During my mid-late teens I kept a journal of notes that for the man that I would one day marry.
A tidbit from one of the entries says, ". . . by God's grace,
He shall write our story in His time. An oh! How grateful I am for that knowledge!"
He has indeed *written* our story, or at least the beginning of it :-)
Jonathan & Monique Einwechter
August 8th, 2009
Jonathan and Monique met for the first time on November 23, 2008 when the Hoffman family stopped in Pennsylvania to visit Jonathan’s brother in law, Nelson Phero and his family while making a trip to see their own extended family on both sides. However, because of the distance between Kansas and Pennsylvania they were not able to truly get to know each other until the middle of December when the Hoffmans returned to PA in order to drop Monique off at the Phero’s so that she could stay with their family to help as needed during the month of January while Nelson received medical treatments.
At first, the relationship was a very casual friendship. They spent a lot of time together as the Pheros and Einwechters were at each other houses for birthday celebrations, a tree clean up party, at church, when Monique visited with Jonathan’s sisters and had family Bible time with the Einwechters. It was a very good time getting to know each other, which really strengthened their friendship – seeing each four or five days a week in many different circumstances.
During this time, Monique began to notice in Jonathan many of the qualities that she had prayed for in a husband, such as friendliness, a genuine love for his family, humility, a desire to study and live out scripture, diligence, leadership, and a passion to honor Christ in his life. An attraction to him as more than a friend began to grow in her heart. However, having been taught by her parents the importance of guarding her heart and not allowing herself to form “crushes”, Monique began to pray that God would remove these feelings and desires and that he would guard her heart for the man that she was to marry, because, whoever it was, surely it wasn’t Jonathan; he was a friend and nothing more. Instead of these thoughts going, though, they intensified, and Monique began calling home almost daily to share with her parents her thoughts and struggles in regards to Jonathan, asking for prayer, counsel and accountability as to how she should deal with her emotions as she sought to remain in a neutral, brother-sister relationship with Jon.
For Jonathan, Monique was someone he enjoyed spending time with as a sister in Christ, she was becoming a good friend, but he had no intentions of going any further.
With the hopes of giving Monique a fun memory of her time in Pennsylvania, Jonathan and his sister Abigail invited her to join them in milking cows for a local farmer Saturday, January 10th. After an enjoyable milking, Jonathan pulled Monique aside to explain to her the difference between several different types of milking systems - milking parlors, stanchion barns, and tie-stall barns. As she stood there listening, Monique really began to appreciate the way Jon taught, humbly and thoroughly and the thought suddenly hit her, “This is the kind of man that I could follow!” And that evening, while getting ready for bed, Monique finally acknowledged to herself that she had moved beyond a neutral brother-sister relationship in her heart. A little before this time, Jonathan, though not really interested in Monique yet beyond friend, began to consider perhaps God had set an opportunity before him to get know a nice girl and decided to take advantage of the opportunity and be open to God’s leading, whatever that may be. The more he got to know her, the more he became attracted to her, however he still wasn’t sure what he thought. Everything clicked for him, though, on Sunday, January 18th, ten days before Monique left for home. After church Monique and some friends were having fun taking pictures outside in the snow. As they were reentering the church building Jonathan and Monique caught each other’s eye, and the look on Monique’s face made Jonathan think, “She is a sweet girl!” The next ten days were spent very intentionally getting to know each other - doing things together almost every day. During visits they spent time talking about their childhoods, exchanging salvation testimonials, sharing some lessons God had taught them and the trials He’d brought them through, learning of each others likes and dislikes, hobbies, and vision for life. Jonathan found himself attracted to Monique’s heart for the Lord and desire to make scripture the ultimate standard for all of life, her joy in and desire to be a wife, mother and homemaker, and their similar vision for life. It was a good time for them to truly see each other’s hearts. During this time Jonathan sought counsel from his sisters, brothers, parents, and an elder in their church to see if Monique was consistently the person she seemed to be, seeking to know if he ready to start a relationship with her.
