The young woman worked in a medical clinic and was living in an apartment in the city, alone with her dog and cat. One day at coffee break, a fellow worker mentioned that her father, one of the doctors, owned a couple of duplexes out in the country and one of the units was vacant. The young woman expressed interest in moving. Sometime later, as she was coming in from walking the dog, her phone was ringing, and she managed to pick it up on the last ring. It was the doctor, asking if she wanted to rent the vacant unit. He said that this was the third time he had called her and if she hadn’t answered this time, he would have offered it to someone else.

She moved into the duplex and became friends with another young woman living in the other half of the duplex. They began sharing meals, with each cooking every other night.

The young man was living in another province half a continent away. He had completed a couple of university degrees but was working in a factory, trying to figure out what he should do with the rest of his life. He had a friend from university who was teaching far away in a Christian college in the same province as the young lady described at the beginning of this story. This friend said she almost never went into the staff lounge at the college, but one day she went in, and there she encountered a man who was one of the senior professors and administrators at the college. He mentioned that he was looking for an editorial assistant for some book projects. She immediately thought of her friend working in a factory half a continent away. When he got home from work that day, he found an urgent message from his friend, asking him to call her right away. He did, and she connected him with the senior professor. The professor happened to travel to the other province shortly afterward. They met, and the young man accepted the job.

The job, of course, was half a continent away, and he prepared to drive across country. His older and wiser sister, fearing it was too far for him to drive alone, offered to travel with him. When they arrived, he had only a few days to find somewhere to live before the sister had to fly home. The sister thought he should rent a room in a house with a group of other young men because it was less expensive, but this did not appeal to him, and he moved into a duplex in the country, across the driveway from the young woman.

The first night he moved in, the two young women invited him to join them for dinner. Soon, he was part of the rotation, with each of them cooking every third night. Friendships grew.

There was one hitch. He was a committed Christian, and the young woman across the driveway was not. Then, one of the doctors she worked for invited her to a Christian Businesspersons’ dinner, and a few days later she committed her life to Jesus. The young man and young woman began looking for a church together. They found a church, and she was baptized there, choosing the same Bible verse as he had chosen when he had been baptized years before.

In time, the friend in the other half of the young woman’s duplex became involved in other things and was not around as much. The young man and the young woman were eating together and going to church together. It was not a usual romance, but their lives became increasingly entwined. A year to the day after he had moved into his duplex, they were talking one evening, and they realized they were being drawn together. They became engaged. (Of course, she had discerned where things were going long before he did.)

He did not have doubts, but an unexpected phone call from a friend half a continent away extolled the blessings of marriage and confirmed that he was going in the right direction.

Looking back at all of the many steps that had brought them together, the young man and young woman were convinced that there must have been a divine plan behind it all.

Two months and six days after they became engaged, they were married, and they lived…together, with love, through all of life’s ups and downs, guided by the same Divine Hand that had brought them together.

The young man and young woman are no longer young. This month, we celebrated our 47th anniversary. We give thanks to the One who had brought us together. We thank Him for the many years we have had together, the many blessings we have received, including children and grandchildren, and the continued guidance we continue to receive.

“God sets the lonely in families (Psalm 68:6).

“What God has joined together, let no one separate” (Mark 10:9).