(Becka’s Perspective)

One night at church in the fall of 2021, my cousin Ashley told me that her friend Jonathan wanted to introduce me to his friend. Ashley and I worked together in the coffee shop at church, and I knew Jonathan because he was a pastor there at the time, but I had no idea who his friend was. Ashley didn’t give me a name or any details. All she did was point out Jonathan and his friend from across the room. I was unsure if I was interested and too shy to meet a stranger.

So we never met, and nothing came of it. (Or so I thought.) But he always stayed in the back of my mind. One day I visited another church with my mom, where I noticed a cute guy playing guitar on stage. I wondered why he looked familiar when I finally realized that he was Jonathan’s friend that I was supposed to meet but never did! I eventually worked up the courage to ask Ashley more about him, and found out that his name was Roland and he was an old friend of hers too.

Over the next two years, I always wondered what would have happened if I had met Roland that one night at church. He didn’t actually go to my church, so I hoped that one day Jonathan would bring him back around to the coffee shop, but he never did. I would still visit that other church sometimes, hoping to see him playing guitar but was always too shy to talk to him. Then I eventually stopped seeing him there, and thought I missed my chance forever.

Fast forward to the fall of 2023 - one day when I got to church, I saw Roland on stage playing guitar at my church. It turned out he had recently joined the worship team and started attending my church full time. I knew it was God bringing him back into my life to give us another opportunity to meet!

One night in December of that year, he came by the church coffee shop, where Ashley introduced us. He asked me for my number and we went on our first date one week later - a hike, of course! And the rest is history. One year later, on Christmas Day 2024, Roland asked me to marry him. And of course I said yes, because I get to marry my best friend. :)