By the time Monique returned to Kansas, Jonathan knew that he was interested in pursuing a relationship with her, but he want to leave a little time before starting one just to make sure his interest was genuine and not a crush that would come and go. His parents desired this also and encouraged him not to rush into this but take time to pray and seek God’s direction. During the time of waiting, Jonathan and Monique kept in touch through Facebook chat and e-mail.
On March 4th Jonathan sent an e-mail to Monique’s father, asking him for permission to officially begin a relationship with her, the ultimate purpose being to identify if it was God’s will for them to marry. He granted Jonathan permission and on Saturday, March 7th Jonathan and Monique spoke on the phone for the first time since her return to Kansas. Throughout March and into April Jon and Monique spent time learning more about each other, developing a relationship, discussing convictions, studying the scriptures together and praying together. In April Jonathan, Karen and Abigail came out to Kansas to visit the Hoffmans. Monique and her family were greatly impressed by Jon’s efforts to really get to know her family, spending time with her parents, brothers, and sister, seeking to build a relationship with them as well. The visit, turned out to be a pivotal one. Jonathan and Monique were able to spend a lot of time deepening their relationship walking, talking, praying, and reading the Scriptures together. By the end of the visit time Jonathan was confident that they had been intended for each other. He returned home and gave his parents a full report and told them he believed Monique was the woman God had for him. Mr. and Mrs. Einwechter were pleased with what they heard, and Mr. Einwechter advised him, when making a major decision to spend a few days praying, thinking over it, and writing down reasons for coming to your decision. Jonathan did so and in the end was all the more convinced.
May 16th, Monique came out to Pennsylvania for a visit. After Jonathan, Abigail and Phillip picked her up from the airport; they went to the Einwechter’s house, picked up a picnic lunch, several more siblings and drove to a hiking trail. To this day, Monique is convinced that hike was the fastest she ever went on. Jon was excited and eager to get to the top, though Monique wasn’t quite sure why. Toward to end of the hike the Einwechters sat down to eat their lunch and Jonathan lead Monique a little further on, the a small clearing with a beautiful view of the countryside. After sitting a few minutes, Jonathan dropped on both knees and asked Monique to marry him, to which she said, “I’d be honored to!” They returned to the Einwechters for a few minutes and then went over to the Pheros because Nelson said he had a surprise for them. The surprise turned out to be the whole Hoffman family! They had driven all day Friday and through the night so that they could be in Pennsylvania to celebrate with Jon and Monique the day of engagement. That visit ended up giving Monique a fast introduction to farm life. She had the opportunity to help Jonathan cover his crops at 11pm because of a late frost; she was exposed to the early mornings, long days and late nights.
She returned home June 2nd and then was back to visit June 12th-22nd, during which time Jonathan and Monique found a house to rent. Both knew that they would not be able to make the trip to see each other during the month of July, which made parting difficult. Jonathan encouraged Monique, reminding her that this was the last time he was taking her to the airport to send her home. After her next visit, they would be married. They kept busy through July, both with wedding plans and for Jonathan, working in the field as well. Jonathan, with much help from family and friends, spent a week and a half in July cleaning, painting, and refinishing floors in their new home. On July 23rd the Hoffmans returned to Pennsylvania. Jonathan picked Monique up and whisked her away to see the house he’d prepared for her – his bride-to-be. He had personally arranged three bouquets which he had placed in the kitchen, bed room and laundry room, each being accompanied by three notes written for her. Needless to say, Monique was overwhelmed with surprise and gratitude for the work done and the love Jonathan expressed to her through his provision of a home, the labors he put into making a nice for her and the flowers and notes he had taken the time to put together for her.
Jonathan and Monique are both very grateful and full of praise to the Lord for bringing them together from across the country and backgrounds through an amazing work of who has seen fit to bring them together and unite them as husband and wife. He is good and is worthy of adoration.
From left to right: Dad Einwechter, My Man, Brother-in-law Ben, 
Ben, ever practical and organized, keeping notes
