Everyone Loves a Wedding

Who doesn’t love a wedding? Love, marriage, good food, and a chance to get all dressed up. Even if it is a “pretend” wedding, it’s great fun. Monday of the final week the team teaches all day on love, marriage, choosing a spouse, commitment, and love languages. So in the afternoon session we stage a wedding, complete with minister, bride and groom, groomsmen, bridesmaids, parents and relatives. The auditorium is spruced up and the chairs straightened. Bows are tied on the aisle chairs. Costumes and music are carefully planned.

Lunch that day is a quick affair because we have just one hour from the end of morning classes till the wedding begins. Flowers bought in the morning are put into bouquets while the women pull on their wedding dresses while the men put on dress shirts and ties and boutonnières. There’s a buzz in the air that is almost real – well, it IS real, even if the wedding isn’t real.

The bride’s veil is actually fashioned from a mosquito net and the inside frame of a straw hat, and dressed with ribbon, but it looks very real. The dress varies from year to year with the bride, and the colors of the bridal party also vary with the occasion.

At 12:45 the doors are opened to the auditorium and the groomsmen allow the “guests” to enter, instructing the professors to sit on the groom’s side while the students sit on the bride’s side. Danny is at the piano lofting lovely tunes. At 12:55 the groomsmen usher in the relatives, and then bring in the parents of the groom and the mother of the bride. At 1 PM sharp the processional begins. The auditorium erupts into applause and phones are quickly pulled out to take pictures and videos. The bridesmaids head down the aisle amid much cheering. This year we added a “flower girl” and “ring bearer” – our youngest team member and our teaching assistant. They stole the show!

Finally the bridal march starts and the bride comes in on her “father’s” arm amid more cheering. No one ever told a Chinese audience that you aren’t supposed to cheer at weddings… As they arrive at the front, one of the leaders precedes through a simple, but very biblical wedding ceremony, Bible in hand. He speaks of the intent of marriage, of how it is honored and blessed by God, and how a married couple is to demonstrate God’s love through their marriage. At the end he presents the new husband and wife. This year’s couple, though in their sixties, actually are quite newlywed and thoroughly enjoyed doing the ceremony.

After the recessional the entire audience moves outside with the bridal party – AKA the team – and we take a group picture. Then the bride throws her bouquet and the girls all tackle each other to be the one to get it!!

Why do a wedding? Not because we want to applaud western culture, but because we applaud marriage and want to model what a biblical wedding entails. In the morning session a panel of married team members discussed whether you need an expensive wedding to make a good marriage. In the afternoon we demonstrate that a simple wedding can begin a great marriage. Weddings in China are taking on mammoth proportions in terms of money spent yet more and more marriages end in divorce. This topic is timely for the students, and often poignant and sometimes painful for the professors.

And so it goes. Day after day, deeper and deeper into the hearts and lives of our learners. We have two more days of program, including the closing ceremonies. Each class does a song or jazz chant or skit, all in English. There is the usual closing program folderol that mirrors the opening program in many ways. Speeches and much clapping. Gift giving. Yet underneath the ritual is a deep level of trust and enjoyment.

Late this afternoon I wrote a speech for the dean to give at the closing program. Our deputy dean is always tasked with the job, and I asked him if he’d like a day off. He readily agreed. I simply took a speech he had written two years ago and revamped it, bringing into it all the idioms and details of this year’s program.

At the end of his/our speech, he says, “While we are together with our foreign teachers, while we are learning English and methodology, the theme of love is throughout the program. Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast. It is not self-seeking. It keeps no record of wrongs. Love always protects, and trusts. Love never fails. And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. These lines in Chinese were quite familiar to me while I was young. Only through the contact with you do we have the deeper understanding of the true meaning.  Love is reflected in the mutual help between teachers and students. Laughter is contagious, and so is love. Your great love and the great contribution you have made will no doubt go down in the history of this university. We cannot thank you enough.”

Flowery language, but genuine, heartfelt sentiment. The thanks go both directions. The team will leave with Chinese friend deeply imbedded in their hearts and lives.