Our Wedding

It all started a year ago. I realized that I really respected and admired a guy named Luke Anderson (as a godly man) in the Rock. Soon I realized that I needed to be very cautious around him. My thoughts often drifted towards him, but I did NOT want to let them distract me, so I would shut them down right away. I did not let my mind focus on him... never letting myself think about him too much or showing him any sort of favoritism (making sure I treated him like every other brother in the Rock).

It was easy at first cuz we hardly ever saw each other. But, soon it became hard, as we became good friends through being on staff together. By God’s grace alone, I was able to take my thoughts captive pretty well, reminding myself that God’s grace was sufficient and He loved me where I was at. No condemnation in Christ, so each day I started over. Plus, I was support raising, which let me tell you, is so hard at first that I didn't have any emotional strength to think about anyone other than Christ!

This went on for a long time, but eventually (two months ago) God got me in the swing of things with support raising, and I started to enjoy the ups and downs... the constant emotional pain that requires God’s healing touch (which He ALWAYS gave) and the never knowing what to expect that requires constant prayer (which God ALWAYS answered… just not always in the way I expected!) Basically, I was content with this crazy time. I wanted so bad to be done support raising, but I knew that God was doing it in His timing and I had NO complaints!

BUT, that left me the emotional strength to think about Luke! AND we ended up having to spend more and more time together for staff things… and that made it worse and worse! He was one of my nearest and dearest friends, and I couldn’t imagine life without this friendship. I just took every opportunity to take those wayward thoughts and turn them into prayers! I prayed for him a lot… for his support raising… for his character… that he would follow the LORD faithfully… his heart journey with Christ… and most of all, that if he was meant to marry, that God would prepare that woman and make her someone who could come along side him and propel him towards Christ!

In an attempt to win the battle of contentment, I first never spoke of my struggles with anyone. I didn’t want to verbalize it and make it seem more “real”. Plus, I was convinced that the guy didn’t like me (he never showed me favoritism from what I could see, to any girl for that matter, and I LOVED that about him), and that neither of us needed to be in relationships at that time.

Next, I started to avoid social situations where he would be in which I had no ministry purpose. I didn’t want to give in to temptations, and it was hard. But as much as I tried, we kept crossing paths! Somehow, I finally won the battle (or so I thought!) I stopped the thoughts well when they came up, and I avoided him well enough, that God was truly my focus most of the time.

Then, one Sunday night, Luke called me and said he needed to tell me a story. I waited for him to start telling it, but instead he said, “How does Tuesday at 6pm work for you?” I was confused by this (why couldn’t he just tell me over the phone?), but I agreed. Ironically, it was the only night that week that I was even free.

As soon as I hung up the phone, however, I started FREAKING OUT! I stopped any attempt by my brain to convince me that he liked me… in fact… I was so utterly convinced that he was about to tell me that he was in love with another girl that I was almost sick! Why did this bother me so much? I felt horrible for even thinking this, but I finally realized that I wasn't sure if I could be happy for him!

I felt like I was losing my best friend! What if that other girl doesn’t like me and I never get to hang out with him again? OH MAN! I secretly wanted HIM to like ME, yet I didn’t want to have that thought in my head! No. Bad thought… unrighteous… and totally not honoring to him or the LORD.

So I admitted it to God, gave it to Him, and never thought it again. Yet, I was in agony about the whole situation! I didn’t know what he was going to say, but I knew in the pit of my stomach that it was about a girl! I knew I wasn’t good enough for him… and knew he deserved the best girl! I wanted to be happy for his happiness!

So I began to pray that God would prepare my heart and give me the correct response After pure AGONY for two days, Tuesday finally comes. I prayed all day! “God, please prepare me in advance! Give me the right response!” Gut wrenching pain strikes at 5pm, about an hour before he arrives. So, I read psalm 139 and remembered that God has pre-ordained every day. This day. So I asked God what He wanted me to know. And I felt like He was asking me, "Do you trust me? “Yes”, I said. "Do you trust Luke?" God asked again. “Yes LORD”, I replied. "Then let me figure out the rest”, God said. “Okay Papa”, I said.

I was finally calm... ready for anything! He picks me up and I remember to bring along his birthday gift (homemade cookies) as a good distraction for me. We're talking like normal, laughing about the random things we like to chat about, and then I notice we're on the highway. I wondered where we were going, but remembered God's question about trust, and I decided not to ask.

