A Bold Prayer
As I look back at one of my first actions as a Christian, it is apparent that God has blessed me with a ton of faith. I was 30 years old and divorced with joint custody of two young children. I had been dating several women, but I immediately decided I wanted to leave any future relationships up to God, so I prayed a very bold prayer:
- I told God I wanted the woman he had for me.
- I told Him I was willing to wait 30 years if necessary.
- I also said I was content if He didn’t have anybody for me.
That was it—I didn’t mention any other qualifications or attributes I would like in my future wife; I just trusted God with everything, even the smallest details.
Quitting Dating “Cold Turkey”
I also realized I would hardly be trusting God if I was “playing the field,” so I immediately went celibate and chaste. Nobody told me to do this, and I had never read or heard about it, but it just made sense that if I was dating during this period, I would very likely miss anyone that God brought my way. On the other hand, having given the whole marriage thing up to God with absolutely no conditions attached, I figured that since I was 30 with two kids, He would probably lead me to a Christian woman about my age who also had one or two kids, and thus I would not have any more children. That was not the first, and definitely not the last time God must have been chuckling at my naivete!
I knew I had a lot to learn, and fortunately the church offered many opportunities to do so. I got involved with a singles group, and started reading and studying the Bible every day. Then one day as I was driving my car, I suddenly said out loud, “I’m going to have more children!” I just knew, but I didn’t know how I knew, and I certainly never imagined how many kids I would have!
Go to the Desert - at 1:30 am?
A few months later I had one of the most amazing experiences of my life. It was around 1:30 am and I was praying next to my bed just before going to sleep, when suddenly I sensed God telling me to go out to the desert. This seemed absolutely crazy! In fact, I started arguing with God, saying “Do You know what time it is? Besides, I’m not dressed, and there’s no gas in the car!” Then I realized that if I was arguing about it, it was probably the real thing, so I had better go. I got dressed, grabbed a blanket and my Bible, prayed that I wouldn’t run out of gas, and headed to the Pima Canyon Trailhead, which was only a few miles from my apartment.
I hiked up the trail, and in just a short distance came to a beautiful spot overlooking the city of Tucson, so I sat down on my blanket and waited, and…nothing happened. I kept waiting, wondering if I should be watching for lights in the sky, and still nothing. I actually fell asleep on the blanket for a while; then woke up and went home.
No Doubt
You would think that in a situation like that where I had driven to a trailhead in the middle of the night, hiked up the trail, waited patiently for whatever sign or message God had for me, and then nothing happened, I might have felt that I had somehow imagined God telling me to go out to the desert. Here’s what’s interesting—even though nothing had happened, there was no question in my mind that I was supposed to be there, I just didn’t know why yet. According to St. Teresa of Avila, one of the signs of a true message from God is that there is no doubt that it came from God, and you remember exactly what God said for the rest of your life. She says that a person who “hears” an actual message as if it is spoken within their mind will remember the exact words and even the tone with which those words were spoken. While I had not heard the message as spoken words, to this day I remember every detail as if it had happened yesterday.
Praying for Others
When our singles group got together, we would have a time of prayer, and a woman in our group named Debbie often asked us to pray for a friend of hers who was going through a very difficult period in her life. Debbie had invited her to come to our Baptist church with her several times, but as a cradle Catholic who was not active in the Catholic Church, she wouldn't go, so...
God Brought the Church to Her!
A young woman in our singles group moved into the apartment next door to Debbie's friend, so Debbie invited her to a Wednesday evening Bible Study that was right next door to her apartment, and she agreed to go if Debbie promised that she would never bother her about visiting her church again. That session was her first experience with a Bible Study, and she really liked the way we prayed for our families and friends. It “just so happened” that our group was planning a trip on Friday to the Chiricahua National Monument in the southeast corner of the state, so of course we invited her to go with us, and she agreed to go as long as Debbie rode with her.
Low on Gas
We were returning home Saturday evening so we could go to church on Sunday. Debbie’s friend had gotten lost on the way to the campground, causing her to be low on gas, so I offered to follow her home just in case she ran out. She made it to Tucson and we stopped at a McDonald's for dinner. When we were getting ready to leave, I asked her if she would like to go to church with me the next day, and said she would.
An Amazing Week
At the service the next morning, we were standing holding a Bible together, when I suddenly felt something like an electric current passing through the Bible between us. I have never experienced that feeling before or since.
On Tuesday I got a clear “nudge” from God to visit her at her work.
Friday, I got another clear nudge that it was time for a date—my first date in ten months.
We went to a movie, and on the way home, for the first time in my short life as a Christian, I specifically asked God what was next. His answer was, “Back to the desert!” I didn’t think that was an appropriate activity for our first date, but the message was clear, so I explained that my intentions were strictly honorable, and there was a beautiful spot overlooking Tucson that I wanted to show her. We headed up the trail to the exact same spot I had visited ten months earlier. We had only known each other one week; had only had one date and had never kissed, but as we stood and hugged each other, we knew we were going to get married, and five weeks later we did!
Who Needs Compatibility?
It turns out God doesn’t think that compatibility is necessary for a marriage to work, as we are about as different as two people can be; and yet we are still together over 40 years later, having raised nine children: her five and my two from previous marriages, and then two more that we had. All of our nine children are doing well, and we now have 15 grandchildren and one great grandson, so as usual God knew what He was doing!
