Sixteen years ago, when we bought our house, we thought that this would be a great starter home, and in a few years we would buy the one of our dreams. After settling in and getting to know our neighbors, our roots grew deeper and deeper. One day I was sharing those sentiments with my Mama, and what she said seemed to settle the matter. “Well, honey, you were going to move until your neighbors convinced you otherwise.”
So it goes with much of what happens in my life. I often have plans or standards until God shows me that my plans need to change, or at least, my thinking needs to bend. So it has recently gone with our family’s thoughts on dating.
Our rule has always been: No Dating. No Dating. No Dating in high school. Our thoughts were you are only kids once. Then along came a sweet girl in study hall. Blast that study hall – where no one actually does any studying! In all honesty, our families have known each other for years, but the girl suddenly went from just a girl we knew to the interest of our son’s heart.
As this budding romance began, I had some conversations with the young lady’s mom which in turn led to our family praying about this situation. She knew our family’s stand on dating, and she also knew us to be people of our words.
Many know that the verse of my title actually ends in “Behold it was Leah.” Genesis 29:25 (NIV) Jacob’s surprise ending to what he thought was going to be the love of his life, but ended in a major disappointment. Our willingness to pray about the situation led from our awareness that perhaps our thoughts needed some adjusting. One realization was our sadness that our young man wasn’t so little and wouldn’t be living with us for that many more years, and the other was that he would have plenty of his own Leah moments in life as that growing up took place. Having rigidity in our parenting isn’t something we were known for; so, we didn’t want to begin now, causing all of us disappointment.
After looking at how he has conducted himself in every other aspect of life and after spending much time in prayer, we knew that our thinking was based not on the responsible young man who lives with us. We decided that as long as one condition was met, the two could begin dating (which mostly consists of hanging out at either house with parents home). We have always expected our sons to be gentlemen and this was no exception. The condition: we required Sawyer to ask her parents’ permission to date her and to share about his faith and how he would conduct himself with their daughter. Showing courage beyond his years, he did.
But that is only part of the story . . .
The sweet girl shares his love for Jesus and for others. Both share a love for little kids – she’s a Sunday school teacher while he coaches little kid football. Family dinners, movie nights, impromptu suppers after sporting events became routine. (I will admit that it probably took some time to get used to our senses of humor.) Over time, she just blended right into the fold of this crazy life we lead around here.
So even though, I am still having a hard time letting go of childhood for a soon-to-be man, I could not be more thankful that the girl we all get to grow up with is Rachel.
God only knows what the future holds for them each as individuals, much less as a couple, but I do know that when he was little we prayed for “the girl” he would find someday. I just didn’t think we’d get to meet her so soon.
