THEY DON'T NEED SANTA CLAUS 4

As they settled down in Michael's sitting room that night, Michael looked around the room at his friends and heard the words they were not saying aloud. "If only they had more time to reach out to more people. If only night didn't come so early....This was what they would do till their last drop of Strength: sharing the salvation message, preaching to the lost, restoring the broken, the backslidden...

"At least we exhausted all the gifts we went with and everyday is another opportunity," Grace subtly whispered into his ears as she passed plates of food around. 

He smiled at her but a lump formed in his throat that wiped his smile away. His pocket suddenly felt heavy. There was something he needed to do tonight that would be some sort of icing to his cake. He asked God for the umpteenth time that day for boldness to propose to the beautiful lady serving food around whose passion for God was always a big motivation to him. 

Minutes later, Grace and Shade were relaxing on the front porch, reminiscing the events of the day. Michael thought it was the perfect moment to pop the question. He walked out to meet them...

"Can you two just quit playing this pretend game. I mean, if you know that he's..." Shade was saying.

Michael's brow creased and he stopped dead in his tracks. Were they talking about him?

"Shade!" Grace exclaimed "We're at his house for goodness sake. Don't talk about that here."

"If that young man doesn't propose tonight, I'm going to pray that God gives you both some common sense." Shade replied and shrugged. 

Michael couldn't help but laugh out loud. Their heads snapped back in surprise on hearing his voice. 

"Way to go, Shade." Grace grumbled through gritted teeth. "Thank you so much."

Shade giggled. "I'm just going to wait for you in the car." She said and walked away, leaving Grace alone with Michael.

Michael cleared his throat and came to sit beside her. Grace wanted to jump out of her skin. Was he really going to do this? And now? 

"Why not?" Michael answered. She had always found it unnerving that he could tell what she was thinking just by looking into her eyes and now... well, the floor under her feet might as well have been air because she wasn't feeling her legs anymore.

"Shade has made this very easy for me actually, so..." He paused, watching her remain so calm as if she was expecting this already, but seeing in her eyes that she couldn't believe it was actually happening. He knew because he felt the exact same way.

"Olamipo Grace Oluwaseun, will you marry me?"

On hearing the question, Grace's mind reeled back to three years ago, when she was in her room, praying and crying that God would lead her aright and help her not to miss it this time. She had suffered a heartbreak from a so called brother in her church and it had pushed her further into her shell. A shell that made it very hard to trust people. If it wasn't for God, she didn't know if she would have survived that heartbreak. So she had prayed and prayed, trusting God for the right person, but in no hurry whatsoever. And there came Bro Michael, one year after that prayer and puzzles started to click, lines began to fall in place, dreams and revelations became clearer and...well, here they were.

"What did you say?" She asked again, deliberately, teasing him.

Michael smiled at her, knowing exactly what she was doing. "I said, Olamipo Grace Oluwaseun, will you marry me?"

Grace burst into laughter. "Ohh ohh," she grumbled playfully, still teasing. "See what Shade has caused now. You were not supposed to look this confident. I wanted to watch you suffer more than this."

He chuckled, but Grace could see he was waiting for her answer, wanting to know if she was going to say yes immediately or tell him she was going to pray about it. Somehow he knew that she had known for a while now, that she was aware of what God was doing in both of them long before now. 

He watched her closely as a fresh smile broke out on her lips and a sparkle entered into her eyes.

"All my life I waited for you to show

I'm amazed at how well we flow.

The seeds of love in each other, we will continue to sow.

And since the ways of God you know, 

Mr. Michael Aderigbigbe, how can I say no?"

That's the end of the story guys! Thanks for following through to the end. So many lessons to learn from this story...Tell us the one you'll never forget in the comments 👇