Everyone loves a good love story. Well, our love story started back in 1991 when Suzy and I (Gio) were students in college. It was a small college where pretty much everyone knew each other, but for some reason, Suzy and I had not met during my first semester there. I knew who she was, and I assume she knew who I was, but we had not really spent any time together.
As the second semester got started, my focus was my studies and gearing up for the baseball season. I had not really had a ton of interest in dating at that time, but the Lord was preparing a meeting that would end up lasting a lifetime!
One of the ways to make money on campus was to work the intramural games. Whether being a referee for a basketball game, taking stats, or working the clock, there were always some small ways to make an extra buck. Suzy was always at the scorer’s table taking stats for the games, while I usually just vacuumed the hallways for my extra money. Well, on this one day as I was walking through the dorm, I noticed an announcement on the board stating that someone needed cover for one of the stat jobs for that night’s intramural games. I figured it was easy money and I took it.
The Beginning of Our Journey
When I arrived at the game, guess who I would be working with? Yes, Suzy was already there getting her book ready. I sat next to her and introduced myself and she gave me a crash course on score keeping. We talked the entire night, and I truly enjoyed the time we shared. After the game, we talked a little more and then exchanged dorm room numbers, that was the number of our phones in our room. This was well before cell phones.
One conversation led to another and another and in just a few short months, we were dating with intentions to get to know each other and see if this was something that would last. Well, here we are some 31 years later and we are still together!
If you were to ask me back in 1994 when Suzy and I got married, do you think you married the right person? My answer would have been, “for sure”. My reasons would have been: we dated for three and a half years, we love each other, I needed to make a commitment to her. All these are good reasons, but the one reason that I know today that totally changes the way I view Suzy is that she is God’s personal, perfect provision for me!
The Journey God Took Adam On
What we find in Genesis 2 is God taking Adam through a process to get him to the point to receive Eve as God’s personal, perfect provision for him. God starts off by saying in Genesis 2:18, “The Lord God said, ‘It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper suitable for him.” This statement tells me that God himself created a need for man to have earthly relationships. Adam was in a perfect relationship with God, but according to God he was incomplete.
Once God created that need, He gave Adam a unique job. That job was to go and name the animals. While Adam was naming the animals, it dawned on him that there was no suitable helper found for him, Genesis 2:19-20. Adam, I’m sure is starting to feel those desires that Suzy and I felt of wanting to be with someone, and spend time together, and eventually do life together. It’s a pure desire that God places in us, and God showed Adam his need. As a single person it is ok to feel these things.
The issue comes when you move from a desire to be in a relationship to being desperate to be in a relationship, bypassing God’s timing and His will for you and you overlook red flags just to be in a relationship.
In Adam’s case, he waited on God and God delivered. We see in Genesis 2:21-22 that God provided for the need that Adam had. God put Adam to sleep. This is a beautiful picture of resting while God does what He said He would do. When Adam woke up, Eve was not by his side. God brought her to him. This is a beautiful picture of God gifting us our spouse.
We close out this section of scripture by seeing that Adam then received Eve as God’s personal, perfect provision for him. Genesis 2:23 Adam says, “This is now bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called ‘woman’, for she was taken out of man.” Adam gladly received Eve based on who God was to him. He trusted that God was going to provide exactly what he needed.
The Journey God is Taking Us On
When I first heard this faith principle, it made complete sense how God was working both in me and in Suzy back in 1991. We both had a desire to be in a relationship. God placed that there. We were both looking, but not in a desperate way to see who that person would be. And on a day, not expected by either one of us, God put us together.
Now, there has been a lot of working out our own sinfulness that we have had to navigate. We both came from different backgrounds and cultures, and I was a little more intense in dealing with issues than Suzy was. But the amazing part is that at the end of the day, our differences did not matter. What was most important was that God put us together, and that regardless of how either of us “performed” in our marriage we were exactly what the other needed, the good the bad and the ugly!
Today, Suzy and I see each other as God’s personal, perfect provision! We are thankful that God had our paths cross 31 years ago. And we are grateful that He continues to grow us personally so that we can be exactly what the other needs, and we are also glad that God has blessed us to live this life together. We look at it this way: when I receive my spouse as God’s personal, perfect provision, and love them with an unconditional love, it is an act of worship to the God who brought us together.
