Sneaking Away to Type

Valentine's ages ago ....

The rice awaits to be cooked. It beckons with the smells of dinner simmering downstairs. Yet something propels me to write. Dash to the keys that know the dance with my fingers. Can I post in 5 minutes. While the smells simmer, can I gather to write about the one the rice boils for ...

My story. Our story. The frost of February reaches even our home in Arizona. The month of love to adorn my word for the year, loveprints. How a master creator, knit our lives together. Ryan, little King, and Sarah, princess, married, united, a mystery portrait of His love enwrapped in ours.

Picture a crowded church. A nervous young women at the age of 19 for the first time gathers the children on crowded steps on the front of the church to share simply a message for their little hearts. A thousand or more adults peer from their polished pews as she shares. My nerves almost caused me to cancel. I fought on, with a little nudge from my Jesus knowing that I would meet someone that night. I did. He heard me. He was one of the 1,000.

Very soon thereafter, the he became a regular fixture around everything I served. He joined our college small group. He began to teach Sunday school with the 5th and 6th graders in my classroom. The campus ministry, his face appeared. He says the first time he heard me pray, he was overwhelmed. I had no idea what God was doing. I chose not to see. I looked away.

Then one day in the midst of my time alone, tucked in scripture time, conversation and prayer, a whisper to my heart from my Abba. He simply said that Ryan was the one. Fear tried to take hold. I refused and with simple boldness remarked with a gleam in my eye. "I'm not saying I don't believe you. I know you too well. But if this really is from you then I don't have to do anything. In fact I could do everything to stop it and it would still happen." Then I continued on with my life, blind to the happenings around me and the workings of my heart.

I had never dated. Boys in high school didn't seem too interested in the 'most likely to succeed' 5' 10" girl. In college, they came out of hiding. Everywhere they seemed to be standing with flowers, notes, an invitation to dates that I thought were for everyone in the group. Naive. Simple. Afraid. Any time a friend would become interested, I simply would drop the friendship with the poor boy with a resounding thud.

Hence the blinders, lovingly placed by my Abba Daddy to protect me from seeing.

Ahhh 5 minutes ticked by. The rice beckons ....