Witnessing the Hands of God through Wedding Preparation Part 1

As of 22 October 2016, Huanyan and Angelina officially got married. In case you are wondering why there was no update for the past 10 months, it’s because we were busy with all the wedding preparation stuff. However, this does not mean that we were too consumed with the wedding preparation that we lost focus of the manner that God was involved in the whole entire process. And this blog post will be one which we testify His manner of intervention through the wedding preparation, from the time we started planning for the wedding, to the time when Huanyan proposed, to the time when we had our engagement party, and to the time when the actual thing took place. As usual, we will take time to testify each other’s side of the story before ending with an overall reflection.

We think the journey towards our next half of the eternity had been one which has its own ups and downs, and its own challenges but not without its blessings. Certainly, looking back, the journey had been one which myself and Angelina found our relationship and our relationship with our respective in-laws grew by leaps and bounds. Because so many things happened over the past one year, we would like to tell our side of the story in terms of our journey towards each individual milestone, even though some of these milestones may overlap with one another.

Angelina’s side of the story

I decided I was ready to commit to spending the rest of my life with him because I saw how Huanyan put his heart to preparing the birthday celebration for me – 3 surprises in a row: buffet lunch, a letter and a fun time jumping trampoline, and a promise that this will not be a once-off effort, but just the start of many more to come, even after marriage.

With that we started to source for wedding venues and to commence the more detailed planning of the wedding.

The actual sourcing of venues and various vendors were surprisingly smooth – both Huanyan and I came to a consensus on the various vendors without much disagreement. We had quite a similar opinion on a number of things. Where there were differences, we had a “system” where we differed the decision to the person who either had greater experience in that particular area or the person who was more particular about the area. Thus Huanyan took the lead in deciding all the tech and serviced related stuff like videography, AV, worship, ushering, while I took a lead in the other aspects like photography, deco and design-related like decorations and outfits.

What was surprisingly difficult was trying to understand the expectations of parents. There was a lot of expectations on how things should be done, but little was communicated upfront. Even after repeated asking, the requirements were not stated clearly, but yet conversations on the wedding was peppered with “should”s. For someone who valued certainty and control over the outcome of situations, this was especially unsettling, because I felt that none of the plans we made were fixed because we had to leave room for changes, to address the unsaid expectations. What had made it even more challenging was that the unsaid expectations would only surface when we were close to the execution of the decision. However through all these unsettling times, I observed from Huanyan how things may not be bad as I make, and how it is possible to take remedial action to address these request that surfaced, without having to make extensive changes to existing plans. Thus I am learning from him how to remain more cool-headed when last minute changes arise, instead of entering into a panic mode.

The Journey towards Engagement

The two families, including the grandmas, first met for a dinner in Feb 2016. It was agreed then that we would have an engagement party to formally announce to our families that we will be getting married. That was the first milestone challenge – to figure out what an engagement party entailed and how it should be done. We were also asked to give out cakes to relatives to inform them of the wedding. Even till the day of the engagement party, I still could not fully visualize how the engagement party would be conducted, which once again is very unsettling for me. Luckily Huanyan took the lead that day and hosted everyone that day.

The Journey towards Pre-Wedding Photo-Taking and Concept Video

This was conceptualized and done amidst all the very unsettling time of wedding preparations. But I have to say I had a lot of fun planning out the details of our photoshoot (e.g. locations, outfits, props). This was what I enjoyed the most in the whole wedding process. And I am thankful that our photographer was not very calculative with his time, for a 6 hours package, we ended up shooting close to 8 hours in 7 different locations. Though it was really tiring to wake up at 5am for the makeup and to shoot in the sun, it whole process was really fun and enjoyable because of our photographer and make-up artist who made sure we were tickled and laughing at them most of the time. On top of this, we also got Huanyan’s cousin to shoot for us at COMB, the place that we first got together. Loved the pictures we got! I am thankful that Huanyan agreed that photography would be one of the items that we would spend more on, because it really meant much to me to be able to capture those moments (before I start putting on weight, if I do indeed follow the natural trajectory of most people).

Huanyan’s side of the story
The story took place after November 2015, after I celebrated Angelina’s birthday with a high time of trampoline. That was the point when she felt that she was ready for the proposal. There were a few obstacles when it came to the proposal. Firstly, I made a commitment to speak to her parents before proposing. However, this part of the journey did not turn out easy. More details will be revealed later.

Jump to our joy!

Secondly, there was the question of engagement. Her parents expected an engagement party. For the uninitiated, the Western world today still does an engagement party after proposal to announce to their close friends and family that they are getting married. In the ancient traditions, this is also practiced after the wedding is confirmed to announce to their tribes and clans of the big events. But today in Singapore, the proposal was almost the same as engagement and hence, both myself and Angelina spent quite a bit of time trying to figure out what exactly is an engagement and whether that is synonymous with proposal in the minds of my parents-in-law.

