“You have a hot date tomorrow with Amy Standley!” Rob announced entering my office.
Date?!? I began freaking out in my head. It’s just coffee.
“Y…e…s…,” I tried to cover, hoping Rob didn’t notice. Dating and I never got along. Most of my first dates landed around 9.0 on the Rhictor scale. I spent much time leading up to first dates worshipping the porcelain throne, heaving everything I’d eaten for the past few weeks. Then I struggled to hold conversation with the girl with whom I had no trouble talking before and when I asked her out. The cold sweats began.
“It’s not a big deal,” I continued after a beat. “Just coffee.” My voice cracked like a pre-pubescent boy.
“You can’t do just coffee on a first date with Amy.” Rob said it like I should have known that rule. In college, Amy lived with Temple, about a mile off campus. Temple’s boyfriend (now husband), Jason, introduced Amy to his best friend, Rob. The four spent much time together. Amy and Temple’s house was a second home to Rob. After graduation, I just happened to be hired as the youth pastor of Rob’s home church. So, that’s how we ended up staring at each other on that Friday afternoon.
“Amy said coffee when I called, so coffee it is.” But Rob’s “encouragement” changed my mind. On the way into town – I lived 72 miles from Amy at the time – I stopped and picked up a floral bouquet and a copy of The Oregonian newspaper to get some destination ideas (it was well before SMART phones and Google Assistant).
Apparently, after leaving my office, Rob called Amy with a similar proclamation. She’d been just as confused as I had been. When I arrived for our “date”, Amy was on a long-distance call to her sister Lisa in full freak-out mode.
“It’s just supposed to be coffee!” she’d told Lisa.
“If he’s got flowers, then it’s a date,” was the bit of wisdom Lisa gave her before hanging up the phone. (Amy filled me in on our third date.)
I was so nervous after talking with Rob that I spent the evening futzing over outfits and plans. In the morning, before the date, I changed clothes four times! I settled on stone-washed denim jeans and a mustard yellow button-down shirt. Amy would confide in me years later that she hated that shirt. I’m glad I showed up with the flowers, or it may have just been coffee.
Eight months had passed since I declared to my college roommate I would marry Amy Standley. In that time, many things happened to ensure we would never meet again, but God had a bigger plan. I believe God gives us choice in whom we choose to love and marry. The romantic in me still believes that sometimes God moves Heaven and Earth in order for two specific people to meet. When I take into account all of the things working against us becoming a couple, my head swims. Good grief!?! All the head-swimming ceases, though, when I remember two incredible words: but God.
Those two words are so powerful. Amy and I wouldn’t have met, but God convinced Amy to go to Eugene Bible College for a one-year Bible certificate. Amy and I wouldn’t have had a first date, but God prompted Rob to drop a few hints. Amy and I were both separately told we couldn’t have children, but God decided to confound the doctors…thrice! There are many more instances in my life where those two small words change the direction of the narrative.
As I sat pondering these two words, God took me on a trip through Scripture. I found forty-one chapters in the Bible containing this powerful phrase. One story stood out from the rest. One man – who happens to be one of my favorite characters in the Bible – stood out from the rest. In speaking about this man, Stephen said, “Because the patriarchs were jealous of Joseph, they sold him as a slave into Egypt. But God was with him” (Acts 7:9). At the end of his life, when his brothers came to him in fear for their very lives, Joseph said, “You intended to harm me, but God intended it for good to accomplish what is now being done” (Genesis 50:20). I pray I will see “…but God…” strung through the narrative of my story and will be able to speak blessing and not curses when all is said and done.
Good Grief?!? 