Our love story starts in a class room. In a dance studio in fact. Not for dance lessons. Though we did take irish dancing lessons together once, funny factoid. Anyway, our university was bursting at the seams, and I guess our class had no where else to meet. It was basically a songwriting/composition class. I believe it was actually a group lesson of sorts, where you would bring what you were working on. We were sophomores in college, hardly mature enough to be handling such matters of extreme heart spillage every week. And yet for the sake of education we were presented with the humiliating, yet sometimes rewarding task of sharing the vulnerable workings of our hearts, out in the open.

Did I mention it was in a dance studio? Meaning it had a whole wall of mirrors. Anyway so you would sit there, in front of the mirror. STARING. Staring at yourself, or staring at others (or pretending not to) as you listened to the sharing of songs. It was actually quite cool, maybe not the awkward staring, but the sharing was really helpful. I mean it sounds pretty embarrassing and I guess it was in some ways. However, the room was filled with the electricity of budding creativity. Creativity that for the most part had yet to be fizzed out with the ways of the world or the realities of a pay check. Creativity that was pure, new, and fresh.

The professor was an adjunct professor. Which means he was not overly “educational” or stuffy. He was often late and kind of weird. But overall he was a pretty happy guy and created a nice safe environment for sharing. I remember four distinct students from that class. Two girl friends who were very near and dear to me. Gals that I am not close to now, but I believe we would probably just about pick up where we left off, due to the nature of that raw season of life that we shared.

However there were the two other people in that class that would change the course of what happened next in my college years and beyond. Two boys.

Ah yes…

Not too long into the year after rubbing shoulders and sharing songs these boys asked me to join their band. Where we would attempt the process of creating and writing together sharing the close tight spaces of our hearts as we creatively poured out onto each other.

I should mention, however, that I was literally falling apart this year of my life. Truly lost. Wondering who I was. As a student I was failing at all 10 of my classes. Some of which only required showing up. I couldn’t manage that crazy school juggling act that some college students seem to do so easily. And all the fears about myself came to it’s head.

Fears that I was not enough. Fears that I wouldn’t get what I wanted. Fears about life being worthless. Fears that what I thought about God was just not true. I could feel the dreams slipping away, and I blamed myself. It literally sent me into a depression, spiraling downward soon to crash and burn.

But for now, The band.

Enter a very intense portion of my life. If this were a sit-com, it would actually be a pretty good one. Two guys and one girl. One guy perfect, put together, likely to be famous, charming, outgoing, an intense leader, handsome. The other guy mysterious, quietly handsome and a bit unkempt, extremely talented, deep, but kind of confusing. Me the girl as artsy and scatter brained, too transparent, over sharing damsel in distress. They all become close friends and the inevitable occurs: LOVE TRIANGLE.

If this were a sit-com, the hilarious scenarios and romantic tension could continue forever. Each season would end and you would be left hanging wondering: WHO DID SHE CHOOSE?

But my life however is NOT a sit-com. And it ended up like this. I was the Yoko Ono and I broke up the band.

But remember that sit-com analogy? Well it would have gone something like this. It’s the season finale. After seasons of wishing she would just get the “perfect one”, you finally are rooting for her to pick the least obvious of the two. After you realize the perfect put together, charming one is just NOT right for her, she turns him down!  And you just know that the quietly handsome one is going to go after her…And then it ENDS!

Gag. He doesn’t. She is left alone to fend for herself. The one who you fall in love with as a viewer, the talented mysteriously handsome one leaves her in the lurch.

Remember her life is falling apart?

Yes this would be the part where my existence crashed and burned. I did not pass my sophomore technical which means life as a music major was OVER. Remember that depression I mentioned? Well it about overtook me and I nearly didn’t finish school because of it. But by the grace of God, I was led down a different road. My doubts and fears came to a head as well. And my fear about God not being who I thought? Well those were blessedly squashed.

God ran after me. He pursued me as the the most favorable character of my romantic story. He proved himself as a good, good father who is trustworthy. Worthy of worship, who would always keep me safe and always have my best interest. A God who would provide for a girl who was just lost without him. I know it was in these deep dark questions and fears of my heart that He found me. Truthfully as messy as it all was He is the one who “caught” my heart so to speak.

This story was supposed to be how I met my husband. Though I guess it was about more as most stories go. Truthfully I had a LOT of growing up to do still when the band fell apart. And it took a THIRD guy, one who was really WRONG for me, to mix up the pot enough for me to really romantically fall apart. In fact, I almost married the third way too wrong for me guy. YIKES that was a mess.

But God does have a sense of humor. And the guy in the band, remember the quietly handsome, talented one? Yes…our paths crossed later down the road. And in true sit-com fashion maybe “when harry met sally” perhaps, we became friends. And some time after that when everyone in our lives were probably wondering: Why don’t they just get together? Finally with much anticipation, he came after me. Though he had become more real to me and less of the dreamy guy I though he was, he was a real man with strengths and weaknesses. But he loved God and he loved me. One day out of the blue he called me up and we casually started dating in secret. And then we become engaged. And married. We later move and find our life calling in music ministry together. We have two children. And we are NOT perfect. But we are best friends. And we are daily perfected just by being iron sharpening iron. Figuring out this life day by day.

And really I realize my story IS a sit-com with God up there penning the story. He writes the funny parts, the hard parts, the good parts, knowing all along that one day I would be sharing this tale with tears in my eyes giving GOD THE GLORY, because it all comes from his hands. Doesn’t it? All of the crazy brokenness that he perfects, that he resurrects out of the ashes just to share his Glory.

Truthfully God is who holds my heart. He is the romantic interest of the story. The one who fought for me, the one who came after me, the one who keeps me safe. And isn’t that the best part of the marriage relationship? The fact that we get to mirror that image? It is a beautiful mess of a story, but it is God’s story and that is one I want to share. Maybe I started to tell the story of how I met my husband one quiet evening, but instead I shared the story of how I once was lost, but I was found, and about God who saved this wretch like me.