. We know the same God who brought all of God’s handiwork into being, also is bringing Justin and Linda together to begin life together. Grant us a renewed understanding of what it means to be in covenant with
each other as Justin and Linda become husband and wife in the company of these friends, and in your presence. Amen.
Presentation of Bride and Groom
Who presents Justin and Linda to be married today?
Parents: We do.
Honoring Parents with Rose Ceremony
Justin and Linda will present orchids to the mothers.
Scripture Readings from Eugene Petersen
Psalm 121
I look up to the mountains; does my strength come from mountains?
No, my strength comes from God, who made heaven, and earth, and mountains.
He won’t let you stumble, your Guardian God won’t fall asleep.
Not on your life! Israel’s Guardian will never doze or sleep.
God is your Guardian, right at your side to protect you—
Shielding you from sunstroke, sheltering you from moon stroke.
God guards you from every evil, he guards your very life.
He guards you when you leave and when you return, he guards you now, he guards you always.
1 John 4:7-12
My beloved friends, let us continue to love each other since love comes from God. Everyone who loves is born of God and experiences a relationship with God. The person who refuses to love doesn’t know the first thing about God, because God is love—so you can’t know him if you don’t love. This is how God showed his love for us: God sent his only Son into the world so we might live through him. This is the kind of love we are talking about—not that we once upon a time loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as a sacrifice to clear away our sins and the damage they’ve done to our relationship with God.
My dear friends, if God loves us like this, we certainly ought to love each other. No one has seen God, ever. But if we love one another, God dwells deeply within us, and his love becomes complete in us—perfect love!
Words to the Couple: Fullness in Life
This is a great day! We are at a beautiful place. God has pushed away the clouds and we are filled with the warmth of the sun and the warmth of this fellowship! You have invited your respective families and close friends to make this a full house. Everything has come together making today filled with joy and happiness.
Justin and Linda, you are living very busy and full-throttle lives at the moment. As you pursue significant and important careers, you are consumed with finishing up your medical residency in Sacramento and completing your MBA in San Francisco! We don’t know how you do it! It’s often a full day. But we are indebted and appreciative of what you do because Justin you are literally healing and saving lives and Linda, you make all of our daily lives easier in the work you do at Google. We are fully grateful.
As gifted and talented people, you have made commitments to use these abilities and resources to create a more compassionate and healthy world. Together, you will make a good team sharing the abundance of your love for each other with those who are in need of love.
The Apostle Paul wrote a famous prayer in Ephesians 3:14-21. He says, “I pray that, according to the riches of his glory, Christ may grant that you may be strengthened in your inner being with power through his Spirit, and that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith, as you are being rooted and grounded in love. I pray that you may have the power to comprehend, with all the saints, what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, so that you may be filled with the fullness of God.”
In your marriage to be together for the rest of your lives, we hope and pray that, “Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith as you are rooted and grounded in love.” And when you do this, you will be “filled with the fullness of God.”
I think you are beginning to catch what the theme of my message is to you—fullness of life! While you are too busy today with a full schedule, you are also filled with the fullness of God.
The Psalmist in 16:11 says, “God show me the path of life. In your presence there is fullness of joy; in your right hand are pleasures forevermore.” Justin and Linda, in your faith in the Lord leading you to have a fullness of God, God will bless you with a fullness of joy.
The fullness of joy will be found when you are sharing in the tasks of cooking and making kim chi together not only to be full yourselves but to share with those who are hungry. The fullness of joy comes when you are traveling and your eyes are filled with new sights and your ears are captivated by new
sounds that you begin to champion solutions to some of the needs of our fragile and precious planet.
And when Linda, the more outdoor one, invites Justin, the more indoor one, to go outside, you will rejoice in the beauty of the earth. God’s glory and majesty can be seen in the fullness of God’s creation.
While we hope and pray that our lives will always be filled with joy, there will undoubtedly be times when you may feel empty or that your lives are so busy that your plates are too full. It is at those very times that you are reminded that when Christ dwells in your hearts and you are rooted and grounded in love is when you will rediscover a fullness of God leading to a fullness of joy. May you have today, tomorrow and forevermore a fullness of life in the Lord.
Exchange of Vows
Justin: I, Justin, promise you, Linda,
to be your husband forever.
As your husband, I promise to continue to love you
and spread our love to others,
to seek peace in you and with you,
for ourselves, for our children
and for our suffering universe,
and to find joy in you and with you
through the laughter of all that is.
And I promise to be responsible forever,
because I love you.
Linda: I, Linda, promise you, Justin,
to be your wife forever.
As your wife, I promise to continue to love you
and spread our love to others,
to seek peace in you and with you,
for ourselves, for our children
and for our suffering universe,
and to find joy in you and with you
through the laughter of all that is.
And I promise to be responsible forever,
because I love you.
Exchange of Rings
These rings are an outward and visible signs of an inward and invisible grace, which unite two hearts in love. They are of special significance because the circle of these rings is a symbol of the unending and enduring quality of the love that Justin and Linda are sharing today.
Justin: Linda, I give you this ring as a sign of my love and faithfulness.
Linda: Justin, I give you this ring as a sign of my love and faithfulness.
Declaration of Marriage
Justin and Linda, because you have declared your willingness and intention to enter into the state of marriage with each other and have declared the same in the presence of God and these witnesses, and have given these rings to each other as a symbol of this commitment, by virtue of the authority vested in me as a minister of the gospel, I pronounce you husband and wife, united in the pure and holy bonds of marriage. What God has joined, let no person put asunder.
Wedding Prayer
Let us pray. Joy rings through the skies, and songs echo in the trees, O God, for love is alive today. We thank you for the love that has brought Justin and Linda to this moment of promise, and ask you to bless their marriage. Lead them along the paths of peace. Let their love grow as true as the vines in this vineyard grow around us. Give them your patience and vision to see beyond the daily troubles. Be their abiding presence in the day and in the night, so that their love may be a beacon of hope to a hurting world. Amen.
Benediction
May the road rise to meet you and you are safe.
May the wind be always at your back to continue solving the problems in our world.
May the same sun that shined warmly upon your face, Linda in New Jersey also now shine on both of you in California.
May the rains fall softly upon your places of work in Sacramento and school in San Francisco until you are ready to start a home together.
May God hold you in the palm of his hand and bless you with love, hope and joy. Amen.
Pronouncement
It is my pleasure to introduce for the first time as a married couple: Justin Louie and Linda Lee!
Embrace and Kiss
Justin and Linda, you may now kiss.
Recessional Handel’s Queen of Sheba
Announcements David Louie
Postlude
Wedding Coordinator: Marlena
Officiant: Rev. Don Ng
Grace
Justin Louie and Linda Lee’s Wedding Dinner
June 1, 2019
Holy God, Giver of all good things, our hearts are filled with joy this day. In all the goodness and blessing that you afford us, there is nothing sweeter than the blessing of witnessing the love and commitment Justin and Linda have for each other. Now we ask for your grace for the wonderful nourishments that we are to receive so that we may continue to become strong in the Lord. Grant us good fellowship around these tables and lead us to care and love one another as you have made known to us in the love of Jesus Christ, our Lord in whom we pray. Amen.