(For Christian’s story, visit Barcodes and Street Signs)

Our story began in December of 2016, the week after my mom’s liver transplant. I had come home for the week from Mayo Clinic for some rest and was still reeling over everything that had just taken place. It was both the most stressful and most miraculous time of my life. As I was alone in my house, floating around on the internet with nothing better to do, I was hit with a determination out of nowhere to “just look” at one of the Adventist dating websites–which was surprising, given the fact that I always hated the idea of online dating. Like, really hated it. Any time anyone brought it up I would blow it off and say it’s a lack of faith in God to find me someone in person.

I had graduated high school and college without ever having a boyfriend– I’d gone on dates, sure, but never more than an occasional dinner date or movie. I’d had interests, but none that ever panned out. Something had always held me back from truly pursuing a relationship with anyone, and I never quite knew what it was. The opportunities I had to get closer to people just didn’t feel right, I don’t know how to explain it. I never wanted to pursue something I didn’t know for certain was 100% the way God was leading and not just my own will, and I never got that confidence. So I waited. And waited. And waited… for the “right one” to come along, praying that all the discomfort would be pushed aside and when I found him, God would make it clear. And when my mom’s illness got more critical, I was the trained medical professional in the family. I was the caregiver, and knew realistically that I didn’t have the time to devote to a serious relationship. Deep in my heart, before the transplant, I wondered if I would ever have the time. I remember asking God through tears one day how this was all going to turn out– because I couldn’t see in my little finite brain any possibility of things changing for the better. God has such good plans that are so far beyond anything we can ask or imagine.

So here I was, on the other side of a miracle, realizing the change that had taken place in my life. God had moved the roadblocks of my responsibilities as a caregiving daughter, and healed my mom– but He also opened the doors to heal my lonely heart in the process. Despite my misgivings about online dating, I was bored, and felt a strange feeling of a world of possibilities being opened up for me– so I decided to go online and JUST LOOK. I texted my friends who had been trying to get me to try it for years to find out which site was good. They didn’t respond immediately, so of course I took it into my own hands and picked one of the multiple (which, turns out, was the scam website nobody ever joined. Go figure). The home page had a bunch of usernames that were online at the moment and a few “example” profiles on the side…the first profile in the list was Christian’s. I clicked on his name, and I could almost sense that he had a real relationship with God from just reading what he’d written. I can’t explain the feeling I got from just viewing his profile. It felt almost like an urgency and a chest-burning and knew I had to message him. So I joined the site (for $99 and a contract for a whole year…) and wrote him a quick message. By the next morning, he’d written paragraphs back and I was way too excited.

As soon as we started emailing back and forth, the interest started to grow fast. After about a week we had our first Skype date—he told me how he’d turned from Atheist to Christian, and I told him my mom’s miracle transplant story. Afterward I found myself on my knees praying to God that this was “the one,” telling Him that I could see He was doing something amazing with this man’s life and I wanted to be a part of it. I wanted desperately to be his helper, and that was a feeling I’d never experienced before. In fact, it was a thought that had never even crossed my mind before. The Skype dates grew into long phone calls. We talked about God and our individual testimonies and what we’d read in the Bible that day, and there were a ridiculous amount of times where we had studied exactly the same thing or had mind-blowingly similar thoughts. It was like we were spiritually connected from 500 miles away. We talked for hours every day. As we got to know each other I realized that everything about him was lining up, and I was seeing before my eyes the very things that I had prayed for for years.

But as the interest grew, so did the fear. I had figured he was talking to other people as well and so naturally I was worried I wouldn’t make the cut. As someone who had never even dated anyone before, I didn’t do competition. So I prayed. A lot. And whenever I prayed and turned in the Bible for encouragement or direction or answers, I was led to Bible verses that were exact responses to my prayers–like an actual conversation. There was one point in which I hadn’t heard from him in a few days and I was starting to get frustrated–which was really just the cloak for what I was really feeling: worry that he was losing interest. So I prayed two things. The first thing I prayed was that if God wasn’t with me on this, I wanted Him to cut it off and not let it go any further so I wouldn’t get hurt. The second thing I prayed for was direction and instruction–I told God that I wasn’t going to say anything more to Christian until I heard from the Lord Himself telling me to do it or Christian messaged me back. After praying I got up and went on with my day, and within an hour, while playing around on my phone, I ran across a part of a Bible verse that I hadn’t read in a very long time. So I flipped to it in my own Bible, and it was this:

“Do not be afraid, but speak, and do not keep silent. For I, the Lord your God, am with you. I have many people in this city, and no man will attack you or hurt you.”

Acts 18:9

…Uhhhh…cue the jaw-drop.