Thirdly, the criteria for Angelina to say yes during the proposal was to have a meaningful surprise with a hydrangea bouquet and a nice ring. Getting the bouquet was relatively easier but it's finding the ring that will look nice on her and planning the meaningful surprise. 

And so the planning began. 

The first idea I always had in mind was to do a video, an interview video in fact with many close friends telling the camera why Angelina should marry me. Thus sometime in February and March, I began my route to find the different people to do the video. 

The second idea that I had was how to surprise her with the video. After some planning and thinking, as well as playing some "poker" with Angelina, I fixed a date to surprise her. That particular day, I arranged for a nice bouquet and a nice set of helium balloons and I got some of her good friends to ambush her at another friend's place while I set up the proposal venue. She really enjoyed the surprise. 

The nice bouquet that I got her

The nice ring I got her

Angelina with her balloons and flowers

Proposal success!

The Journey towards Engagement

And after we had a clearer picture of what the so-called "engagement" is all about. We sat down and started planning. However, this did not mean that we know totally what should be done even though my in-laws kept thinking that I should know what to do. They even asked me "what is the objective of holding this engagement" and I was like "what the heck!"

To cut the long story short, as far as I could understand back then, I knew that the engagement party would be a major milestone in terms of my relationship with my future in-laws, primarily because they saw it as a point where they would be personally involved to ensure that the wedding go ahead and that they stop any "third party" who might come in the way. But honestly, who would be so audacious to do so?

In any case, with Angelina getting more and more stress by the day, I had to soothe her and give her some assurance. But how does one give assurance to someone who needs control and certainty over the outcome when there is none of those in the first place? My secret is this: 硬着头皮, to bite all the bullets and to see how we can compromise.

The result is this.

Considered a success, I supposed

The Journey towards a Better Relationship with the In-Laws

The journey towards a better relationship with my in-laws is a difficult one and this is the main factor that precipitated throughout the major milestones. The obstacles are multi-fold.

Firstly, different backgrounds mean different expectations. I come from a pretty much mid-traditional and mid-liberal kind of Chinese family. My family people are not very much concerned about rites and rituals except the basic ones when it comes to ancestor veneration and in the case of the wedding, giving betrothal gifts to the bridal family. Angelina comes from westernised family background. Her parents were western-educated. However, her dad is what I would call, a westernised man seeking his Chinese roots while not knowing which one is really the root. He expected us to follow traditions but deemed some of the traditions that we proposed as outdated. It was only after a while when I realised that his "traditions" are not the "traditions" we would normally understand.

This brings me to the second obstacle - the obstacle of language and communications. I think God used the experience to train me well in interpreting what other people say. For one, my father-in-law is not someone who uses word simply, in the sense that most normal people would use. For example, he asked me who is the one who is solemnising the wedding. It was only after a while when I realised that what he meant by solemniser is not what you and I would understand. His solemniser is the one who has guided us throughout this relationship. This forms a difficulty as misunderstanding creates bad relationships. It takes a lot of patience on our part to slowly figure out what he wants.

Thirdly, what is being communicated generally has a deeper connotation. What is not said is more important than what is actually said. This applied very much to the journey towards a better relationship with my in-laws. At the end of the day, every party involved wants to feel good about the wedding. This is the same for my in-laws. However, a lot of the communications from my in-laws are communicated across as "our part to take note." If I had been more astute or they have been more forthright, many issues from the beginning could have been avoided.

Lastly, I faced with the many interventions and comments from my in-laws. How would you feel if a normal churchgoer lectures you, a theologian and bible scholar + a veteran in running events and services, on pastoral ministry and how a church wedding should run? Many times, I felt like giving the proverbial middle finger and ask them to shut up. But there is another issue as well - I felt being held hostage by them.

To explain this point, I would like to highlight that I strongly believe that a girl, as long she is not formally married, stands under the headship of her father in the family. It means that I saw myself as having no right to deny what my in-laws wanted because technically speaking, she is still under the headship of her father. This was a principle I wanted to hold on to till the wedding day.

But despite all these difficulties, I think the journey can easily be construed as a testimony on how God guided us. Because of the communication issues between me and my father-in-law, my mother-in-law entered into the picture and played the active role of a bridge to close the communication gap. This was crucial as it not only helped me to understand the communication gap better (since Angelina was no longer at that moment sane enough to be the bridge) but it also helped me to build a better relationship with my mother-in-law. She commented so, that if not for this, she would still be having surface conversations with me.

