Saturday
April 10, 2004
11:00 AM
The Rotunda of San Francisco City Hall
1 Dr. Carlton B. Goodlett Place
San Francisco
Order of Service
Prelude
Processional
Seating by Brian Tom of the Groom’s Parents—
Tsz-Fat (Edward) Li & Hau-Yuen (Angela) Yeung Li
Pastor Don Ng & Groom Banny Li
Best Man Daniel Li
Groomsman Kenneth Kam
Bridesmaid Amy Hou
Matron of Honor Jennifer K. Chang
Flower Girl Kylie Chang & Ring Bearer Jared Hom
Bride Karen Tom & Mother of the Bride Pauline Tom
Greeting & Welcome
In this most public of places, we have gathered as a community of family and friends to witness Karen Tom and Banny Li express their love. This is a day of joy, a wondrous moment of blessing and a beginning to many seasons of love. We are here to celebrate, support and sustain them in their marriage.
This is a holy time—for we are in the presence of the God who created us for relationship.
This is an awesome moment—for we are aware of the strong, yet fragile, cords of love which are being woven here today.
This is a joyous and hopeful day—for we celebrate another sign that relationships are truly fashioned in deep love and mutual respect for one another.
God has brought us together, not only to support Karen and Banny, but also to sense the wonderful mystery of love by which God makes the world sing and dance. May this special time serve as a blessing of God’s love on everyone here as we witness the love Karen and Banny have for each other.
To maintain the reverence of this time, please silent your phones and pages at this time. Thank you.
Invocation
God of creation, we gather now at the creation of a new life, the shared life of Karen and Banny. You created the world around us, you created us, and now, as you bring these two together, you again are starting something new and beautiful. Grace these moments with your creative presence. In the name of Jesus the Christ, we pray. Amen.
Presentation Question
Karen and Banny are ready to commit their lives to each other because of the love, nurture and guidance they have received from their parents. They are strong individually but are even stronger when together as the result of the homes from which they have come.
Would Banny’s parents please stand?
Parents Stand
Acknowledging that God has brought together Karen and Banny, who today has the honor of presenting them for holy marriage?
Parents: “We do.”
Mother of the Bride Pauline Tom kisses/hugs Karen. Karen gives Pauline a rose. Cousin Brian ushers Pauline to her seat.
Poetry Reading Uncle Raymond Tom
Message—Opening Doors
We know that weddings happen on these same steps almost every day. Instead of a private and quiet place, you have selected one of the most public places in the entire city of San Francisco. The love that you share with each other should be proclaimed with joy and celebration. You opened up the doors of City Hall so that the whole world would know that Banny loves Karen and Karen loves Banny!
The Bible talks a lot about love. In 1 John 4:7, we see that we love one another because love is from God. And when we love, we are born of God and know God in our hearts. Perhaps you may not have known this but when Banny asked Karen out for lunch after attending a training course together, love between the two of you started to happen. Banny likes Karen’s quiet accommodating spirit and Karen likes Banny’s talkative outward-ness. Most of all, Karen likes the way Banny opens the door for her to walk through. When you love each other, you are showing forth God’s love in the world.
Your marriage today begins a life-long experience of opening doors for each other. With Banny’s love for going out to be with friends and to engage in lively discussions, you will open the door for Karen to meet new friends, visit new places, and to broaden her horizons of her world. With Karen’s love for her family and close friends, you will open the door for Banny to value and appreciate the richness of family life and traditions.
I know that you have recently purchased a new home to begin your new life together. As you continue to open the front door and the back door of your home, I pray that the doors of your house will symbolize how you are open to each other’s ideas and opinions. Banny, you may like that heavy, manly, distressed looking furniture but also make room for Karen’s wish to have a contemporary and modern décor too. Blessing each other with your desires and hopes will always open you to the newness that marriage brings.
Karen, when I first met Banny in Yosemite, it wasn’t too hard to see so much of your Dad in him. One of those characteristics is Banny’s self-confidence. Banny, your “can do” attitude is winsome and great to have. Together, the confident love that you share will sustain nothing sweeter, nothing stronger, nothing higher, nothing wider, nothing more pleasant, nothing fuller or better in heaven or earth; for love is born of God. I know that your Dad is watching you from above and giving his blessing to you on this happy day.
There’s a poem from 1st century BC China that goes like this:
I want to be your friend
Forever and ever without break or decay.