No mistaking that command, is there? So with an “aye-aye, Captain,” I went to do as I was told.

The next week, though, my resolve was tested again. Once again, I stopped getting responses from this guy. And I was so done. I prayed again to God and said, “Was that just a one-time thing? Did you just want me to talk to him for a week more? I don’t get it, You said You were with me. What do I do now?” My immediate, natural response was to stop texting him altogether. If I wasn’t wanted, I wouldn’t push the envelope. If he was more interested in other girls, he could choose one of them instead. I was not going to compete. But God had other plans, and He made them real clear when the next verse I opened to in the Bible was this:

“And now I plead with you, lady, not as though I wrote a new commandment to you, but the one you had from the beginning…”

2nd John, verse 5

My eyes about bugged right out of my head.
“Did I stutter?”

One page. The book of 2nd John is one page out of 1,792 pages in my Bible, sandwiched in between pages of prefaces explaining the surrounding books, and that is the specific page and verse I flip to after asking God what to do now. He sassed me!

I got up off my knees half-laughing (because who can truly say they’ve been back-sassed by God?) and went to text the man. From that point on, I made a promise to God that I would not back out of this. If He wanted it to end, He’d have to make Christian the one to do it, because I’d just been given direction from God twice to keep pursuing this– and that was what I was gonna do. I just asked Him not to let me mess it up.

From that point on it was like we were even more tied together spiritually. The conversations we had were like God was teaching us the same things at the same time, and was walking with us both, together. There was one day when Christian told me he was going to take a day away from everyone and everything, just fall off the grid and spend time alone with God. (Of course this made me nervous because the faithless part of me was thinking “oh, so you’re still talking to other girls and don’t want me to get in the way…” I know, I’m crazy. Thankfully that’s NOT what happened.) I prayed for him all day–that God would help him abide in Him and lead him in the way he should go, to draw him nearer to Him. I kept repeating the verse, “abide in Me and I in you,” and praying it over him. That evening, he called me on Skype. He was telling me the story of how he had been spending time with God and then, like we all do, got distracted and went on the internet instead. He came to a site that required a CAPTCHA (one of those things where it gives you all these random letters and numbers to type to prove you’re not a robot), but it wasn’t a normal CAPTCHA code. It wasn’t random letters and numbers. It was a phrase of words. And that phrase of words freaked me the heck out–and it might freak you out a little bit, too.

The words it asked him to type in were ABIDE IN ME.

From 500 miles away, with no contact whatsoever and total radio silence, God translated the exact prayer I was praying for Christian into a code that he could see with his eyes to draw him back to focusing on Him.

God was with us.

We decided to meet in person in March of 2017. Christian bravely made the 8 hour trek up, and we talked on the phone for almost his entire trip here. When he arrived, after a nervous first few minutes, it was like we’d known each other our whole lives.

During the months that followed, we took turns driving to see each other for a few days once a month. While it was difficult being so far away from each other, we both had peace knowing that God was leading and claimed the promise, “though you now have sorrow… your heart will rejoice, and your joy no man will take from you.” John 16:22. God was molding us into something good, refining us. And now, through the ups and downs that life has, we have the confidence that God chose us for each other. There is no question in our minds. We gave God the reins and He showed up and showed out…because that’s just who He is.

We discovered months later that we’d both been convinced we were going to marry each other before we even met in person for the first time. We planned our wedding months before our formal engagement (which is a little unconventional, and considered reckless from a worldly perspective—I know, I know, I’ve heard it all before) but from my perspective, I had a promise from God and was willing to take a a chance on His word. (Also, I wanted a summer wedding and venues fill up FAST.)

We were engaged on a cliff a little less than 3 months before our wedding and it couldn’t have been more perfect.

Long distance was HARD. 500 miles away might as well have been the other side of the world, for a year and a half. But as much of a pain as it was, it was also a blessing. We learned to communicate with and trust each other better than we would have otherwise. We found things to talk about on the phone for hours upon hours every single day, and we learned not to take each other’s presence for granted but count it as a miracle and a blessing. So now it’s been a little over three years of marriage, and the lessons we learned in those hard times turned out to be building blocks for our marriage that we wouldn’t trade for anything! When we give God control, He gives us better than we could ever imagine— “for the good of those who love Him.” Romans 8:28.

If you’re reading this and have struggled with relationships in your life, your experience may be similar to mine or completely the opposite. But regardless of the differences, the call is the same— put God to the test. Be STUBBORN in your faith in Him. Claim the promises He put in His Word — “trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding, in all your ways acknowledge Him and He will direct your paths.” Proverbs 3:5-6. He WILL. And you won’t be sorry.

Cover image PC: Essence Photography. Engagement photos PC: Nathan Bange