Rejoicing in Baby Steps!

Yay! I am so excited! A little bit of background info if you didn't already know: this summer God really burdened my heart for one of my coworkers from Zaxby's. At the end of the summer she commented she would like to keep in touch. So, I was truly thankful that God burdened my heart for this girl, I prayed earnestly for her, I desired so much for her to know the love of the Lord, a love unlike nothing she had ever experienced before and will never experience unless it's from Him. However, because I was so burdened for her, I thought about her a lot, talked with her a lot, prayed for her a lot, i.e. she quickly became an idol in my life, it was definitely affecting my relationship with the Lord. This was really hard to hear from a friend this summer, but as much as it was hard to hear I am so thankful for her hard questions this summer and truly valuing my relationship with God above anything else! So because she had quickly become an idol, I really had to lead out in the relationship for both of our sakes, for me so I might not make an idol of her, and her so she might not seek the love she desires from Christ in me. However, it got to the point where I felt like she was never being intentional with me. It was very one sided: if I texted her, she would text me; she would not text me if I did not text her. I didn't want our relationship to feel dominated by me, to feel controlled by me. I needed to have some sort of control but I wanted her to feel the freedom to be intentional with casual things so that she would also feel the freedom in more personal and intimate things. So on Sept. 6 I prayed wondering if God still wanted to use me in her life, which was so hard to think about! We were not talking as regularly, I was not at the beach anymore living life on life with her, so what did this mean? I prayed God would provide opportunities to talk with her after fallen through opportunities, I prayed that these would be initiated by her. So a month went by after this prayer, not talking to her at all, I had decided and was starting to be content with the idea that God was no longer going to use me with her, I had planted the seeds and it was someone else's call to sow them, water them, fertilize them. UNTIL last week she texts me and apologizes for not responding to my attempts to talk with her, I text her back and never hear from her. Well, I guess she's still out of the picture. UNTIL this week I am at home on fall break and she texts me randomly, we talked that night and then the next night a little bit when she texted me again. So, I am rejoicing in baby steps! Because this were totally conversations, initiated by her, from the Lord, opportunities to talk to her! Ideally I would like to reach the point where she initiates phone dates, a more personal and intimate way of communicating that I def feel like would be beneficial for our relationship and it would be an opportunity to talk about more serious things, but I am rejoicing in baby steps and trusting in the Lord's timing for a phone date!! Praise Him!