Waiting and Loving It - Feat Tobi and Bukky Atte

Hiyaa!

FINALLY! This is happening! I am so sorry that I have procrastinated and moved the 'launch' date for so long! I was trying to sort some things out.

I am particularly grateful for all my partners in this for their patient willingness and quick response to the request.. God bless you!

So this is a new series on this blog! Like I mentioned HERE, the theme of the year for 1+TheOne blog is Building Relationships, in addition I have said HERE and HERE on this blog, the importance and beauty of waiting to get married before getting intimate/having sex with your partner and my personal decision to do it to honour God and in obedience to His word. I know I have come across a number of people who want to do it but do not quite know how it can ever be possible or what practical measures to take after you have made a decision to wait (I listed some HERE). I have also advocated HERE for more visible role-models to be vocal about what it means to keep sex in the beautiful context of holy matrimony as I have come to realise it could just encourage one person enough to want to make that decision!

So, every Tuesday, this blog will be featuring a married couple who decided to wait until marriage before having sex. They will hopefully let us in a little into their world to understand why they made the decision and what happened afterwards... For some of them, it wasn't always the case in their relationship but the significant thing is that they asked God for mercy and made a decision to honour Him in their relationship!

I hope this series blesses you.. Enjoy! xxxx

Ladies and gentlemen, our very first guest on 'Waiting and Loving It' is... *drum roll*...


Please tell us a little about yourselves

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Tobi is a Licensed Relationship, Life and Motivational coach and speaker. Bukky is a Public Health Practitioner. We are such home bodies. We love God. We enjoy the movies and good food. Tobi is the crazy one and Bukky keeps him in check (guess who wrote that.lol)

How did you meet?

We met at the National convention for The Redeemed Christian Church of God in Texas. At the Young Adults/Single breakout session, I (Tobi) had just spoken and Bukky had spoken briefly before I took the stage. After my talk, Bukky came up to me and told me that we may have a mutual friend and we did. I remember seeing her later that evening at the other side of the huge hall and giving her the “Call me!” signal. She just smiled and kept walking. I didn’t stand a chance. Anyways, a few days later, after she hadn’t called me, I sent her a message on Facebook, telling her that she could be arrested in the State of Florida (where I lived at the time) for not calling me. I think that scared her because she called me and we started talking. The funny thing is that I had seen a picture of her on a mentoring website about a year before and thought “wow this girl is sooo beautiful…but she is way out of my league” I reached out to her anyway on that mentoring site…I sent some foolish concoction of a paragraph like “wanting to see what she thought about the mentoring site and blah blah blah” She sent back like three words “It’s great. Thanks” I was turned off and never replied …..So fast forward to the convention…it had been a year, I didn’t recognize her or even remember her (remember the exchange was very short with the “girl’ on the mentoring site).

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After we started talking for about 2 months or so, I was in one of my usual Bukky’s Facebook page stalking sessions where I drooled over her pictures (don’t judge me. She married me right?) and saw a picture and stopped. I felt I had seen that picture somewhere before and couldn’t figure out where. So we started investigating and she started thinking of where she had used that picture. Yea...you guessed it. She was the girl on the mentoring site. The girl that was out of my league was now madly in love with me (Just stop and imagine the fist pump I was doing) Crazy…but that’s how God works because between the short interaction on that website and when we actually met, God had individually taken us both on a journey of individual growth. I had learnt so much...I was a different man and she was a different woman. God=Awesome

What initially attracted you to your spouse?

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Tobi: You know…I don’t know…her lips, the way she talked...her eyes…her hair. OMG it was this funky natural hair. Yes. What she said…she had depth. She spoke with me for 5 minutes and I thought “She is going to affect the world”. Also, I had missed a word during my talk (my talk had fill-in-the -blanks) and she was the only one who came to meet me afterwards right away to ask what that word was. She was paying attention to what I said. More importantly though, she met (and surpassed) all the things on the list that I believe God gave me.

Bukky: When I first met Tobi, I met him as a friend and someone that anyone would want to have in their life. A truly nice guy. We lived in different states at the time so majority of our conversation was via phone and Skype. Through our conversations, the initial thing that attracted me to Tobi was the type of connection we had. Here I was, chatting away on the phone with someone I barely knew and I was very open with him telling him things I’d never told anyone before, and he had that ability to just listen and give sound advice. Most people would consider me shy or soft spoken but around him I was totally myself.

How did you know that you wanted to spend the rest of your life with him / her?

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Tobi: I really spent some time seeking the face of God asking him to make my “list” for me and when I met her, she was a match for that list. It was surreal. I asked her out officially to enter a relationship before we actually went on our first date. I knew I was going to be spending the rest of my life with her.

Bukky: I knew I wanted to spend the rest of my life because the way I met Tobi was nothing either one of us could have planned. I saw God in it and that gave me the assurance. As Tobi and I began to know each other better, there was an overwhelming peace that I felt in my spirit and that’s besides the fact that he’s everything I’ve ever wanted in a man and a lot more :-)

What made you make the decision to wait?

Tobi: I knew that I had a calling to help people figure out many aspects of life…especially the area of Godly relationships. So it wasn’t about “doing it for her” or doing it because “it was morally/socially right” no. I NEEDED to do it because I needed to be able to have lived what I will be helping people live. That said, it was probably the hardest thing I have ever done but God saw us through and I am even more equipped to help others.

Bukky: I’ve always known that I was going to wait until marriage. It was a decision I made early in my walk with God. So meeting Tobi didn’t change my resolve. I did not want to disappoint God.

What practical measures did you take to ensure that you stuck by your decision?

Before we went on our first date, we sat down together and talked and created a modus operandi /manual document that covered different areas of our lives and how we will carry them out. It included areas like: How did we get here? Why are we in a relationship? What is our marriage mission statement? What does it mean to be helpmate? What does it mean to be a leader? Sex, how we handle conflict and so on. Then we went on our first date.

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What one advice would you give to your single self in preparation for marriage now that you’ve crossed that line

· God made you. He knows you best. Ask him for what you need in a spouse.

· Don’t look at sexual purity before marriage as something you are doing for the other person’s sake…or as a gift you are giving the other person. Look at it as something you are doing for yourself. (Just ask Samson and then ask Joseph) So much easier said than done…I know but it’s important. That’s why as men, you want to date a woman that you see yourself marrying and you want to marry her sooner than later.

· Have a marriage mission statement. Why do you want to get married? What is that marriage supposed to accomplish in life and in the kingdom of God?

Describe in 3 words / sentences the best part of being married!

a) God teaches us a lot about himself through our marriage. The lessons aren’t always easy but it’s great to know that via marriage, you are in God’s elite school. It’s like selecting a few people in the army and putting them through rigorous training so they can join the Special Forces.

b) Having someone that is “ALL IN ONE” with you every day (your bestie, fashion consultant, fellow soldier, personal assistant, boss, sibling, lover, adviser, partner in crime, cuddle buddy, hobby buddy and so on…all in one person)

c) Someone that can really challenge you without belittling you. Someone who can really call you out in love on issues that matter and help you grow.

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I hope you loved reading as much as I did!

PS - Did you know that Tobi also runs a fantastic blog here at www.ijustmetme.com ... So many treasures there on relationships et al.. Thank me later :-) xx