God Will Bless Those Who Wait: December 2009

Title:

"When Dreams Come True"

By:

Eric & Leslie Ludy

About This Book:

(taken from the back cover)

"This daringly real, intensely moving love story gives vision and hope to everyone in search of a love worth waiting for. In their bestseller When God Writes Your Love Story, Eric and Leslie Ludy described the breathtaking perfection of God's plans for each young person and offered fresh guidelines for being Christlike in relationships with the opposite sex. When Dreams Come True shares the Ludys' personal story, illustrating how they lived out the principles of the first book in their own romance and marriage."

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

You know, I have read many stories of people who have had godly relationships...but I'd have to say that the Ludy's story might just beat all. This book starts out when they are both children and goes all the way until they are married. This book was a great blessing to me. You know how you often wonder if anyone else out there feels the way you do about relationships and the whole waiting on God thing? Well, I'll tell you this...you know while reading this book that Eric and Leslie completely understand how you feel and where you're coming from. They were already there...and God led them thru it. You can see the hand of God on their relationship from the start...it is an amazing love story that only God could have written! This was one of the few books that I have read in the last week...and God has taught me a lot thru them. I would strongly encourage y'all to get ahold of some of the Ludy's books and read them...and while reading them, ask God to open your heart and show you what you need.

Links:

Eric & Leslie Ludy's Website

Their Online Store

Their Books On Amazon.com

Ok, so I think this is going to be my last guest post for now. I hope to have a few more within the next few weeks, but we will see. : ) This one was written by my dear friend Katy and I am sooooo excited for y'all to read it!! Please be sure to go over and check out Katy's blog when you're done reading, I'm sure you'll love it as much as I do. : ) You can also go over and check out Kelly's blog, I'm sure he'd love to have some visitors as well. : )

Kelly & Katy:

A Courtship In Progress

"It all started on April 18, 2008 with a simple "random" comment on my blog. Kelly had been surfing blogs and had listed as one of his favorite movies "Last Flight Out" and I guess when you click on the link it will take you to other blogs that have that listed as and out of the 88 blogs of however many thousands there are on blogspot he clicked on my blog and commented on a post I had done about John Piper and honoring parents. The God thing was that I had not put "Last Flight Out" as my favorite movie Abby had (she had a blog on the same profile accidentally and changed it) and I had just a few days before considered changing my profile but then decided against it. So that was kind of a God thing :) So we started commenting back and forth which turned into long IM conversations, which lasted hours.

In October 2008 Kelly told me that we needed to not talk for awhile and broke off almost all contact for about 10 months due to some things that he needed to prove to his parents. When we started talking again in May 2009 I was not really ready to trust him at all. I had been hurt once before and I just wasn't ready to take that chance again. I was relived to know that his parents knew about me and we started talking on the phone. I did not have any feelings for him at this time (or at least I told myself that...truth to be told I kind of buried them away and tried to forget them). While he always had been spiritually mature in some ways he had not become a man yet and I was definitely not the woman I needed to be either.

So we talked on the phone a few times in the spring and then I headed off to camp and he headed of to 3 1/2 months in Papua New Guinea leading a team of all older guys in building a ministry center for To Every Tribe Ministries (the mission board we as a family were planning on going to the mission field with).
As I said before, I had had feelings for him before but I did not really have any feelings for him beside friendship for him during this time. Although I did pray that the Lord would take him from boyhood into manhood during his time in PNG I didn't really give him much thought the entire summer. I guess he did a lot of thinking about me though :) When he came back he called me and within the first two minutes of our conversation I realized that I was not talking to the boy that I had been before but instead to a GOD CENTERED man that had just...emerged. It was really amazing!

We started talking again and I started to really struggle with feelings that I had thought were non-existent except now things were definitely God centered it was really hard. So I started just surrendering him to the Lord and my desires to the Lord. Then, all the sudden Jen had been talking to him about his part in the American Gospel Tour and she said that there was no way she was going to invite him on it unless we had met him in person. The next thing I know he and his brother were coming out to visit us on November 10th to meet and discuss the Gospel Tour. Now truly he was coming out to discuss the gospel tour.

So three weeks before I was going to meet him in person I was a wreck. Then I realized that I HAD BEEN surrendering my singleness to the Lord BUT with lots of strings attached. So I came before the Lord one day and told Him that I was not only surrendering my singleness for the present but for the rest of my life EVEN IF it meant that I was going to be single for the rest of my life. In fact, I chose to expect it. Once I made that decision my whole attitude changed and I began jealously guard my heart. Once I started that every time I would start to think if only or stuff like that I would instantly give it to the Lord and try to get re-focused on Him.