Also, because of the support of the people around us, the journey was much more bearable and I was able to fulfil most of the requests. So it was God who placed the people around us to support us. This has to be acknowledged.

We have much more stuff to write about but we will leave part 1 at here.

The Reality of God in a Love Relationship

As we close 2015 and move into 2016, we hope to testify about how real has God been to our relationship in 2015. To say the least, 2015 is a happening year both of us in terms of how the relationship has grown more towards a marriage that we have both set out to achieve. In some sense, we are also trying to keep this blog alive and avoid this blog from dying. After all, this blog we aimed to start up to bless people through our testimonies.

Huanyan's side of the story
For myself, I think God has been real in this relationship through the ups and the downs. But more importantly, it is the small wisdoms that I acquire when following my "instincts" that shows God being real in this relationship. One example was planning for Angelina's birthday. We were planning to go out for a celebration on 15 Nov since I was supposed to be teaching in HopeSem on the day of her actual birthday. Hence we were thinking where to celebrate and how to celebrate. She wanted something fun and so...

But I was actually short of ideas. Then I had the idea of doing some old-fashioned research on the internet and found Amped, which is a company doing trampoline jumping. We can go to the place and jump one hour of trampoline. At this point, I remembered that she has been wanting to go jump trampoline for a very long time and we decided that we will do precisely that on that day after a hearty buffet lunch at Robata Robata. 

What happened next was simply amazing. As we played at the trampoline, we began to play catching during the last 10 min of our session and we really had fun. Angelina was able to laugh heartily for the first time in our relationship. Looking back, it was simply God directing my decision to lead her in that place where we can have fun and play together. It brought me to a place where I realise what it looks like for both of us to have fun. We can expect more sessions of catching in the future. 

Us after the session of trampoline

There are also other times when I acted out of nowhere or when I decided to instinctively give her something. These "something", for some reason, turned up at the right time and helped to cheer her up. I interpret these as the little wisdoms that God impressed in my heart.

Nothing cheers her up more than a random gift of snacks

God also gives me wisdom in the area of letter writing. For those who are not in the know, I actually write love letters on paper to Angelina on a regular basis. Initially, I was only using flowery language but after Angelina gave me feedback that I need to write more about my feelings and substantiate those thoughts with evidence (a bit like writing a history paper), I began to test out different ways of writing, being more intentional in my words. 

Sometime the letter becomes a card

The end result is that I began to insert more biblical perspectives on our relationship into my letters to her. It may not seem very romantic to a lot of people, but I am beginning to believe that the most romantic thing that one can do for his significant other is to disciple her in biblical perspective. This is what Paul wrote in his epistle to the Ephesians:

Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the word, and to present her to himself as a radiant church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless.

 This is a fairly familiar passage. What I have noticed over the years is that God expects us to love our wives, and the way to love her is disciple her so that she may appear sanctified before God. One way to do this and show love to her is to disciple her in the Scripture, allowing her life to be transformed through the infusing of Scriptural truth into her spirit. As I reflect back, this is the wisdom of God that I simply acted upon (without thinking much really).

Another way that God has shown His reality to us is through the little blessings that He showed in our lives. There are times when we find good deals which allow us to have our own fun and high time, enjoying some luxury that we would not otherwise enjoy given our current lifestyle. One such example was a high tea session at Movenpick Hotel. We managed to obtain a Groupon deal and went on to Movenpick to enjoy our high tea - with Angelina like a tai-tai:

A potential tai-tai in the making

Other times of blessing include the one time when I was given a pair of Platinum class movie tickets to watch Avengers by my boss. As a result, we were able to enjoy this:

Probably the one and only time...

I think one lesson that God taught us through these blessings is that even when we do not earn the same level of income as last time, He is still there to bless us, and to take care of us. To me, this is one way that He has shown Himself to be real and faithful in our relationship. These blessings allow us to spend memorable time with one another as we get to know each other more towards marriage.

Angelina's side of the story

Indeed God has been very real in this aspect of being able to "enjoy life" though we have left our very comfortable paying jobs. When we left, I was actually quite apprehensive about how this will affect the kind of lifestyle and dates that we can have. I remember Huanyan frequently suggesting going to cheaper places for meals and being very mindful of the amount we are spending in view of our reduced income. Initially I was quite sian, and I was envious of those who can go to cafes and restaurants as and when they want without having to think of the cost. As a girl, I still enjoyed being pampered with good meals in a nice ambience, but to Huanyan the cost was the main consideration. Thankfully we were able to talk about it very openly and eventually came to a compromise - we will a good meal each month. I must really affirm Huanyan for giving in to me because when he realised how important good meals were to me, and making adjustments to his budget so that he can bring me out :D 

And so on my part I started looking out for deals, so that we can have good meals that are value for money. And actually that became quite fun as it was like a game to look for the best value for money meals. We also started thinking of how we can maximise our dollar through credit card discount and rebates. I must say, because of our change of jobs, we have become better stewards of our finances. God has also blessed us greatly over this one year. Though financially, we have less than what we had previously, but the things we got to experience are amazing! 

