The Return

This vision-message is a witness pointing to what's coming.  It aches for the coming--it can hardly wait!  And it doesn't lie.  If it seems slow in coming, wait.  It's on its way.  It will come right on time. - Habakkuk 2:3 The Message

It's been almost six months, but I have returned.  And so did she, sort of.

We had just ended our May 25th bible study and we were saying our goodbyes when one of the members of the group said it was put on her heart to share Habakkuk 2:3.  She didn't know why, but only that somebody needed to hear it.  As soon as she had finished reading it, I claimed it for me and my relationship with Rebekah.  I felt like God was using her to speak to me.

I usually worship at my church on Saturday nights, but I was meeting with some friends for lunch on Sunday so I opted to go to the 11 am service.  After the service a friend and I were hanging around waiting for others in our group.  She had gone to get some coffee and as I was standing and waiting for her, Rebekah, wearing a pink blouse and black slacks, walked past me not more than ten feet away.  My friend returned and I told her "she who shall not be named" had just walked past me and I pointed her out, about forty feet away talking to some friends.  She asked me if I wanted to go up to her and start talking to her, but I said no.  We did walk past her and her friends as we walked into the church's bookstore to kill more time waiting for our friends.

I walked around briefly, looking at the selection of CD's and DVD's and realized that I wanted to get the DVD of the last service that the choir sang at.  I was standing at the display of, and searching through, the service CD's and DVD's when out of the corner of my eye I noticed the partial form of someone with blonde hair wearing a pink blouse and black slacks on the other side of the display.  I went back to my browsing and when I turned to my left, that person was standing just two feet away from me.

It was Rebekah.  Did she follow me into the bookstore?  Was this just fate or was this a divine appointment?

We made small chit-chat talking about what had been going on in our lives.  I felt uneasy and nervous in the beginning, and I think she felt the same way too.  I had a death grip on my bible as I held it to my chest.  My friend came over and asked if I was doing okay and I said I was fine (she later told me it was to give me an out from the encounter if I needed it).  As we spoke though, I became more at ease and she seemed to relax as well and even smiled a few times.  It became time to leave and I said I'd see her later (I don't like saying goodbye).

I heard it, I claimed it and God made it happen in His time.  To be continued...

Something's Not Quite Right

Walks. There were many of them. It all started on a Halloween night. I was doing a load of wash and was putting it into the dryer. Rebekah walked in carrying a top that needed to be dried. I asked if she would like to put it in with my clothes and she agreed.  A few minutes later she returned and asked if I'd like to take a walk to the grocery store. It was only about a mile away and I didn't feel like dishing candy out to trick-or-treaters. I figured that it would be great exercise.

The walk was pretty uneventful. We made small talk about nothing of any significance. When we got to the store, she had to use the ATM machine. I stood a few feet back, but noticed she glanced over her shoulder a couple of times at me. Was she worried that I was sneakily gathering her personal information? Yeah, right. Was she checking to see if I was "checking her out"? Oh, please.

She gathered a couple of bags full of groceries and I did the gentlemanly thing; I offered to carry them home for her.  She accepted and we made our way home with more small talk along the way. This would later become a tongue in cheek joke for me.

We went for walks most of the nights for the next two weeks. She walked at a faster pace than me, so she was usually in front as I trailed behind at a slower pace. Whenever she realized she was too far in front, she would slow down until I got close then resumed her pace. Needless to say, we did very little talking until we got close to home when she would let me catch up to her. Was this just a time where she had someone to walk with? Was I some type of bodyguard or escort for her? I always looked at these walks to be a way to unwind and enjoy the outdoors, but it seemed more like just exercise to her.

Like other things between us, the walks stopped suddenly, with no explanation or reason. So I thought I'd knock on her door one evening to see if she wanted to go for a walk. There was no answer, so I went for a walk by myself. I tried it again the next evening with the same result.

So I thought I'd try giving her a call the next evening. She answered and after I asked her if she wanted to go for a walk, she said I was coming around her door too often, just like a "puppy dog". Well that was a fine how-do-you-do! I recalled that she was the one for the last two weeks that came to me asking if I would like to go on walks. Now she was trying to insult me by calling me a "puppy dog". Initially, I did take it as that, but then I started thinking about the attributes of a "puppy dog".

I realized that dogs are very loyal. That was me. Dogs are very loving. You can yell at them one minute and they go scurrying, but moments later they will be back ready to lick you and play with you. They forgive easily. That's what I strive for. They don't give up. Dogs have been known to remain by the side of their dead masters. I've been known to be that way. Was she really complimenting me? C'mon. It's like God had turned what was meant for evil into good.