When the hills are all flat
And the rivers are all dry;
When it lightnings and thunders in winter,
When it rains and snows in summer,
When Heaven and Earth mingle
Not’til then will I part from you.
This is the degree of confident and purposeful love that you are called to give each other today. Against all challenges of life, you are committing to each other in love forever. Today, you are seizing the moment to be united as one in the eyes of God because love is born of God.
Under this vast and glorious rotunda, it is easy to see that your generous love has spilled out from the two of you to all of us. We pray and wish that when you walk out of these doors today that your deep love for one another will bring you happiness and peace, successfully enduring lightning and thunder in the summer or rain and snow in the summer, for not until heaven and earth mingle will you part from each other. Continue to open the doors of life for one another.
May God bless you always.
Exchange of Vows
Keeping the promises that two individuals make to each other over a lifetime reveals that love can explain all mysteries, resolve all differences, and remove all mountains. Today, Karen and Banny stand before us to share their promises to each other.
Banny—I, Banny, take you, Karen, to be my wife,
knowing in my heart
that you will be my constant friend,
my faithful partner and my one true love.
I promise to be there when you need me,
to encourage you and comfort you,
to laugh with you and cry with you,
to share with you my hopes and my dreams
and to love you with all of my heart,
today, tomorrow, and forever.
Karen—I, Karen, take you, Banny, to be my husband,
knowing in my heart
that you will be my constant friend,
my faithful partner and my one true love.
I promise to be there when you need me,
to encourage you and comfort you,
to laugh with you and cry with you,
to share with you my hopes and my dreams
and to love you with all of my heart,
today, tomorrow, and forever.
Karen and Banny, do you before this gathering of your family and friends and in the presence of God, pledge to live out these promises as long as you both shall live?
Karen & Banny: “We do.”
Exchange of Rings
From the earliest of times, rings are an outward and visible sign of an inward grace which unites two hearts in love. And they are especially significant today because the circle of the rings signifies the enduring and unending quality of the love now being pledged between Karen and Banny.
Banny—Karen, I offer you this ring
as a symbol of my promise and hope
May it symbolize our love,
faithfulness and dependability
from this day forward.
Karen—Banny, I offer you this ring
as a symbol of my promise and hope
May it symbolize our love,
faithfulness and dependability
from this day forward.
Let us pray. By these rings, O God, join Karen and Banny together. Bless these rings that those who wear them, who give and receive them, may be ever faithful to one another. May Karen and Banny remain in your peace, and live and grow together in abundant love. Amen.
Soloist Your Love Jim Brickman
Wendy Quan
Wedding Prayer
Most loving God, you have called Karen and Banny to a lifetime of loving and giving and forgiving. As they grow in the life they have together, shelter their hopes and dreams with your perfect will. Give them power and wisdom to fulfill your purpose in their lives. Light their way by the love that is born from you. By your Spirit of truth, strengthen them in faithfulness to you and to each other. May their union also unite two caring families that will pray and support Banny and Karen for the rest of their lives. Bless with joy the home they make together, that its love and laughter may refresh all whom they welcome within it. May their love never fails. In Christ’s name, we pray. Amen.
Announcements
On behalf of Karen and Banny, we invite you to proceed to the Reception Luncheon in the North Light Court on the side of the Rotunda while family members remain for the taking of wedding pictures. Karen and Banny will greet each one of you at the reception.
Charge and Benediction
Go forth in joy, and as you do:
Abide in friendship, as you share each other’s needs and dreams.
Abide in caring, as you open doors for each other.
Abide in faith, that God may empower you.
Abide in hope, that God will guide you throughout all your days.
Abide in love, that God may watch over you from this day forward.
In the name of God, the Creator, the Redeemer, and the Holy Spirit. Amen.
Presentation of the Bride and the Groom
Now it is my privilege and joy to introduce to you for the very first time, “Banny and Karen Li!”
Embrace and Kiss
Recessional
Karen and Banny
(Karen gives a rose to Banny’s mother.)
Jennifer & Daniel
Amy & Kenneth
Kylie & Jared
Pauline Tom
Tsz-Fat Li & Hau-Yuen Yeung Li
Pastor Don
Postlude
Wedding Coordinator: Mae Gamboa
Keyboard: Joy Shih Ng
Officiating Minister: Rev. Donald Ng