The Gospel According to Wedding Photography

My wife is a photographer. She's pretty dang good at it too. I might be biased, but you can see for yourself that Katie Campbell is legit. Ok, now that the shameless plug is over, back to photography.

This morning she was watching a photography conference on the internet (I would rather watch paint dry) but while I was getting ready the guy speaking said something that struck a chord in me. He said "the bride and groom spend almost $10,000 on their wedding but when it comes to photography always skimp”.

Isn't that so true though? I was like that. Thank goodness my wife knew better.

Let's think through this logically.

The cake is about $500-Temporary
The reception $3,000-$5,000- Maybe 2 hours long
The decorations $500-Temporary
The dress $500-$1,000 (for normal people, some spend tens of thousands)-You wear it once
The tux- $100- Rented, temporary
The misc stuff- $500-temporary
The Honeymoon- At least $2000-1-2 weeks of your life

Most weddings on the conservative end run around $10,000

So, we spend unbelievable amounts of money on all of the things that give us what? You might get a great experience, maybe some good food, a great cake, and some sweet memories, but what do you have left when it’s all over? NOTHING.

When it comes to the one thing that will last the rest of our lives, what do we do? We get the cheapest photographer we can find that, at best, will give us some photos that resemble a wedding album circa 1980. I have heard countless couples say, “The one thing I regret about my wedding is that we skimped on photography”. Why, because it’s the one thing that we have to show for our weddings. It is the one thing that will last us the rest of our lives and yet we give the least amount to it...

Wedding photography I like our lives. We are so consumed with the temporary and fleeting world that we will not look just a tiny bit into the future to see what truly matters.

The bible equates the relationship with Jesus and his Church (you and I) as a wedding. Our relationship with Jesus is a wedding ceremony. Our lives are the preparation for the wedding feast.

What do we do with this preparation? We spend the bulk of our time, talent, energy, and money on things that are fleeting like cars, homes, clothes, ipods, tv's, popularity, parties, and to pay for it all we work ourselves into oblivion. Meanwhile, we spend the least amount of time, energy, and money on the one thing that lasts forever, the advancement of the kingdom of God. The bride of Christ has ONE purpose that all of our little purposes filter through. That purpose is advancing the kingdom of God by living our lives on mission and sharing Christ with the hurting and broken world. What we do give all of our money to is creating awesome memories and living comfortable lives so that, at best, we can live in mediocrity.

I was talking with a guy the other day that has been a Christian his entire life. I asked him what his purpose in life was. He told me "My purpose is to be more like Jesus and be a good Dad". Though those things are not bad, they are just mini purposes in the midst of the greater purpose. I think he missed the point.

Our purpose in this life is to live on mission. We are called to be ministers of reconciliation reaching out the lost and broken world. There are appx 5 billion people on this planet that are in search for something more. They are broken and with out hope.

To have killer pictures at the end of your wedding means you might have to sacrifice something temporary. It costs money to have an amazing photographer. Likewise, to live a life on mission will have a cost too. You might have to give up something temporary to have something to show for all eternity.

We will all stand before Jesus one day and I don’t know about you, but in that moment, when I am surrounded with the people who came to know Christ through the mission he set me on, I want look back on the album of my life and say “It was so worth it to spend so much on my photography”.