After a hiatus of about three months guess what?  Yeah, she came knocking on my door to see if I would go for a walk with her. I told her that she was nuts to think I would go for a walk with her after the way she treated me. Not really. I did the friendly thing and went for a walk with her.

Several weeks later I was getting tired of the insignificant small talk. I was conducting business as BOB Delivery Service. BOB stood for Beast Of Burden because it seemed that a lot of the times we went for walks, we'd end up at a grocery store and I'd be carrying the goods back home. So during one of our walks when we were heading home with stuff from the grocery store I asked her,"If you could change one thing, what would it be?"

Without hesitation she said, "My parents."

I just about fell over. She described her relationship, if you could call it that, with her parents. There was hurt and pain in her heart. There was a major chasm not only with them, but also with her only sister.

It finally made sense. I now began to understand the emotional disconnect in her life. She was protecting her heart from any more damage. Now I was another threat to her. I was her friend but it would be difficult for her to be mine. Becoming close would be difficult at best. This would overshadow anything we would do in the future.

To be continued...

Disneyland

Disneyland is known as "The Happiest Place On Earth" and rightfully so. Whenever Rebekah and I visited there, we were consumed and lost in the fantasy world of Mickey and friends.  Whatever burdens we were carrying were left at the entrance.

Ten years ago, this past Christmas Day, was the first time that Rebekah and I first visited Disneyland together. We had been housemates for six months and my best friend gifted me that Christmas with the use of his car. Now, my friend lived sixty miles away and this offer came right out of the blue.  To this day, I believe God had His hand in this and everything else having to do with Rebekah.


We were out on one of our many walks together the night my friend dropped off his car.  The conversation evolved into what we were doing for Christmas. She had no plans and neither did I, so we decided that it would be fun to spend the day at Disneyland.  I had not been to Disneyland since they had opened California Adventure so I thought it would be fun to see how things had changed.

So on my day off a few days before Christmas, we went out shopping and ended up out in the Inland Empire forty miles away.  Yes, there were Disney stores much closer, but we liked doing spur of the moment things and having little adventures.  We spent a few hours at the Ontario Mills just window shopping and hoping to find a Disney store there.  No luck.  There was another mall a few miles away in Montclair, so we headed there.

Now I was getting pretty tired when we got there.  Most people, I believe, would go to one of those convenient store directories to locate the store they were looking for, but not me.  Men don't need maps.  We don't need directions.  We love to explore, right?

So we practically walked through the whole mall before we found the Disney store.  I encountered a little obstacle at this point... MONEY!  I thought that we were just going to go to Disneyland for the day.  She wanted to get annual passports.  I explained my situation to her and without hesitation, she said to give her my money and she would pay for the passports and I could pay her back later.

We walked out of there with Rebekah holding on to a couple of plastic credit card looking things that would allow us to gain entry to Disneyland.  We got home, anticipating what was to come in just a few days.

To be continued...

Remember, Repent, Repeat

I'll be the first to admit that I really blew it when it comes to my former marriage. This morning though, I again felt the forgiving love of my Father during the message at my church's worship service. I sensed that this was advice that He was giving me to prepare me for the impossible that I'm praying for.

I had my part in letting my marriage become stale and miserable. My marriage got to the point that it was like way too old bread and mold was growing on my marriage. I broke my marriage vows to my bride. Instead of keeping her the love of my life, my daughters became that. I always wanted to do family activities. I didn't make time for just me and my bride. I always thought that we could get back to that once the girls grew up and moved out of the house. I was wrong.

There were three things that I could have done that may have made things fresh and wonderful and save my marriage:

• Take my bride out on a date once a week
• Affirm my bride ten times a day
• Take a three day, two night vacation once a year

When things got stale, I needed to have remembered what I did when she consented to be my bride. We spoke to each other on the phone almost daily about the events of our day. We would go out to the movies or to grab a meal on Friday nights and weekends. We spent time sitting in my car just talking.

I always made it a point to compliment her about something; her hair, the perfume she was wearing, the clothes she was wearing. She received praise for her successes and consolation for her failures. I told her as, often as I could remember, that I loved her.

When I first got to know her, I discovered that her aunt and uncle lived in the same town that my family lived in about a hundred miles north of us. So periodically, we would drive up on a Friday and spend the weekend with either her relatives or my family, and visit the other. That carried over to when we had our daughters as well.

