You’re quite welcome. I hope it helps. Upon re-reading the post, it needs polishing. I could have used a good editor – or a better scotch 😉 Best wishes to your site and you.

What great advice! Thanks for sharing Devon 🙂

1. If you start with a joke, make it gently self-deprecating. (“Hello, my name is Devon. I’m a friend of the groom and that makes me, to most of you, no one in particular.”)

2. State the obvious. (“We are here today to celebrate the wedding of Adam and Eve. This is a wonderful occasion to congratulate two souls who have now become one in love. And we are grateful to their parents for hosting this event and filling us with more food and wine than is probably wise.”)

3. State the obvious is wrong. (“But, in a different way, we cannot celebrate this happy
couple. They do not need us to be happy – they already have each other.”)

4. Find one subtle idea that connects the audience with the couple. This is the hard part. (“Still there is one thing we must be grateful for. Adam and Eve have given us hope – hope that we might one day enjoy this happiness, hope that we might rekindle our own passion, hope that our children will one day know this fulfillment.”)

5. End with one line that rings. (“So, please raise your glass to Adam and Eve, to their parents, to all of us here…[In California: ‘I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship.’] [Jewish: ‘L’Chaim!”]”)

This is not my formula. It has Greek origins, but is mostly known, among people who know such things, as the foundation of The Gettysburg Address.