"I think we should break up," he softly said. Those were the words I'd been dreading for months. "I'm ready to start seeing other people."
My trembling fingers tightened around the phone cord, and I choked back a sob that threatened to explode from my tightening lungs. There was a long, awkward pause as he waited for me to speak. My only consolation was that he could not see my pale face. I would never have been able to hide my devastated expression had he been in the room at that heart-wrenching moment.
The nightmare had come true...again. What had started out as a harmless, fun, innocent relationship had slowly become complicated entanglement of emotions and passion, only to end abruptly now that the fire had ended. The cutting pain that ruthlessly squeezed my heart was so intense I could scarcely breathe. Somehow, I managed to end the phone call with at least a small amount of dignity. As I placed the receiver into its cradle, a dark cloud of despair overcame me, mercilessly pouring a violent torrent of rejection and hopelessness into my reeling mind.
It was over. Once again, I was in for a sleepless night of agony, hours of weeping until no more tears would come. Once again, I would have to face the aching, desperate loneliness of walking into a crowded room full of strangers-with no hand to hold, no strong arm to gently rest on my back and give me security. Once again, I was alone.
How many years had I longed and urgently searched for true love? How many nights had I lain awake, dreaming of a beautiful romance-a lasting relationship that wouldn't end in heartache?
I had made incredible sacrifices in an attempt to somehow cling to every short-lived dating relationship that came my way. I had given pieces of myself away to each man that came into my life-pieces of my heart, my emotions, and even my body. Yet once he had tired of me, my fragile heart would be played with and then carelessly tossed aside. Even if I was the one who ended a relationship, the heartbreaking pain was inevitable. Every time it felt like something precious was being violently ripped from inside of me.
I yearned to be loved and cherished. I had dreamed of a perfect love story for my entire life. But somewhere in the midst of the endless cycle of one temporary romance after the next, my dreams had shattered right along with the broken fragmented pieces of my heart.
I had asked others for advice. Those from the older generation had simply given guidelines to follow, which were so completely out of touch with the reality of my world that they were worthless to me. As a Christian, I had listened carefully to the instructions given by the church leaders, and tried to follow the Christian rules of dating to the letter. But their rules never protected me from a broken heart and shattered life.
When I turned to those in the younger generation, I found we were all in the same boat: an endless cycle or shallow and cheap romances that never lasted and left us emotionally bleeding and insecure. In fact, the pain I experienced was small compared to what many of my friends had gone through.
As I lay on my bed pondering these thoughts, I found myself inwardly forming a desperate prayer.
"God, where are You in this?" my heart cried. "I am Your child. All my life, You know I have longed for something beautiful. I have searched for true love. Does a pure and perfect romance even exist in this dark world of lust and perversion and sin? Should I even dare to dream of something beyond the shallow, meaningless, cheap version of love I've know so far?"
Then came a soft, gentle tugging upon my heart. Suddenly I somehow knew that my life did not need to be this way and that God had something better for me. It was almost as if God Himself was reminding me, I am the Author of true love; I am the Creator of romance.
A quiet challenge deeply touched my spirit in that moment. It was as if God was tenderly standing before me, with tears of boundless love in His eyes, whispering to my heart, You have searched for true love in your own way. But My ways are not your ways. I want to script a beautiful tale just for you, but first you must trust Me with the pen of this precious area of your life. Will you let Me write your love story?
It wasn't too long after that tear-filled, hopeless night that my unforgettable journey began. It was a journey to discover something I never before knew existed- the matchless beauty of a God-written love story. More out of desperation than confidence, I invited the Creator of the universe to be the center of my love life. Did He disappoint me? Quite the opposite. I was soon to discover that my most faithful Friend in the entire world, who loved me more than I could comprehend, had a plan for my love life that would take my breath away with its beauty.
As for God, His way is perfect. ~ Psalm 18:30, NIV
When God Writes Your Love Story by Eric & Leslie Ludy