So the 1st two days that Kelly and his brother Mike were at our house were horrible for me! Not because of them at all in fact Kelly was everything I had ever dreamed that he would be and more but I just was really quiet and not crazy outgoing and I just felt like I had disappointed him. Plus Danny and Abby are crazy outgoing so I just really felt bad (and a little bit jealous lol). The ironic part is that God completely confirmed to him that he should go ahead and ask my parents if he could pursue a courtship relationship (dating with a purpose of...marriage) during the first two days! I actually asked him about it and was like "How on earth did you know I didn't even talk?" and he told me that I didn't have to talk because he just observed and knew that the Lord wanted him to move forward.
In the meanwhile, I have absolutely NO CLUE and as the week progressed I was working overtime to keep my feelings for him (because yeah...I had a lot!) surrendered to the Lord.

One thing that the Lord had been laying on my heart the last six months before Kelly even was at all back in the picture was that I was supposed to go and serve the Lord in the foreign mission field. I had accepted that that probably meant I was supposed to be single so I was just moving towards that goal already. The whole week Kelly had been asking me questions about missions and how I felt about surrendering all to the Lord and being willing to serve Him in a hostile and/or persecuted area. I had absolutely no qualms about that and told him what the Lord had laid on my heart concerning missions. Little did I know that he was checking off qualities (because he is going to be a missionary to PNG).

So the last day rolls around and it was just not a good day for me. I felt like there was so much left unsaid. 10 minutes before I had to leave for work I really felt like I needed to let him know that my #1 fear about going to the mission field was that people would think that I was going just because he was going WHICH WAS NOT THE CASE AT ALL but I was afraid that people would think it would be. So I blurted it out to him like 10 minutes before I left and all he said was "It took you all week to tell me that?" To which I replied "Well, I kinda just got the courage up." And then that was it! OMW, I was a WRECK at work that day. I was almost in tears the whole time so finally at one point I just went into the kitchen, physically raised my hands to the Lord and surrendered the whole situation to Him.
So then on Wednesday night Kelly called and we talked for about 2 hours and I walked away from that conversation accepting the fact that while I had feelings for him I needed to just wait and we both needed to guard our hearts and be really really careful to honor the Lord in everything.

SO on Thursday, November 19, 2009 at 1:04pm (I know how sad is that lol) Kelly called me. I was on the way home from babysitting and Abby was driving. So I was just rambling on COMPLETELY oblivious when all the sudden he goes "So I have been thinking a lot about our conversation last night." I started worrying. I was sure I had said something that I shouldn't have so I am thinking up this amazing apology in my mind when all the sudden he goes into telling me that he knew he was really buddy buddy with Abby and Jen but that it was just because he was trying to be careful so he is saying all this stuff and I am SO OBLIVIOUS STILL so all the sudden the phone cuts out and then it comes back in and by this time we are home and Abby and Danny had gotten out of the car. So all the sudden he says "I have a question to ask you." And I said (COMPLETELY oblivious) "Yeah?" And he goes, "I have already talked to your parents and they have given me their blessing to ask you if you would be willing to enter into a courtship relationship with me?" All the sudden I was having a hard time breathing. The first words to come out of my mouth were NOT "Yes I would love to enter into a courtship relationship with you." NOPE, not me! Instead they were "Are you serious?" I was so shocked I seriously thought I was dreaming! When he assured me that he was indeed incredibly serious I got really quiet (again still working on the whole breathing thing). He very nicely said, "Well you don't have to give me an answer now." And I am thinking: I would really like to give you an answer now but I just can't seem to get all the things I want to say from my brain to my mouth! I think I said something about how I had been praying for months about this THEN I asked "Can I give you your answer now?" To which he replied "Yes" (and he sounded a bit relived I wonder why? lol). So when I could breathe again I said "Yes, I would love to enter into a courtship relationship with you." I think that next thing I said was "So, does this mean you are my boyfriend now?" :) And I am so glad he is!

So that is my story...the shortened version. God is just so good and it has been absolutely amazing how much I have grown in the Lord in the short time we have been in a relationship! I have realized that more now then ever I have to jealously guard my relationship with Jesus. Keeping Christ first and my relationship with Kelly second. It has definitely been a transition but I am so excited to see what the Lord has for us next! The neat thing too is having the blessing of all four parents :) He definitely went about it in the right way!

So right now we are moving forward trusting the Lord and taking things day by day. Our hearts desire is to bring honor and glory to the Lord through our relationship because when it comes down to it, our lives should be about Him and not about us."