Part 5: The End of Waiting for Dating- The Value of 3 Years Together

· by · in In A Relationship, Singlehood. ·

hold meDear Andrew,

Remember when you told me how you really think about it and mean it when you use that introduction? I really thought about it and meant it.

Now that it comes to the end of these three years that once seemed like forever, they seem all too short. I couldn’t have ever imagined 3 more beautiful years. No other teen in the world has been blessed quite like we were, like we ARE, and they never will be again. However, Mrs. I is right, the story needs to be told. I’m not sure in how much detail, but even when the story is told it will still be ours like a secret. Maybe writing our story will help us solidify these years, so we don’t forget, and so we can start a new chapter without worrying that the last will really be gone. I would like that closure.

Andrew, after much time and thought these 3 years I’ve found that I want to be loved exactly the way you want to love. I am more and more drawn to this love the more I uncover of it… 3 years is a very long time to be together in comparative terms to the people our age around us who think 1 year together is selling your life away…

I’m glad we’ve waited to share a physical relationship, growing slowly as we progress and still not having shared the gem of my unmarried bodily gifts–that is my kiss. I didn’t use to value it so. I can’t tell you I waited and waited for the right boy to give it to willingly, because that would be a lie to make everything seem highly idealized and romantic. Yes, I waited, but up until now not willingly. There was a time in my life I wanted desperately to kiss someone just so I could have done it… There were times I wanted to kiss boys out of attraction but not love, times I wanted to kiss with love but not with the love back from the boy I wanted them to have. And when you came into the picture I would have gladly relinquished any promise or restrictions had I not felt the obligation to keep these seemingly ill-timed promises to God.

But over these three years you can be sure of the growth of my perception of my own self-worth. God Himself, and you as an instrument, have brought me further and further along this path. You can be proud of your role in that. God gave you a protective heart and one that truly loves me for who I am. Your love for me has helped me love myself, opened my eyes to the incredible treasure God made me to be in every part. You are still taking me farther every day.

Keeping my kiss to myself seems attractive now. This beautiful gift I can only give once as a “first kiss” must be given to one chosen carefully, and with that special chosen one, must be handled with care. It truly is a once-in-a-lifetime chance to give my first kiss to the right person, and I believe I have found that person in you. We’ve spent three years discerning, and now it is time to decide. My decision is to court you; that you are worthy of discerning a life-long commitment in marriage with, that I desire very much to take this next step of faith in our relationship, and that I choose to represent this new step with the gift of my kiss.

You have told me before not to feel pressured by this time schedule, and that if I still feel like I am not ready for any reason, you will still wait for me for as long as I need. I am ready. I think God did a good job of picking out a time schedule, and of preparing us along the way. It is not really just this one first day and this first kiss He was preparing us for (though He did that too), but a whole new season. God built the groundwork of love for us. Now we can be more active in setting up our “house with love for walls,” a house we may someday with the grace of God inhabit. Our foundation is firm, and we have Christ as the cornerstone. The way we build our house now over the next couple of years will determine how good or bad of a home we will end up with, or if that home is one we would willingly live in at all. I’m not terribly worried, because as long as we let God lead, the bricks will fall into the right places and we will turn out with a glorious castle to be proud of.

So yes Andrew–I now formally accept the invitation you proposed to me three years ago and which you tell me you still extend. I am very excited to begin this new adventure, with you as a now more courageous and able souldier and I a more mature and submissive red flower. Let’s get building!

Yours, Grace Elizabeth Judah Daigler

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