God’s Gift Of Love For Two Of His Children
Delight yourself in the Lord and He will give you the desires and petitions of your heart.
Psalms 37:4 (Amplified)
Imagine time, place, and circumstance as two individuals petition God for their mates. For 15 and 20 years, respectively, Marion and I patiently waited for God to bless us with a gift of love. Marion prayed for a godly man with whom she would spend the rest of her life.
One thousand three hundred miles away, I was asking God to bless me with the beautiful woman He
prepared for me. I continued to pray for about 11 years and after numerous failed relationships, I decided
to just thank God for the gift that he had for me and wait for Him to send her. I was living in San Antonio at that time, and Marion was living in Fontana, California.
I moved to Riverside, California in 2015 after being chided by my son, and overwhelmingly drawn to my
grandchildren Shai, Sonali, and Alexander. I had no idea of what God had in store for me.
During this time, my sister, Tena, convinced me to go Christian Mingle to meet someone. At the same
time Marion’s brother, Alvin, convinced Marion to go on Christian Mingle to meet someone. Just as I
was about to cancel my subscription, a stranger prayed with me for my mate. Days later, I opened up the
website and there was Marion’s picture with her nephew Tony. At the same time Marion opened up her
website and saw my picture with my daughter, Kristian.
Marion and I corresponded with each other on the website for a month. She finally gave me her phone
number and told me I had earned the privilege of getting it. We talked for hours at a time. Me and
Marion finally went on our first date at Panda Inn in Ontario, California. When I first saw her, I was
amazed at how beautiful she was, her pretty brown eyes and her glowing smile. When I walked up to her
I measured her height and she was the right size and she laughed and said wait until I put on my heels. I
said to myself don’t be stupid and mess this up. I knew she was the one for me. When we were getting
ready to leave I told Marion let’s take a picture of our first date to look at years later. She looked at me
and smiled and said, “aren’t you a little over confident.” I smiled and said, “no, you’re God’s gift to me and
I am God’s gift to you.” She smiled and said, “we’ll see.” The unfathomable romance began.
At our wedding reception party I sang, “ Always and Forever,” to Marion and told her that the song
expressed the true feelings of my heart. I told her I would always be with her, forever, no matter what. I
am so thankful to God that He allowed me to keep my promise.
The Monday before Marion died she looked at me and said, “I’m going to take a nap and then I’m going
to sleep.” She looked at me and said, “pay attention,” and with emphasis she repeated very slowing,
“I’m going to take a nap and then I’m going to sleep.”
Marion was in a state of REM sleep until she died. On the night of August 9TH, an hour and a half before she died, I prayed over her and asked God to let His will be done and to give me and the family His strength and peace to take us through whatever decision He made. I pulled up a website for worship
music that included the lyrics. At that moment I was singing gospel lullabies from my heart not realizing
that God used me as an instrument to help usher her into his presence. Fifteen minutes before she died,
Marion opened her eyes and we glared into each other’s eyes very intently the way that two lovers do
when you feel the weight of all your emotions and passion and everything that goes with it. Before she
died Marion looked at the left hand corner of the ceiling and gazed there for a moment then looked back
at me and then looked into the ceiling one more time and closed her eyes. She stopped breathing and I
thought I lost her. She took another breath, and I was relieved for just a second. She stopped breathing
all together. At that moment, my baby was gone into the presence of our Lord and Savior. Despite my
grief and sorrow I felt like it was a privilege for me to experience the transition of her leaving this world
and being welcomed into the loving arms of our Lord and Savior. I thank God that he allowed me to keep
my promise that I would be there to the end always and forever.
Marion and I only had two and one half years together. Our relationship was so close that we spent
every free moment together except when she went to Ross with her sister Shirley. We had the
opportunity to honeymoon in Cancun, cruise to Mexico and take several small trips to San Diego,
Arrowhead, San Francisco, Atlanta, Las Vegas and places in between.
Only God knew how short her lifespan would be and He prepared me to be a blessing to her. As
everyone knows, Marion had prayed for all the things that He allowed us to do. Because she was such a
lover of giving to others He wanted to be sure that someone would be a giver of love to her until the end.
I thank God that He truly gave us an opportunity to experience a real love story that lasted to the end of
this life. I now have the comfort of knowing that we will be reunited and experience God’s love and joy for all eternity.
Thank you Lord for the gift of love that you gave to your two children.
Timothy Raymo
9/13/2024
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