Finally, we end up at Ledges (a state park in our area). We pulled into a part of it that I've never seen before. We’ve gone to Ledges before to pray about staff and support raising stuff, so I figured we were going to pray after his story or something? We are walking along this trail, talking as if we are on some kind of adventure, and I treasure the moment... thinking this is the last time I'll ever get to take an adventure with my friend alone again... sad!

We came to a clearing, on a rock over looking a river (it was like a mini version of the Lion King rock face, near the “Circle of Life”). It was near sunset and was captivating! I was stricken by the beauty all around me! I was not really able to think about much by this stage. He spread out a blanket to sit on, and I think, “What a gentleman…” which lead to, “this place is forever ruined cuz I'm about to get the worst news ever, but yet it is the best news ever for him... and he'll be so happy... and I need to be happy for him and this other girl!"

So I quickly give him his gift... and he seems a bit distracted. Finally, he says, "I need to make a statement and ask you a question before I tell you my story.” I'm thinking, "Great! He's not only going to profess his love for another girl, but now he wants my opinion or approval or something!"

He says something along the lines of, "For over a year and a half, I've been struggling with this..." and I'm thinking, "Do I really want to hear how he fell in love with this other girl? Ahhhh!” But he goes on with something like, “and after lots of prayer, counsel, and leading from the LORD, I believe there is not another woman in the whole world I could ever love as much as you and would be honored if you would pray about courting me."

I was in shock. And for the first time in my life, I was STRICKEN SPEECHLESS! I had no idea what just happened! And out of my mouth comes the words (in a quiet, calm and emotionless voice) "Can I hear your story now?" (I know… such eloquence, right?) Poor Luke was probably thinking that I didn’t like him by this stage… cuz I was completely docile! But hey, I was in SHOCK! What else could I say?

Anyway, you can read his story below. After he stopped talking, I just sat there a moment. It was dark enough that he couldn't really see my expression, but I couldn’t even tell you what it must have been, cuz I was still in shock. This could NOT be real, could it? It had to be a dream!

Finally, I quietly said, in a calm monotone voice, something like "I need some silence right now to pray to God…" Yet inside, I was SCREAMING! Yes… freaking out! Me? No. Not possible. I’m not worthy! This is not what I was expecting! AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!

After what must have been 15-20 minutes (it felt much longer) of recollecting the past year and the last 2 days, I started thinking random thoughts like, “I need to make him wait and talk to my screener… wait… no… he’s done that. Okay… um… I need to pray about this for a week... at least a day so that people won’t think I’m a bad Christian girl!”

Finally, after spewing all this out to the LORD silently in my head, I calmed down. I realized that I was trying to control this, and not really asking God what HE wanted me to do. When I did, I felt God’s quiet voice ask, “Why won’t you accept this from me!” I replied, “Because I don’t deserve him, LORD!” But God responded with, “That is NOT why I give people things! I do it because I love you, little one!”

FPeace swept over me. I felt like He wanted me to tell Luke my side of the story... to be HONEST. After another 5-10 minutes of hearing nothing else but “share your story”, I realized that I had been praying for this for 2 days! For the “right response”. So, I decided to go ahead a do it. “Give me the words, God!”

Meanwhile, Luke is perfectly silent. He sipped on tea, ate the cookies I made him, and looked down at the river silently. I looked at him and said, “You are patient, sir!” And he says something along the lines of, “I’ve been learning a lot about patience this past year and a half.”

I finally smile, and say, "Now I get to tell you my story" and proceed to share all that I shared above about this past year and the past few days. The words just flowed out of my mouth, and I was not thinking about them. God was just giving them to me (hopefully eloquently, but I don’t recall!) And I end with something like (before I could stop myself), “…I could never love anyone else the way I love you!”

Yup… that was the clincher! It was my heart talking. He looks at me and says, "Can I give you a hug?" Of course I say yes, and it was our first real hug! Oh so priceless! Then I'm like, "I guess this is me saying "yes", huh?” And we laughed! We then proceed to recollect the past few months, laughing about all the agonizing moments we shared without realizing we both were struggling! And we of course set some boundaries.

Finally I asked who he wanted to tell first, and he’s like, “Actually, do you want to come to my parents house with me, because my family is sort of waiting to hear what you said!” I was totally excited to, and we did. It was glorious! What a day! What a week! What an adventure that we started on!

