Tis the season...

It's that time of year folks....wedding season!

Last Saturday I photographed the nuptials of a happy, young couple as the sun streamed through the stained glass windows of the Union Chapel UMC in Joppa, MD. The daughter of some dear family friends, was blessed with gorgeous weather for her big day. Julie and Jason will have over 500 sunny memories to look back on as they walk through life and together weather their less than sunny days!

Shooting a wedding always takes me back to the day I got married. The weather was partly sunny and partly cloudy for my big day! As a matter of fact, as we took our marriage vows the community around us was cleaning up the aftermath of a storm which spawned small tornadoes and wreaked havoc in the country community where I grew up. It involved no death or dismemberment but it leveled barns, uprooted mature trees and took down power lines. We lost electricity and thus running water was not! So for 12 of the 15 hours before my limo was to arrive and take me to my awaiting groom I was in great distress! Little did I know then that my wedding pictures would serve to remind me in an almost tangible way that life storms will certainly come and surely go. (I will share more on that in a future post!)

Today, I photographed another wedding, this one in the beautiful Rocks State Park, under God's magnificent canopy of creation. Our sweet neighbor of six years has taken the plunge after nearly nine years of young widowhood and single-handedly raised her precious daughter from six months of age! As the reception commenced I rejoiced with such a heartfelt joy for Michelle and her new husband, Patrick. God had turned her mourning into dancing!

I share these wedding memories to bring the realities of life to my blog. We all have times in our lives where our joy can barely be contained within our being and we shudder to think about the fact that we will indeed experience treacherous life storms. Thankfully a weather-beaten life has the hope that the clouds will clear and the sun will shine on our souls again.

God said in Ecclesiastes 3:1-22...there’s a time and a season for everything. Each day we face our custom-made life. Certainly, both good and bad seasons will come our way because that is what life is comprised of and we know this full well. The providence of the all powerful God meets up with our will and the choice we make to accept or reject the reality of our life experiences. We can choose to ride out the storms with or without a faith in God to sustain us. Certainly it is far better to trust Him and be peace-filled knowing that He is at work in us, seeing and many times carrying us through the tough times. Man-made resolve and/or vices only bring a temporary peace.

Every season has its place in the time line of your life. Be blessed in this and each and every day, in every life experience and each season, be it good or bad. If you are trusting in Jesus, you have the hope from the scripture, Romans 8:28, And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose.
God has plans for you in whatever season of your life you are in!