Verse
Mark 2:19-20 – “And Jesus said to them, ‘Can the wedding guests fast while the bridegroom is with them? As long as they have the bridegroom with them, they cannot fast. The days will come when the bridegroom is taken away from them, and then they will fast in that day.’”
Meditation
Jesus likens Himself to a bridegroom, and His presence among His disciples is a time of joy, not mourning. Fasting, an act of repentance and longing, is not fitting while the Messiah walks among them. Yet He foreshadows the sorrow to come—His suffering, death, and the grief of His disciples. There will be a time for fasting, a time when the Church waits in hopeful expectation for the return of her Bridegroom. The joy of His presence sustains His people now through Word and Sacrament, but the fullness of joy is yet to come. The Church, like a bride waiting for her groom, fasts and prays in eager longing for the day when Christ returns in glory.
Old Testament
Isaiah 62:5 – “For as a young man marries a young woman, so shall your sons marry you, and as the bridegroom rejoices over the bride, so shall your God rejoice over you.”
Isaiah declares the joy of God over His people, using the image of a bridegroom and bride. Jesus fulfills this imagery, showing that the time of His presence was a foretaste of the final wedding feast to come.
Collect
O Lord, our Bridegroom and Redeemer, as we await the day of Your return, strengthen our faith that we may not despair in trial but rejoice in the promise of Your everlasting kingdom; through Jesus Christ, our Lord, who lives and reigns with You and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen.
Hymn Verse
"The Bridegroom soon will call us,
Come to the wedding feast.
May slumber not befall us
Nor watchfulness decrease.
May all our lamps be burning
With oil enough and more
That we, with Him returning,
May find an open door!"
— Rejoice, Rejoice, Believers – LSB 515:1
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