Oh things are going to be hard, the devil is going to attack, and we are going to hurt each other… but God is sovereign! He brought us together, neither of us deserved the other and neither of us DID anything to attract the other. It was God. So He’ll see this through, whatever the end result is! Praise God for that!

It started in the summer of 2006 when I looked across the Rock and saw a woman named Holly Boston passionately chasing after God. What really caught my eye was the passion and zeal with which she lived caused her to live solely for God. When I saw this needless to say I thought that it was beautiful and rightly so. I didn’t think that much of it at the time but about a month later I realized that something about Holly was resounding in my heart. So I stared to pray and ask God that he would take away my interest in her. This prayer had always worked in the past yet after a few more months of growing interest even though I hardly ever saw her and had never actually served with her, I decided to let Tim Borseth and Mike Biang know my interest and asked for their prayer on my behalf. I figured that if this wasn’t from God then with these men’s prayer it would go away. A couple of months after this Holly came back from staff training and Holly, Nate Swinton, and I started to go through the process of going on staff together. Through this process all of us were being taken through the highs and lows of seeking God for everything in our lives and his provision. I was able to watch how Holly intimately knew and loved our Lord and how when the hard times hit she ran to him. Around this time I also let my father know of my interest in Holly and asked for his council and prayer. He as Tim had told me to wait and for many good reasons, so I honored their council and waited. This continued until about six months ago when through much prayer and digging in the word I felt as though God was telling me that this was the woman that I was meant to marry. This was quite the revelation, so I spent the next few months praying and confirming and growing in confidence that this in fact was Gods will and not just my own desire. Ounce I was as confident as I could be I went to ask Tim Borseth, Paul Johnson and my Father for council and their blessing in pursuing this relationship. They all said that they would like some time to pray about it and see what God would say to them. The waiting process up to this point had been hard but nothing compared to waiting and wondering when I was convinced that I had heard from God. I mean you start to wonder if council is going to agree with what you have heard and these Godly men love me and so of course God would let them know if I was wrong. But if I hadn’t heard Gods voice on this can I hear Gods voice at all?
Well about a month and a half after I had asked for council I still hadn’t heard back from any of them and Holly and I had to go up to a follow up conference in Ann Arbor Michigan. This would mean a ten hour drive there the weekend together at the conference and a ten hour drive back alone with Holly. I knew that this would just tear me apart so I started to contemplate going to part-time staff because only full time staffers had to go to the conference. I also started to call around to see if there was someone who could come with us so we wouldn’t be alone in the car. But the day for us to leave came and none of the people I had asked were able to go. I made it about five hours in the car with her when my stomach started to cramp and I started to have a pain in my chest as though someone was kneeling on my chest. That knight I got about four hours of sleep and when I woke up at five a.m. I went out and prayed until breakfast. I threw up breakfast and couldn’t keep and food down all weekend. Every free moment I had I spent praying and begging God. God was gracious to me at the conference there were a couple of dear brothers who prayed with me and for me. But the only relief I felt was when I was in prayer and when I had to go back to be with people the pain would come right back. Finally the conference ended and we came back but the pain wouldn’t go away and I still couldn’t eat. On Monday I sat down with my Dad and told him where I was and asked for his council he gave me his blessing and prayed for me. I then got together with Paul and Tim and asked them for their council, they both gave me the same answer to wait two weeks and then come back to them and see were things were at. On Thursday I was laying in bed in early a.m. hours and had not been able to eat for six days now and had hardly slept and was begging God for anything that would end my misery. I just wanted a rest and peace and to know what He wanted for me. Finally in that moment lying there just listening to God he spoke and said “Luke, Just watch me establish you in a month.” After hearing that I was skeptical and wanted to know that was in fact Gods voice so I said “Lord if this is your voice then I need this pain to go away and stay gone.” And as soon as I finished asking in that very moment the pain was gone. And I was exhausted; I realized that I had been living on nothing but prayer and adrenaline for the past six days. I SLEPT…… In Gods words there was much more than just the answer about Holly he said that he had a plan for me that it was Him who was going to establish me not I. God Is So Good!
