My husband and I were married on December 5th, 2009. But before we get to that point, we need to look back on a cold and lonely winter night during my senior year of college …
December 5th, 2007 at around 1 o’clock in the morning, I knelt down in complete surrender to God. I cried out to Him and begged Him to hold me, comfort me. Since my senior year of high school, I had been battered, bruised, and torn in regards to relationships with men. I was on and off the path considering my behavior as a born-again Christian. I was lured by the regular activities college had to offer: parties, boys, freedom to choose my own career.
By my senior year of college, I was ready for something real and true. I wanted to have a family with someone and live in a beautiful house with a white-picket-fence. That night, I felt prompted by God to pray for my soul mate.
Eventually that prayer for my future husband got swept away by the pressures of graduating college and figuring out what to do with the rest of my life. Meanwhile, a seed of bitterness continued to grow in my life regarding men from my past. As I searched to find my “soul mate,” I continued to get tricked and fooled by men who only wanted one thing from me. And at that time in my life I was willing to give it because I thought it would lead to love. It never did and because of that I was very angry and bitter.
I got wrapped up in planning my career as a film/TV actress. If I couldn’t find love, I was going to become famous and everyone would then see how horrible they treated me. So instead of facing my issues/problems and going to God with them, I made more of a mess with my life.
That’s when my mom discovered Faith Church in St. Louis and I met Paul. A mutual friend introduced us before service and because I was so wrapped up in planning my career, I didn’t want anything to do with men at the time (although he was a very sweet young man). He had just been badly hurt by another young woman at the church and wasn’t ready for any kind of relationship either. So for the next few months, I continued to serve at the church in the drama department and children’s ministry and grow deeper in faith.
God was working on me. My family and I started going to church events on the weekends created for family fun. We ventured out one Friday evening to a pumpkin patch for a hayride and bonfire. Little did I know that Paul had his eye on me and was going to try get enough courage to talk to me that night.
That 45-minute hayride seemed to feel like five seconds. He and I talked the entire time. He got up enough courage to ask me for my number.
We had our first date on October 25th, 2008. After dinner, we sat in Barnes & Noble for literally five hours and did nothing but talk. It was very clear we had a connection. The next night, after church service, we took a walk at the park near the church. It was a night I will remember for a long time. Sitting down on a park bench, underneath the stars, he put his arm around me and I remember feeling so at home and at peace. He looked at me in the eyes and said, “Emily, I know we haven’t known each other very long, but I can see myself growing old with you.” And I replied, “I know. I think I am falling in love with you Paul.”
From that moment on, we were boyfriend and girlfriend. We were growing deeper in faith and in love together. Two months later, on Christmas day, my prince charming proposed to me. Best Christmas present ever!
During our engagement period, I came across the Boundless website while thinking about wedding planning and the future with this incredible man of God that God blessed me with. With so much pain and disappointment in my life from relationships with men in the past, I wanted my relationship with Paul to be a great step in a new, godly way.
I was so excited when I began reading those articles that I printed them out, highlighted, and wrote all over them! Later that night, I shared them with Paul. Our relationship took on a new level because we were not only making a committment to ourselves to remain pure and abstain from sex, but to God and our future children.
June 5th we celebrated six months of marriage and I couldn’t be more in love with this man. And because God gives us the desires of our heart, He is continuously writing our amazing love story with such vivid and awesome detail.
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