The Ring

   When Tommy asked me to marry him, he was working part time delivering pizza and going to school full time.  Not a combination to provide one with lots of money!  He really wanted to be able to give me an engagement ring and went to a jewlers to put one on layaway.

    He decided after a few days that putting the ring on layaway was not the thing he was supposed to do.  He couldn't really afford to even do it that way.  He talked to his mom about it.  He told her that he was going to ask me to marry him, and he really wanted to be able to give me a ring, but he just didn't have the money to do it.  His mother thought I should have a ring too, and said she would pray for him that somehow he would be able to get one.  His mother talked to his aunt and she had a solution. "He can give her mine" she says.

    It seems that 20 odd years ago when her husband proposed to her he went through the same delima.  He wanted to give her a ring and couldn't afford to.  He put one on layaway, but couldn't afford that either.  Her mother, whom I've never met, decided her daughter *had* to have a ring and arranged to get one somehow.  We aren't quite sure how that worked, she is no longer alive to tell and my husband's uncle still won't!  However it happened, Tommy's aunt got an engagement ring when her husband proposed.

       So, if I have my facts right, all this talking took place Friday and Saturday of the week.  My mother-in-law took the ring to have it cleaned and got a box to put it in, and shipped it next day air.  My husband was a bit nervous because he had the day planned to ask me, it was a Tuesday.  His mother told him she had shipped it and where he needed to pick it up.  She also suggested he get a nice box of some sort to put it in.

    He had classes that day and went to the post office to pick it up after class on his way to pick me up.  The post office happened to be in a mall downtown and on his way to the post office he passed a "Things Remembered" store.  (They sell personalized gifts.)  So before he left the mall that afternoon he had a ring that God had literally given to him and a beautiful silver heart shaped jewlery box with our initials engraved on the top:

"T -n- K Forever"

    So you see, God does care about provoding your wants as well as your needs.  We have a beautiful ring that is our sign from God that He will always provide us with everything we need, plus a little more!
 
 

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