I spent the next two weeks seeking God and growing in confidence that I was meant to approach Holly in a month. When the two weeks ended I came to Tim and he gave me his blessing. So I went to Paul and he gave me his blessing. Then I needed to talk to one last person, you see Holly had it set up that before a guy were to approach her she wanted him to have the blessing of Jason Dietzenbach. So I sat down with Jason and we spent a few hours talking and praying. He said that he would like a week to pray and see what God would have to say to him. On Friday he said that he would call me around six or seven on Wednesday and also that he had a few thoughts for me. So I was thinking alright he is going to tell me to wait or tell me no. I started to prepare my heart for this answer. On Wednesday 6 came and went then 6:30 came and went finally 7 came and still no phone call so I called Jason and left a message. He called me back saying that some stuff had come up and he was on his way to prayer and would call me around 9ish. I started to freak out so I went out walking a praying for the next couple of hours. So finally 9 came and went, 9:15 came and went, 9:30 came and went AND STILL NO CALL! I was thinking that pour Jason was trying to think of the kindest way to tell me no. Finally shortly after 10 I got the call and Jason asked me if anything had changed I as calmly as I could replied that nothing had changed. So he said “I don’t see-“ and I thought here comes the no “-any reason not to encourage this relationship.” I didn’t know what to say so I asked for his prayer as I now needed to hear from God for the exact time to talk to Holly. Over the next few days God put Tuesday at 6 p.m. on my heart. So on Sunday night I called Holly up and asked her if she was free Tuesday night at six because I had a story to tell her. The plans were made, now I just had to wait and pray. I was doing fine until about four thirty when I my patience started to give out, but the Lord reminded me that he had set that time for a reason even though I had no idea why. So I picked her up at six and took her to one of my favorite spots in ledges where there is a cliff that overlooks the valley that the river runs through. I was surprised that Holly never asked where we were going the entire trip out. I was also concerned because she seemed excited but scared. When we came to the cliff the sun was starting to set and I the clouds were painted in way that I had never seen before, I inwardly thanked God. We sat down and she wanted to give me my birthday present, as my birthday was next day, I opened it though my thoughts were on what I was about to say and not on the gift. I was approaching the biggest question that I had ever asked anyone in my life and wondered if I had a enough courage to face the answer. While all of this was going on in my head Holly was making conversation and I was curious why she hadn’t asked me what the story was that I had to tell her. So finally I said, “I have a statement to make and a question to ask you before I tell you my story.” (great intro right) I then told her how much I respected and admired her and that after much prayer and council I was convinced that she was the woman that was meant for me and that I could never love another woman as much as I loved her and that I would be honored if she you pray about courting me. After hearing this she with a completely strait face and in a emotionless voice said that she would need to pray about it and then asked me who I had gotten council from. This was a slightly less well, “happy” response that I had hoped for. So when she asked me to tell her the story and began to tell her about the last year and half I was preparing to receive one of the greatest agonies of my life. After I finished my story she said that she would like some time to pray right now. So while she was sitting there in silence I had some of the cookies that she had made for my birthday and sipped on some tea that we had brought and watched the sun setting the valley. The only way that I can describe it was that God was there with me holding me and I trusted him to give Holly the confidence in him no matter what the answer was. Admittedly I lost track of time but maybe half hour went by when finally Holly turned to me and said “you have been very patient sir.” I replied that God has been teaching me a little bit about patience over the past year and a half. She then said that she would like to tell me her story and proceeded to tell me how over the past year she had struggled with me and that she could never love another man as much as she love me! A wall of Joy hit me in the face as she told me this and all I could think to say was “can I give you a hug”. As we were hugging she said “I guess this is me saying yes”. I wanted to lift her off the ground and jump for joy at the same time. My heart was pounding so hard I thought the whole world was shaking and there seemed to be fire running up and down my spine. I was dreaming I had to be dreaming. But this was better than a dream this was God given reality.
We spent the next few hours laughing about how many moments there had been when both of us had been in agony and were completely oblivious to what the other person was going through. We then set out a foundation for our relationship 1) Don’t let the sunset while we’re angry (so the devil can’t get a foothold), 2) We don’t let anything distract us from God,,, if this relationship doesn’t spur us toward Him, then we need to seriously re-evaluate it, 3) We will make sure that the other person is spending the time needed with the men and women that we are serving with and are reaching out to. (Basically that we will not become exclusive from the family and ministry that God has given us)