Monday, August 19, 2024
Our 45th wedding anniversary
(click here to listen to or read today’s scriptures)
Our Sunday morning wedding
What must I do to gain eternal life?
In 1978 Margaret had finished her last seminary classes at Lincoln Christian Seminary and I was just leaving my two-year stint in the Unification Church. Margaret loved folk dancing and square danced with my mom and dad. One evening that summer Dad invited Margaret to help him pull weeds out of the soybean fields on his farm, and she accepted. No idea what it meant, but she said YES.
A few weeks later I flew home from London, where our Unification seminary class had spent the summer with Rev. Moon, and within a week I had decided to leave the church and come home. Mom and Dad attended a Rhode Island wedding of one of my cousins, and I hitchhiked to meet them from upstate New York.
After the wedding we headed home. Margaret met Dad one morning to get some gas for her car (part of her pay for selflessly walking those half-mile long beanfields), and he told her his son had come home. OK, she said. Who was that? She wondered. By the next Friday a Sunday School class weiner roast was scheduled, and of course Margaret and I were invited.
We didn’t hit it off at first. She and I circled the fire, staying on haybales as far away from each other as we could. But Mom and Dad knew a good thing when they saw one. They invited both of us to a bible study on Hebrews at their friends’ home, and there we couldn’t get away from eachother. Soon we didn’t try.
I asked Margaret to listen to lectures on the theology of the Unification Church, which ended with the idea that Rev. Moon was the “third Adam,” the second Christ, the new savior. Church members called Rev Moon and his wife our “True Parents,” because he was called to bring not just spiritual salvation to the world, as Jesus did, but also physical salvation, which meant that our children would be born sinless and stay that way. The “Restoration Principle” meant that the Fall would be reversed, and in time the world would become the Garden of Eden God always intended it to be.
Of course Margaret found a number of biblical and theological tangles in Rev. Moon’s thinking, and over time I saw them too.
Then there was a moment in December when I fell in love with Margaret. There are manifold wrinkles in the story, including that she wasn’t in love with me, but nevertheless (long story short) in April 1979 we were engaged, and on Sunday, August 19, 1979 we were married in Mt. Pulaski by our pastor Al Morehead, who beamed as he gave us permission for our first married kiss.
Bliss.
On the night before the wedding my cousin Mike Stebbins and I had a bachelor party. Not much alcohol, but we struck up conversations that ranged from philosophy (Mike’s field of study all his life) to the way you manage a honeymoon to God’s love and mercy and grace. But we went to bed early.
The next day Margaret wore her wedding dress to Sunday School and church, and I wore my white suit. We had championed the idea of incorporating ceremonies like weddings into the normal life of the church, and so we stayed after Al’s invitation to get married. Our friend Roger played unexpectedly rambunctious music on the piano. The audio recorder failed to record. But we both said yes, I lifted Margaret into my arms, and the pictures show us happy, laughing, surrounded by both our families and so many friends, while Al’s smile beamed on us all.
Now it’s 45 years later. Our three kids have four kids of their own, and we have discovered the joys of grandparenting, first for twelve years in Illinois and now for the last four years in Texas. Jack and Aly, Miles and Jasper fill our lives and our hearts with great joy. Our prayers reach out to so many friends and family, and although our voices are a little scratchy, we still sing a song every day, along with our prayers and reading our devotion.
Looking at pictures of our family as our hair changes color and we sit and stand much more carefully, I feel swept up by the joy of time travel, the beauty of memory. Sad sometimes, yes, but always backing up into God’s joy, peace, and blessing.
Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the Kingdom of heaven.
(Ezekiel 24, Deuteronomy 32, Matthew 5, Matthew 19)
(posted at www.davesandel.net)
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