God's Perfect Timing

March 25, 2012

It is interesting, I think, to reflect on your life looking for God moments.  Sometimes, hindsight provides a perspective that allows you to more clearly see God working in your life.  One of those times for me is when I think about meeting Tim for the first time.

I grew up in the Lutheran church but all the garbage from my childhood got in the way of my faith.  I quit confirmation classes as a young teenager, I purposefully began sleeping too late on Sunday mornings so I wouldn’t have to go to church, and I eventually left church all together when I was 19 or 20 years old.  I never saw God in my life, never felt His hand, never heard Him speak to me.  Where was He when I was going through all of that?  I was angry and resentful.  For several years, I hid my unbelief and kept going to church because I had very close friends there.  But after a while, the hypocrisy of pretending to believe, especially while being a sponsor in the youth group, got to me.  So I quit pretending and quit church and God.

In January, 1985, when I was 19 years old, I first told of the abuse that occurred for most of my childhood.  Then, in July, 1987, I moved to Florida following my best friend (she also helped me get a job with her) and put distance between me and my problems.  Telling my secret set me on a road that has been both the most difficult journey I could imagine and the most rewarding passage to self-discovery and healing.  I certainly didn’t take that journey alone.  My family and closest friend were a constant source of support.  And, George, my counselor, walked along beside me the whole way.  He taught me to love myself.  I finished counseling in March or April, 1989.

In May, 1989, I met Tim for the first time.  A friend and coworker invited me to go waterskiing – I didn’t know it was a set-up.  I instantly felt comfortable talking to Tim.  That was a first for me.  Talking to a guy was never comfortable.  The next weekend, the group was going on vacation to the Florida Keys and they invited me along.  At first, I wasn’t going to go with them because I had other plans.  But they increased the pressure on me until I gave in and changed my plans.  After that trip, I knew without a doubt that I would marry Tim.  In fact, when I got home, I called a friend and told her that I met the man I was going to marry.

When I look back on the timing of all this, I am amazed at how perfectly timed out the meeting was.  Had I met Tim just two or three months earlier, it would not have worked.  I was not in a place where I could be in a relationship with someone.  Another coworker who rarely talked to me (in fact, I was rather intimidated by her) was married to Tim’s best friend.  It was her who ramped up the pressure on me to go with them on the trip.  I remember clearly her coming into my cubicle and saying, “What the hell is more important than going to the Keys?!”  I replied, “Nothing?”

I am amazed now to see how God was working in my life, even when I wasn’t a Christian.  There were so many dominoes that had to fall just perfectly for me to meet Tim.  I told my secret.  Then I moved to Florida with my best friend, and she helped me get a job with her at an engineering company and she helped me find George.  At that company, I also worked with Tim’s best friend’s wife and her best friend.  I finished counseling and two months later they asked me to go waterskiing with them.  I had worked with them for two years and never before had they asked me to go waterskiing with them.  Then they asked me to go to the Keys which is where I really got to spend time getting to know Tim.

Only God could have orchestrated that so perfectly.  It still blows my mind that He did that for me, even when I didn’t know Him.

Florida Keys     May 1989