A Destination Wedding Full of Love: Ariel and Jeremy’s Mexico Celebration

I had the honor of officiating in Mexico this June, for an incredible couple named Ariel and Jeremy. It was a magical experience! Not only the magical location in the caves of Playa del Carmen, but the magical connection between this couple. There was not a dry eye in the congregation.

Their love affair carried me back to one of my favorite moments in the Torah, and a spiritual lesson I’ve been thinking about ever since.

A Torah Portion About How We Choose to See

The week of Ariel and Jeremy’s wedding, we read Parashat Shelach. In this portion, Moses sends twelve scouts ahead into the land of Israel to see what awaits the Jewish people there. All twelve scouts walk the same hills. All twelve taste the same fruit. And yet they come home with two completely different stories.

Ten of them see only the obstacles. They say, “We looked like grasshoppers in our own eyes.” No one called them grasshoppers. They told themselves that story before it even began.

But two of the scouts, Caleb and Joshua, looked at the very same land and said, “Aloh na’aleh. Let us go up, for we can surely do this.” The difference was never in what they saw. The difference was in how they chose to see.

When I sat with Ariel and Jeremy during our wedding preparation, I realized they had already mastered this lesson in their own relationship, long before I ever mentioned Caleb or Joshua to them.

The Gift of Better Eyes

Jeremy told me that what he admires most about Ariel is her tenacity, her drive, and the way she cares for every person close to her. Ariel told me that Jeremy has a charisma that lights up a room, and that what she admires most is how he loves.

Ariel shared that there are days when getting out of bed feels like facing giants. On those days, Jeremy does not look away from her fear. He helps her face it. And Ariel has helped Jeremy open a heart he used to keep guarded. Each of them saw something small in themselves, and the other saw something mighty.

That, to me, is the deepest gift two people can give each other in marriage. Not just having each other’s back, but having each other’s eyes. Seeing the best and the bravest in your partner, especially in the moments when they cannot see it in themselves.

Five Years, One Couch, and the Same Three Words

Ariel and Jeremy met five years ago on a Jewish dating app, and they have built an entire world together since. They work together. They live together. They have traveled the globe together, and every year since they started dating, they stand side by side at the same music festival in Las Vegas, singing the songs of when they were “young.” Haha I teased them, you’re still quite young!

When I asked them where their favorite place on earth is, they did not name a city or a beach. They named their couch, just the two of them and their dogs, no plans, no crowd, completely themselves.

A couple who can share an office, a home, an adventure, and a quiet Tuesday night has learned something many couples spend years searching for. Love is not one grand moment. It is choosing each other in every ordinary one. When I asked Ariel and Jeremy separately for the three words that would define their marriage, they each came back with the same answer, without ever comparing notes: love, support, respect.

Wrapped in Generations

Parashat Shelach ends with the mitzvah of tzitzit, the fringes worn on a tallit, which the Torah gives us so that we will see and remember. At Ariel and Jeremy’s ceremony, they were wrapped in a beloved family tallit. I asked them to hear the Torah’s instruction in that moment. See each other the way Caleb saw the land, full of promise. And remember the generations woven into those threads, including the beloved family members we honored that evening, whose love is wrapped around this couple still.

A Blessing for the Road Ahead

It was a true privilege to walk alongside Ariel and Jeremy through their wedding preparation. Every conversation we had was full of laughter, full of good questions, and full of an unmistakable bond between them. I have stood with many couples over the years, and what Ariel and Jeremy have is real, and it is rare.

My blessing for them under their chuppah was this: May you always lend each other your eyes when one of you cannot find your own courage or your own strength. May you keep choosing each other in the small, quiet moments as fiercely as you choose each other in the big ones. And may you face every giant that comes your way hand in hand, refusing any grasshopper story anyone ever tries to tell you about yourselves.

Aloh na’aleh, Ariel and Jeremy. Rise up together. Mazal tov. Thank you for sharing your magic with me.

With love and blessings, Rabbi Amy