Grace In God's Timing
I am thankful for God’s grace to me through the blessing of my wonderful wife, Ruth. We met in 2000 when we were at a Bible camp. It wasn’t love at first sight, but we liked each other a lot right off the bat.
Par for the course, for me. For almost as long as I can recall, I had liked one girl or another. A romantic by nature, there was hardly a season where my emotions and affections weren’t strongly directed toward some girl. But my heart was a sprinter in a marathon. Every time I liked a girl, it would eventually peter out since there was too much time before I would be ready for a serious relationship.
After camp, I came home to Boise and Ruth spent a few months in Yakima, Wash. with her older sister and brother-in-law. We wrote letters to each other quite often during that time. Not love letters, mind you, strictly as friends for spiritual encouragement (with just enough flirting to signal the other one that there was interest). I also found an excuse or two to visit friends in Yakima over those months. I really liked her.
Too soon! We were only 17. But for God’s grace, this story would have ended like all the others. However, in His sovereignty and grace, the Lord orchestrated it so that we would be parted for a while and brought back together when the time was right.
Ruth went back to live with her family in Mexico (she was a missionary kid). We continued to write for a while but that didn’t last. In all honesty, I was the one who stopped writing for which I felt guilty and figured she probably wouldn’t like me anymore. But, by God’s grace, the relationship paused at a point where we clearly liked and respected each other.
Fast forward to the fall of 2002. It was my second year at Emmaus Bible College and Ruth was arriving as a freshman. I knew she was planning to come to Emmaus and was looking forward to seeing her, but afraid she wouldn’t want to be friends because I had stopped writing. When we reunited, she was totally cool! That made me like her even more.
After getting reacquainted as friends during her first year at Emmaus, it was clear that the interest and respect for each other were still there. We began dating during her second year and were engaged by the summer of 2004. The rest is history!
God's grace has abounded in my life through the blessing of my wife. I am so thankful for His grace in bringing us (back) together at just the right time.
– Jonathan Sonoda