As I look back at one of my first actions as a Christian, it is apparent that God has blessed me with a ton of faith. I was 30 years old and divorced with joint custody of two young children. I had been dating several women, but I immediately decided I wanted to leave any future relationships up to God, so I prayed a very bold prayer:
- I told God I wanted the woman he had for me.
- I told Him I was willing to wait 30 years if necessary.
- I also said I was content if He didn’t have anybody for me.
That was it—I didn’t mention any other qualifications or attributes I would like in my future wife; I just trusted God with everything, even the smallest details.
Quitting Dating “Cold Turkey”
I also realized I would hardly be trusting God if I was “playing the field,” so I immediately went celibate and chaste. Nobody told me to do this, and I had never read or heard about it, but it just made sense that if I was dating during this period, I would very likely miss anyone that God brought my way. On the other hand, having given the whole marriage thing up to God with absolutely no conditions attached, I figured that since I was 30 with two kids, He would probably lead me to a Christian woman about my age who also had one or two kids, and thus I would not have any more children. That was not the first, and definitely not the last time God must have been chuckling at my naivete!
I knew I had a lot to learn, and fortunately the church offered many opportunities to do so. I got involved with a singles group, and started reading and studying the Bible every day. Then one day as I was driving my car, I suddenly said out loud, “I’m going to have more children!” I just knew, but I didn’t know how I knew, and I certainly never imagined how many kids I would have!
Go to the Desert - at 1:30 am?
A few months later I had one of the most amazing experiences of my life. It was around 1:30 am and I was praying next to my bed just before going to sleep, when suddenly I sensed God telling me to go out to the desert. This seemed absolutely crazy! In fact, I started arguing with God, saying “Do You know what time it is? Besides, I’m not dressed, and there’s no gas in the car!” Then I realized that if I was arguing about it, it was probably the real thing, so I had better go. I got dressed, grabbed a blanket and my Bible, prayed that I wouldn’t run out of gas, and headed to the Pima Canyon Trailhead, which was only a few miles from my apartment.
I hiked up the trail, and in just a short distance came to a beautiful spot overlooking the city of Tucson, so I sat down on my blanket and waited, and…nothing happened. I kept waiting, wondering if I should be watching for lights in the sky, and still nothing. I actually fell asleep on the blanket for a while; then woke up and went home.
No Doubt
You would think that in a situation like that where I had driven to a trailhead in the middle of the night, hiked up the trail, waited patiently for whatever sign or message God had for me, and then nothing happened, I might have felt that I had somehow imagined God telling me to go out to the desert. Here’s what’s interesting—even though nothing had happened, there was no question in my mind that I was supposed to be there, I just didn’t know why yet. According to St. Teresa of Avila, one of the signs of a true message from God is that there is no doubt that it came from God, and you remember exactly what God said for the rest of your life. She says that a person who “hears” an actual message as if it is spoken within their mind will remember the exact words and even the tone with which those words were spoken. While I had not heard the message as spoken words, to this day I remember every detail as if it had happened yesterday.
Praying for Others
When our singles group got together, we would have a time of prayer, and a woman in our group named Debbie often asked us to pray for a friend of hers who was going through a very difficult period in her life. Debbie had invited her to come to our Baptist church with her several times, but as a cradle Catholic who was not active in the Catholic Church, she wouldn't go, so...
God Brought the Church to Her!
A young woman in our singles group moved into the apartment next door to Debbie's friend, so Debbie invited her to a Wednesday evening Bible Study that was right next door to her apartment, and she agreed to go if Debbie promised that she would never bother her about visiting her church again. That session was her first experience with a Bible Study, and she really liked the way we prayed for our families and friends. It “just so happened” that our group was planning a trip on Friday to the Chiricahua National Monument in the southeast corner of the state, so of course we invited her to go with us, and she agreed to go as long as Debbie rode with her.
Low on Gas
We were returning home Saturday evening so we could go to church on Sunday. Debbie’s friend had gotten lost on the way to the campground, causing her to be low on gas, so I offered to follow her home just in case she ran out. She made it to Tucson and we stopped at a McDonald's for dinner. When we were getting ready to leave, I asked her if she would like to go to church with me the next day, and said she would.
An Amazing Week
At the service the next morning, we were standing holding a Bible together, when I suddenly felt something like an electric current passing through the Bible between us. I have never experienced that feeling before or since.
On Tuesday I got a clear “nudge” from God to visit her at her work.
Friday, I got another clear nudge that it was time for a date—my first date in ten months.
We went to a movie, and on the way home, for the first time in my short life as a Christian, I specifically asked God what was next. His answer was, “Back to the desert!” I didn’t think that was an appropriate activity for our first date, but the message was clear, so I explained that my intentions were strictly honorable, and there was a beautiful spot overlooking Tucson that I wanted to show her. We headed up the trail to the exact same spot I had visited ten months earlier. We had only known each other one week; had only had one date and had never kissed, but as we stood and hugged each other, we knew we were going to get married, and five weeks later we did!
Who Needs Compatibility?
It turns out God doesn’t think that compatibility is necessary for a marriage to work, as we are about as different as two people can be; and yet we are still together over 40 years later, having raised nine children: her five and my two from previous marriages, and then two more that we had. All of our nine children are doing well, and we now have 15 grandchildren and one great grandson, so as usual God knew what He was doing!