The Courtship

How does a single man end up courting? As a single person without anyone, finding that someone special seems daunting to say the least. If you talk to a couple about how they came together, every thing makes sense and it seems it was easy for them. Indeed, looking back on it now, it does seem like things fell into place almost naturally, but this is most defiantly not the case.

Whole books have been written on this subject and I don’t pretend to be an expert of any sort. I can however, tell my story. Every story is different because every story is specificity tailored by God for that individual. The miracle that occurs when you find someone that so perfectly complements you is never repeated twice in the same way. The fact that two people from completely different families and backgrounds could end up sharing their life together is indeed a testament of God at work every time it happens.

I think first something needs to be said about marriage. There are two very different views that most young men have of marriage. The one kind of guy is the steady, settled kind who wants nothing more out of life than to be comfortably content. He will openly admit that he wants a wife and will pursue girls in order to fulfill this goal. His verse is Proverbs 18:22, “He who finds a wife finds what is good and receives favor from the Lord.” This kind of guy can fall into the trap of trying to earn happiness and God’s favor by getting a wife.

The other kind of guy is the radicals I once was, who want to pursue God with his whole heart, mind, and body and therefore holds onto 1 Corinthians 7: “It is good for a man not to marry” and only if “they cannot control themselves, they should marry”. His view of marriage is that it is for weak men who cannot control their own desire and so this kind of guy will not pursue marriage, nor even admit he wants to be married. While on the surface, an undivided devotion to God seems admirable, at the root lies arrogance and an sinful ambition for his own greatness.

Somewhere in between these two extremes is what Kevin DeYoung calls “the plodding visionary”. That rare kind of person who is perfectly content with whatever meager life God has given him, yet stands ready and willing to dare great things or sacrifice everything for God’s glory.

I have this theory about guys. I think that either consciously or unconsciously, one of the ways men size each other up when they first meet, is to decide if he could beat the other guy in a brawl or whether the other guy would beat him. On that other hand, one of the ways a man sizes up a woman that he meets is to decide whether he could marry her or not. To prove my point, think about the way guys describe a girl – “she’s a cutie” verses describing a guy – “He’s strong-as-an-ox”.

So, every guy is always “checking out the girls”, whether he is willing to admit it or not. When I first meet Abigail Hinds, she fell into the long line of “no never” or “maybe someday”. There was no instant attraction or sparks. In fact, the only faded memory I can now recall is how much better a dancer she was than I.

The only point I can reach back to for a beginning, was at a friend’s wedding that both Abby and I attended. I did not speak to her at all during the wedding or reception and barely saw her the entire day. As everyone was leaving, I stopped to talk with the father of the bride. He mentioned that I needed to find me a wife and ask what I thought of the girl in the green dress. I told him I had not seen a girl in a green dress, but my curiosity was aroused. It was only later I remembered Abby was wearing a pale green dress. This was prehaphs the beginning of Abby moving into the “Why not?” category.

Throughout the summer I refused to admit to myself that Abby was growing on me. During the late summer, my sister and I took a vacation to Montana to visit old friends and I liked it out there so much, I decided to come back after New Years and work on their ranch for a while. Abby was still on my mind, but more as a “yeah, that would probably never happen” kind of thought and I refused to let it influence my decision to go back to Montana.

That fall, there was yet another wedding that Abby and I were both participating in. The “why not?” question was so burning in my mind by now that I decided to act on it. I watched her throughout the rehearsal dinner, wedding, and reception, but I could not think of anything proper to say to her. I did ask if she had been dancing lately while we were sitting at the same table during the dinner, but that was all. After the wedding, Abby stopped for a minute as she was leaving and ask me about a prank I had played on the groom. On the drive home after that, I realized that I had a growing interest in her any needed to do something about it.

I deliberated over it for another three weeks before deciding to act. During this time I went through Abby’s entire Facebook account and blog trying to learn as much as I could about her. I found her father on Facebook, and not knowing any other way of getting hold of him without raising undue suspicion, I sent him a friend request. Seeing as I had never met the man and he did not know I existed, he promptly deleted my friend request. I tried the same tactic with her brother and received the same results. I had wanted to be very formal in my request to “get to know” Abby, but seeing no other way for it, I send her father a Facebook message basically saying: “I don’t know you and you don’t know me, but I want to get to know your daughter”.

Thankfully, Mr. Hinds is a very generous man and actually agreed to meet with me. Wanting my family to remain unaware that anything was afoot, I took the truck and left the house early one morning to “go hunting”. Instead, I drove all the way to Raleigh to meet Mr. Hinds for breakfast. Of course I got there long before the scheduled time and sat on a bench in front of the restaurant until Mr. Hinds came. I introduced myself and shook his hand and we when in and ordered our food. We had a wonderful conversation. A summary what I had to say would be something to this affect: “Hi, I’m John Paul Taylor. I don’t have a job. I don’t have any money. I am living with my parents right now and I am leaving for Montana in a few months. Can I court your daughter?” Much to my surprise, he agreed that I could “get to know” Abby as long as I didn’t tip my hand that I had any special interest in her. I did not mention that up to this point I had seen Abby less than half a dozen times in my entire lifetime and knew almost nothing about her.

The following Saturday was a contra dance that Abby and her family attended. I repeatedly tried to get a dance with her without seeming overly interested in her, and was repeatedly cut off. Mr. Hinds, perhaps thinking I was not trying hard enough, came over and shook my hand as he passed a note that read “You can dance with her and even talk to her”. I finally did catch her for a dance and was a happy man.

C. J. Mahaney was speaking at Abby’s church on Sunday which gave me a convenient excuse to go. The following Monday I meet with Mr. and Mrs. Hinds at a restaurant to talk more. I left that evening convinced that it would not work out between me and Abby. There were too many obstacles and I was not at all prepared to be considering marriage. I was very discouraged and suddenly realized how much I had wanted to get married.

One thing that must be said here is you should never take for granted the power of a mother’s prayer. Unknown to me, Abby’s mother had been praying for Abby to find a husband and my mother was praying just as hard that I would find a wife. In spite of my best laid plans, God grabbed me by the scuff of the neck and turned my head in Abby’s direction and would soon do the same for Abby. While I could try to explain the small things about Abby that stood out and attracted my attention, taken as a whole, they cannot account for what was going on in my heart. God had put a desire there and made it unshakable.

The other thing that brought me too a courtship was Abby’s parents. I think most father’s would see it as their job to evaluate a potential suitor and determine if he meets a certain criteria in order to marry their daughter or not. Mr. Hinds on the other hand, saw his job as being to take me as I was and to whip me into shape and make me ready to marry, his daughter or anyone else’s. Mrs. Hinds took an active roles in not only creating opportunities for me to spend time around Abby, but providing helpful hints and suggestion along the way.

On November 22, 2009, Abby parent told her that I wanted to court her and she joyfully agreed.