If I knew then what I know now, would I have done things differently? Definitely. Would it have saved my marriage? I don't know.

September 9, 2009 was a considered a lucky day for people to get married. I've targeted October 10, 2010 to be the culmination of my impossible prayer and be a day of blessing from God. Right now, it seems impossible. Exactly!

Thank you, Kenton Beshore, for letting God speak through you.

Knock And... Dinner

So I got home, and was ready to crash for a while when there was a knock at my door no more than five minutes later. Now Rebekah and I were housemates. She had a studio "apartment" behind our landlord's garage and I had a room up on the second floor on the opposite side of the house. I'm guessing she heard me enter the house, waited just a few minutes, then came upstairs to knock on my door.

I have learned increasingly over the last few years that God is in control. Not sometimes, but always. I learned recently that when you pray using Scripture as an example for God in your prayer, it becomes even more powerful. Unknowingly, I asked just as Isaac's servant did when searching for the wife for Jacob. I firmly believe that there is no such thing as coincidence, but it's God's Hand at work, and His Hand was definitely at work here. How does anyone explain answered prayer like this? I prayed that if He wanted me to tell Rebekah that I loved her, that she would come up to my room when I got home and ask me if I wanted to go out to dinner. And that's exactly what happened!

So we went off to a restaurant just a couple of miles from the house in her car. On the way we were making small talk, but in the back of my mind I was trying to figure out when and where I would tell her. We got there and dinner was brought to our table. The small talk continued as we ate. There was a break in the conversation, so I told her about the prayer I had made earlier in the day and all the sightings I had. All the while, she listened but continued to eat her dinner with her head slightly down. Did she know what was coming? Was the Spirit clueing her in?

The moment arrived. A peace came over me as the nervousness subsided. I told Rebekah about my final prayer that afternoon and what God had prepared for me. Then the words came out gently, "I love you."

The restaurant was full, but you could have heard a pin drop. Rebekah turned the brightest red that I had ever seen anyone become. She didn't say a word. She continued to eat. Now what? Do I say something or just be quiet and let her say the first words? After what seemed an eternity, she continued the conversation we were having beforehand like nothing had ever happened.

Okay. Now we're just going to politely finish dinner before we walk out and she takes off without me. It was a nice evening out and it would be a nice two mile walk home. I could use the exercise, right? Well, no. We walked out to her car and she automatically unlocked the door for me. Instead of taking off without me, we both climbed into her car and went back to the house. What was going on in her mind? Did she erase that moment in time from her brain? It was like that brief moment had never happened. We got home and talked about getting together again in a few days.

... to be continued.

The Beginning

Have you ever had one of those days where you're hearing God AND you're listening? Last Sunday was one of those days for me. It was a day that is taking me on an impossible journey. God used our church's worship pastor to challenge me. God asked me to pray for the impossible to happen and the first thing that came to mind was the relationship that I wanted reconciled with Rebekah (not her real name). And not just reconciled, but the prayer to be fulfilled of us being man and wife.

I know many people will call me nuts. How can I expect anything like that to happen? She hasn't spoken to me in three years. I've reached out to her and there's been no response or acknowledgement. People will say the relationship is dead. They will say that what I want to happen is just impossible. Exactly!

Rebekah and I were housemates and had been doing things together for several years when one day I asked God that if He wanted us to be together romantically, He would show me white Saturn cars while I was out and about. Although this may seem foolish, it is biblically sound. Abraham's trusted servant prayed a similar prayer when he was sent to search for a wife for Isaac. He prayed for a specific thing to be said and a specific action to be taken by the woman that God intended to be Isaac's wife.

I spent the day traveling by bus to run errands in different parts of the county that I live in. Every time that I got off the bus, you guessed it, I saw a white Saturn. I was so amazed every time that it happened, I must have had a grin stretching from ear to ear. My faith was weak, though, and I had to ask for one more thing. Before my last connection to get home arrived, I prayed that if God wanted me to tell Rebekah that I loved her, He would have her come to my door and ask me if I would like to go out to dinner.

I got home and started to unwind, when no more than five minutes later there was a knock on my door. If you're a hopelessly sentimental romantic like me, you know what happened next. I went and opened the door and there she was. If you're wondering if she asked me if I wanted to go out for dinner, well, YES!

What happened at dinner is for another time, but what you must know is that God has continued to show me white Saturns to this very day, and more specifically like the car she drove at the time.