Somewhere between my third and fourth year on campus, I started getting restless.

Whom would I marry? I had a lengthy mental list of attributes I desired from my potential husband.

Some of those were straight out non-negotiable. Firmly etched in stone.

He, for instance, needed to be a born-again Christian like me.

He also needed to be kind, responsible, visionary, and generally a decent human being.

Decent enough not to drive off and leave me stranded in a mall after a random tiff.

I wasn’t expecting perfection, far from it. I was well aware that life partners came with jagged edges.

I was willing to cede ground where necessary.

Consequently, my best friend and I would huddle up regularly and pray regarding our future spouses.

We understood the sanctity of marriage and didn’t want to gamble with such a life-sized decision.

The more prayers we said, the more my mind conjured up images of the kind of spouse God would lead my way.

On campus, none of the gentlemen who tried to woo me seemed to fit the bill.

Tick-tock. Tick-tock. Tick-tock. Time was elapsing.

Three years after graduating, I was still single. By then, I had settled into a decent job and had all my ducks in a neat row.

I was raring to “settle down”.

Unsurprisingly, my potential suitors had dwindled to a trickle. But still, I shooed away the handful that expressed interest.

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If I am brutally honest, I often entertained the thought that God would drop my knight in shining armour straight from heaven.

I was certain that if God willed, He could dispatch me a brand new suitor from the pearly gates and miraculously plant him in a random family.

Divinely, stealthily, and seamlessly like only He can.

In my script, God would need to hypnotise the ‘chosen’ family members, making them believe the said gentleman was always part of their family.

You know, tinker with their mental faculties a little, just a tad.

God would also need to hook him up with friends, former schoolmates, government records, etc.

I was certain that my God could do that (and much more) at the flick of a switch.

So when a former campus mate crawled out of oblivion and started wooing me, I was floored.

He couldn’t be the chosen one because he was not coming through any of the routes I had conjured up.

The gentleman persisted long enough for my heart to start thawing.

A year on, before my heart knew it, we were exchanging wedding vows, my eyes glistening with tears of joy.

And although my husband didn’t slither down from heaven, I have heard him on multiple occasions declare that heaven is his eternal home.

A win is a win, right?

But I digress.

Dizzying Suprise

To date, I still marvel at how God pulled a dizzying surprise on me.

I was fixated on meeting my spouse in any other place but my school.

The odds shrank further when I graduated and sloughed through three years away from my campus mates.

I assumed I would meet someone brand new in my church, workplace, the mall, bookstore, hospital, park, or through a friend.

I had slammed the door on my campus mates and sold the entire house.

Ruminating on my marriage story jerks me to the truth that God’s ways are starkly different from mine, oftentimes polar opposite.

Joseph and the Chief User

He didn’t mean to sound needy or wimpy, but he couldn’t help himself.

After all, he had nothing to lose, having sunk lower than a snake’s belly.

He had been incarcerated for a crime he did not commit, a scandalous one at that.

Nonetheless, God’s favor still encircled him, trailing him from Potiphar’s house to prison.

What’s more? God had divinely enabled him to decipher the meaning of Pharaoh’s chief butler’s dream.

The lucky dude would be set free in three days, while his counterpart, the chief baker, would face the gallows.

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Having played a key role in the butler’s release, Joseph was now also teetering at freedom.

His excitement grew as he considered the possibility; he wouldn’t waste this chance.

He stashed his pride aside and launched his request.

He explained to the butler that he was merely a victim of circumstances, whipsawed between sibling jealousy and a scandalous accusation.

If the butler was a decent guy, he owed Joseph a mighty favor.

“But remember me when it is well with you, and please show kindness to me, make mention of me to Pharaoh, and get me out of this house. For indeed I was stolen away from the land of the Hebrews, and also I have done nothing here that they should put me into the dungeon.” (Genesis 40:14-15)

Joseph could bet his last prison cup that God was going to use the chief butler to set him free.

After all, who dared to forget the man who had unriddled their dream with surgical precision?

Unfortunately for Joseph, as soon as the butler set foot in the palace, he suffered divine amnesia.

“Yet the chief butler did not remember Joseph, but forgot him.” (Gen 40: 23)

Ouch.

Whenever the prison door cracked open, Joseph would stir, expecting his name to be called out.

He waited with bated breath. He tossed and turned in his sleep, his anxiety tight like a thread ready to snap.

Days peeled into weeks, months, and before he knew it, two years had elapsed.

Dejected, he concluded that the chief butler was also a chief user.

He was to later learn that God had an entirely different way for him to get out of prison.

Because God’s ways are higher and grander than ours

“For My thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your ways my ways, says the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts.” (Isaiah 55:8-9)

A Slap on the Wrist

I occasionally have to remind my daughters that I am not their agemate, when I see them attempt to cross a precarious boundary.

Because where does a seven-year-old you bore the other day get the gumption to talk back at you?

Likewise, equating our thoughts and ways to God’s is bound to earn us a slap on the wrist.

He is God; we are not. His ways are higher and grander.

Joseph would later hurtle out of prison more spectacularly and divinely.

Turned out that interpreting the chief butler’s dream was just a rehearsal, the preamble.

Pharaoh’s mammoth, global dream awaited.

After untangling it, he not only earned his freedom but also rose in rank at breakneck speed.

He wound up as ruler over all Egypt, second only to Pharaoh.

That was nothing short of a miracle- winding up as Egypt’s Prime Minister at 30 years, in the prime of his youth, still having plenty of sand on top of his hourglass.

What a spinning turn of events!

Lean in and Learn His ways

Left to our own devices, we are clueless.

We are bound to falter, stumble, and trip over ourselves.

God, however, does not shut us out. He invites us to lean in and learn his ways.

✍️He drew Enoch in, the man who walked faithfully and intimately with Him till he was no more.

Here’s a joke I dug up about the lucky dude.

“Enoch walked with God… and walked… and walked… until one day God looked over and said, ‘Enoch, we’re closer to my place than yours-just come on in.’ And that’s how Enoch was no more!”

✍️God drew Moses in, allowing him classified access to His ways.

“He made known His ways to Moses, His acts to the children of Israel.” (Psalm 103:7)

✍️At a time when the world was brimming over with wickedness, Noah stood out like a neon sign on an inky night.

He was blameless and walked with God. In return, God laid bare His plans to destroy the earth to Him.

✍️En route to destroy Sodom and Gomorrah, God couldn’t bear catching Abraham off guard.

He passed by his house and let him in on the impending tragedy.

Because that’s what friends do, they update each other on their to-do lists.

“The Lord said, “Shall I keep secret from Abraham [My friend and servant] what I am going to do?” (Gen 18:17)

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Although God’s ways are different from ours, He invites us to walk intimately with him and learn his ways.

He wants us to lounge and linger with him in the secret place.

In there, He can’t help but indulge us, whispering His ways to us.

As his ways unfurl, catching others off guard, we will be bowing in worship and awe.

“The secret of the Lord is with those who fear Him, and He will show them His covenant.” Psalm 25:14

Reflection

• Are you contending with pain and disorientation in certain areas of your life?
• Places where you expected God to work in a certain predetermined way?
• Have you given up hope like Joseph, watching people discard promises they made to you?
• Chin up and rev up your faith. Be reminded that God’s ways are not only different from yours but higher and grander.
• Better still, lean in and let Him show you His ways. He waits to become your friend.