Christy and Jacob’s story began when they first met at their college church, Relentless in 2018. At the time they were just acquaintances. After Christy graduated from Grand Canyon University in 2020 she worked at a summer camp called Sky Ranch in Westcliffe, CO for 3 years. Jacob lived in Phoenix, AZ pursuing his Master of Divinity at GCU’s seminary. Jacob graduated in May 2023 and Christy finished her housekeeping manager position in August 2023. After Christy moved back to Phoenix a mutual friend (you know who you are!) invited Christy and Jacob to her birthday in October 2023 where they reconnected. Jacob invited Christy into his community and Christy started coming to weekly Bible studies. It was within this context that Christy and Jacob began to discover the kind of people they became since the last time they had seen each other. Soon, a friendship between them developed and, not soon after, they started to take interest in each other. When they both went on a New Years trip, Christy and Jacob really started to take notice of each other. Jacob experienced Christy’s intentionality, fun personality, and her gentleness. Christy experienced Jacob’s leadership, his deep love for others, and his dashing good looks. This trip became a planted seed in Christy’s and Jacob’s minds that was watered over time and eventually became a desire to explore a relationship. Around October of 2024 that same mutual friend from earlier in the story (she keeps popping up in this story, doesn’t she?) invited them to a Halloween party. At the Halloween party Christy and Jacob ended up playing a party game with each other (cup pong) for about an hour or two. Jacob had such a fun time with Christy that he concluded it was finally time to ask Christy on a date. On Wednesday November 6th 2024, Jacob asked Christy if she would like to go on a date and she said, yes! After about three dates Jacob ended the dating relationship. For a reason Christy couldn’t yet articulate she had trouble developing romantic feelings for Jacob. Although Christy was open to continue going on more dates, Jacob decided it would be best to stop dating. The end. Okay, imagine if that really was the end. That would be a lame love story. However, it makes a good story when there is a low point and you are on the edge of your seat wondering how things are going to turn around! Well, things did turn around! Christy and Jacob remained friends after their dating relationship ended. The same mutual friend from earlier (there she is again!) was getting married in Oxnard, California in February 2025 and Christy and Jacob thought it would be a good idea to carpool, pick up a wedding guest that was in Yuma, Arizona, and split the cost of an Airbnb. The car ride to the wedding was fun, the wedding was even more fun, but the drive back home from the wedding is where things changed forever. After dropping off their friend in Yuma, Christy and Jacob had a couple hours left to drive back home to Phoenix. During this car ride they began talking about deep and personal subjects about their lives. One of those subjects had to do with the very thing that kept Christy from developing romantic feelings for Jacob. After hearing Jacob’s deep care and concern for Christy a switch was flipped in her mind as she came to this realization: Jacob really cares about me. Christy had not felt truly safe around Jacob because she believed that Jacob didn’t care about important parts of her story. It was during that car ride home from the wedding that she finally felt that needed sense of care and safety from Jacob that she had not experienced previously. It took Christy about a month to conclude that it was worth asking Jacob if he was willing to try dating again. Jacob said yes and so they went on their second first date on March 22, 2025. On April 15th Jacob asked Christy to be his girlfriend and, after a very lovely season of dating, Jacob proposed to Christy on Valentine’s Day of 2026.