Happy Forty Ninth Anniversary to us!

O Perfect Love

O perfect Love, all human thought transcending,
Lowly we kneel in prayer before Thy throne,
That theirs may be the love which knows no ending,
Whom Thou forevermore dost join in one.

O perfect Life, be Thou their full assurance,
Of tender charity and steadfast faith,
Of patient hope and quiet, brave endurance,
With childlike trust that fears nor pain nor death.

Grant them the joy which brightens earthly sorrow;
Grant them the peace which calms all earthly strife,
And to life’s day the glorious unknown morrow
That dawns upon eternal love and life.

Hear us, O Father, gracious and forgiving,
Through Jesus Christ, Thy coeternal Word,
Who, with the Holy Ghost, by all things living
Now and to endless ages art adored.

Words: Dorothy F. Gurney, 1883

This song was sung at Greg and my wedding as a duet by my sister Kathy and best friend Heidi. This is a photo of them practicing for a duet with the daughter of the minister who officiated our wedding playing the piano.

Their duet at our wedding was forty nine years ago today. Over the years they sang many duets together. Our love is not a perfect love but God’s love for us and our marriage is perfect! We thank our God for protecting and sustaining our marriage for all these years!

History of the song…

It was Sun­day ev­en­ing [at Pull Wyke, Win­der­mere, Eng­land] and we were en­joy­ing a time of hymn sing­ing. A song that was par­ti­cu­lar­ly en­joyed by all of us was O Strength and Stay, the tune to which was a fa­vo­rite of my sis­ter.

As we fin­ished sing­ing this hymn, some­one re­marked, What a pi­ty the words of this beau­ti­ful song should be un­suit­a­ble for a wed­ding!

My sis­ter turned to me and chall­enged, What is the use of a sist­er who com­pos­es po­et­ry if she can­not write new words to a fa­vo­rite tune? I would like to use the tune at my wed­ding.

I picked up a hymn­book and said, If no one will dis­turb me, I will go in­to the lib­ra­ry and see what I can do. With­in 15 min­utes I was back with the group and read­ing the words I had jot­ted down.

The writ­ing of the words was no ef­fort what­ev­er af­ter the in­i­tial idea came to me of the two­fold as­pect of per­fect un­ion, love and life. I feel that God helped me write this song.

Dorothy Gur­ney

Our wedding party was small with just a Best Man and Matron of Honor. Greg’s only sibling, his older brother was the Best Man and Terry’s wife, Christina, was my Matron of Honor. We wanted to keep that part of our wedding simple. The dress Christina wore was off the rack from a ladies clothing store in a strip mall, classic and not frilly.

Note: The minister who officiated our wedding celebrated his 98th birthday on December 3rd! Doing the math that means Andy was 49 when he officiated our wedding! I copied this photo of him taken by his daughter (playing the piano above) just last week! Happy Birthday to Andrew!

Ellen's avatar
About Ellenhttps://happywonderer.com/I am a wife, mother, baba (grandmother) and a loyal friend. Jesus is my King and my hope is in my future with Him.

36 thoughts on “Happy Forty Ninth Anniversary to us!”

  4. Pingback: Forty Nine Years Ago Today Hodgepodge | The Happy Wonderer ~ ellen b.

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  8. Happy anniversary! Today happens to be my 72nd birthday! What a wonderful day to share. We will celebrate our 50th next April.

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  11. Awww…Happy Anniversary to you and Greg, Ellen! How amazing that the minister who married you is now 98. He looks great still. Thank you for sharing your special day with us.

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  14. Happy Anniversary to you and Greg!!! Something wonderful to celebrate… and may there be many more anniversaries to come.

    Reply

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