Should you apply for a wedding loan?

When a massive wedding becomes the standard, it is tempting to hand your credit card over, knowing you’ll be paying it off for a year. Or, should you consider a wedding loan?

On one hand, it seems tempting. Here’s the “perks”: a lower interest rate than a credit card (by a LOT), a fixed monthly payment, and after 2-5 years, you’ll be done paying off the wedding of your dreams. It sounds too good to be true, right?

Probably because it is.

Here’s the truth: going to debt over something like a wedding is not how you want to start your marriage. And it’s not going to lead you anywhere that looks like peace or joy.

A wedding loan that sounds too good to be true?

Probably because it is.

Proverbs 22:7 reminds us that “the borrower is the slave to the lender.” And let me argue that in this case, it is not simply the “lender” that a couple, as the borrower, becomes a slave to: rather, it’s the wedding itself. Being in debt over your wedding changes the flavor of your event after the wedding is over, like food that goes bad. It will taint the way you see the day when you are still paying it off two years later, even after the one grand day is over.

Here’s a change of opinion that you’ll never read in a bridal magazine or on the Knot:

the budget you have for your wedding (in cash) is enough.

You don’t need more, because God always provides enough for you. 

The writer of Psalm 16 tells us that he knows that “the lines have fallen for me in pleasant places.” (Psalm 16:6) Meaning the boundaries of his life (financial and otherwise), which have been set by God, are not an accident. They are for his good. 

So whether your budget is $50 or $50,000, you have enough to achieve what God wants you to accomplish in your wedding. Without debt, a credit card, and certainly without a wedding loan.