6 Years

Today is 6 years of marriage for Leigh and I. Tomorrow we will have known each other for 7 years and we have 2 boys and are church planting missionaries in Canada. What a wild ride. It's always nice to recap on the things that God has done so why don't you join me on a stroll down memory lane.

This is Jason's story, and Leigh may feel obliged to fill in her story later today, but it happened way back in February of 2001. Since 1998 I had a pray list of what I wanted in a wife. I would pray over that list every now and then and here are some things that were on that prayer list:

1. She had to be a Christian
2. She had to support me in my ministry
3. She had to be a Mennonite, or from the South because I needed someone who could cook really well
4. I had to get to know her before I dated her - since I had the habit of dating women without knowing them and therefore wasting my time.
5. She had to be my best friend

Then I had 2 bonus things that God could answer if He wanted to, but didn't need to. The first was that her dad worked in the White House, and second that she came from a family that was well off. Don't ask me why I put those in there, I put them in there when I was like 20 or 21 so it was just stupid youthful thinking. Well guess what, God answered everyone of my prayers on the list, even the bonus prayers. So, onto the story

It was spring break/seminary week at the Canadian Southern Baptist Seminary and I, being the very studious person I am, was writing some essays in the library. After boredom sunk in I had what seemed to be a cigarette craving, except it wasn't for a cigarette; it was to go onto a chat room. I had never been on an internet chat room before so it was all new to me. I am a Christian so I googled "christian singles chatroom" and I picked the first site that showed up. That is where I met this girl. We started emailing back and forth and so on, and weeks later I got the nerve to ask her for her phone number. I was in Canada, and she was down in Abilene, TX. I called her later that night and she asked me, "You go to the Canadian Southern Baptist Seminary, right?"
I said, "Yes, I do."
She replied, "I think my uncle went there."
"Who's your uncle?" I asked.
"Don Dilmore." She responded.
"How old is he?" I questioned.
"About 75." was her answer.
"I don't think he came here because we have only been around since 1987."
"Ok, well he went to one of those schools up there anyway."

Then next day I asked my friend who was the manager at the bookstore if she knew a student there by the name of Don Dilmore. "I have some of his books in the back." she replied. I was a little upset because we are a small school and you have used books you weren't telling me about? "No, Jason, Richard Blackaby wrote in his books."she replied.
"So what's the big deal? Richard Blackaby writes in my books." He was the president of the seminary at that time.

"You don't understand Jason. This is Don Dilmore's new book, New Beginnings, Richard Blackaby did the forward in it, Don was the Vice President of Development for the Canadian Southern Baptist Seminary."

Wow.

Anyway, her dad got wind of this and flew me down to Houston to meet his daughter on May 19, 2001, and that week I asked her to marry me. May 18, 2002 we got married in Houston. That is the short part of the story, I will see if Leigh wants to write anything else.