Such as a luxury gala dinner at Fullerton hotel!

And we get a chance to dress up!

And I have to say, actually just once of such an experience is sufficient. While these are luxurious ways of pampering ourselves, and we did enjoy ourselves during the session, but after then whole thing was over, we both concluded that we would not pay so much on our own for such an experience. 

One thing that struck me - at the end of the day, all these luxurious experience cannot substitute relationships with people and cannot give you the fulfillment that comes from having strong relationships with people. We actually found it more enjoyable and fulfilling to have home cooked meals by our parents and the time spent with each others' families, as compared to the luxurious experiences we have had.

Another key milestone in 2015 was learning how to manage expectations and working out a compromise without killing each other in the process. I must say that Huanyan has been very patient and giving in this aspect. One of the major issues we were working through is this aspect of connecting emotionally. I had lofty ideas of how I had wanted him to connect with me. And initially, I would just fault him for not doing things in a way I had expected. Only after talking through, then I realised it was not very fair for him because I hadn't communicated these expectations. How could he know what I needed if I hadn't said? I realised that what was very obvious and "duh" to me may not be the case for him because he is not me. And so I learned to actively communicate the expectations I had and to talk through/ negotiate what was realistic and what wasn't. Of course, it took me a while to adjust (and still adjusting) to some of the unrealistic expectations I had/have. 

On his part, he has done a lot to level up and meet the expectations that he deems to be realistic. And he has definitely grown a lot. A lot of the frills that he would not naturally do, he learnt to do, because it was important to me. He also modified his communication style to talk more about feelings so that he could connect better with me. Not easy for him, but he did so nonetheless! At the end of the day, he taught me through his responses, that its not who is right/wrong, but is a issue of respecting each others preferences. And he has definitely been very accommodating of my preferences, and giving up of his right to be "right" out of his love for me.

This brings me to my last point - not only does Huanyan respect my preferences, he respects my limitations and gives me the time and space to grow. Actually I think I am harsher on myself that he is on me. Never once had he said "why can't you be more ...", but he just accepts that I am not like that and still have much to grow in those aspects. And then he patiently talks through the issue so that I have a clearer idea of the issue and gives me pointers on how I can do it better. And he assures me it is ok, when I doubt myself and points me back to God's word as the basis for my hope. And I think this is what a godly partnership is, when one is down, the other comes alongside to provide the support and points the person back to God, without hurrying the growth process or trying to play the role of God to change me. Huanyan has modelled for me what it means to love unconditionally and to see the potential in the person that God has created, but still refining in the process. That is something that I still have much to learn from him!

And of course the year ended off with the hydrangea!

Conclusion

Reflecting at how God has blessed this relationship so far and moving us towards marriage one step closer, it is not difficult to see His hands and fingerprints all over. The question we pose to one another is whether we are able to sustain this relationship in this manner and bring it even higher. The answer, I must say, is yes. And the answer lies in God and His Words. The answer comes from modelling from Christ in terms of His love and humility. That is where we really see the reality of God in our lives. This is what Paul said of Christ and us in Philippians 2:1-11:

Therefore if you have any encouragement from being united with Christ, if any comfort from his love, if any common sharing in the Spirit, if any tenderness and compassion,2 then make my joy complete by being like-minded, having the same love, being one in spirit and of one mind. 3 Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit. Rather, in humility value others above yourselves, 4 not looking to your own interests but each of you to the interests of the others. 

5 In your relationships with one another, have the same mindset as Christ Jesus:

6 Who, being in very nature God,
did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage;
7 rather, he made himself nothing
by taking the very nature of a servant,
being made in human likeness.
8 And being found in appearance as a man,
he humbled himself
by becoming obedient to death—
even death on a cross!
9 Therefore God exalted him to the highest place
and gave him the name that is above every name,
10 that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow,
in heaven and on earth and under the earth,
11 and every tongue acknowledge that Jesus Christ is Lord,
to the glory of God the Father.

You see, Christ humbled himself, to the extent of emptying himself of his divine omnipotence and omniscience to be found in the appearance of man, and to be found in the very essence of man. He was willing to be tempted for our sake, suffered for our sake and die for our sake. This is where, in our relationship, we should be modelling after Christ - to value each other more than ourselves, looking out for one another's interest. This is where we hope to build our relationship upon - that we may serve one another more and more and see Christ through each other's love.