Trusting God through a long-distance relationship

I’d like to share about how I’ve come to embrace the uncertainty of being in a long-distance relationship during COVID-19 and learned to really trust God in my relationship with my girlfriend Ella. I am a uni student living in Brisbane, Australia, and started dating Ella almost four years ago after visiting Vancouver, Canada. Since then we’ve visited each other every 6 months until 2019, when I was able to live and work in Vancouver and have the whole year living in the same city with Ella on a young person’s visa. It was special having that much time together over that year, and it felt like it laid a solid foundation in our relationship which we could build on. Over the next couple of years we had both planned to do an exchange at each other’s universities as a way of being together while we finished our courses. It came as quite a shock then, when Covid happened and international travel ceased indefinitely, throwing our plans completely up in the air and not leaving any certainty as to when we would be able to see each other next. Since then, it’s certainly been a journey in learning to trust God with such an unknown situation, which is something I felt stirred to share as part of this testimony.

At the end of March 2020, when restrictions were imposed and the long-term implications of Covid were quite unknown, we had a small house meeting where I was sharing about my situation with Ella, and how it was quite uncertain whether or not she would be able to come over to Brisbane in July 2020 as we had planned. In response to this someone in the group shared a prophecy for me, which I’ve kept coming back to as a reminder of how God feels about my situation. The essence of the prophecy was really God encouraging me to embrace this time with Him, as He has so much more to build between me and Him. The last line was ‘Treasure this waiting with Me’ which felt like something to really trust God with as it definitely wasn’t how I naturally viewed this time while Ella and I were apart. About a week before I received the prophecy, I felt the word ‘embrace’ which was tied to the uncertainty of Covid and not knowing when we would be able to see each other again. It touched me then that God used the very same word, earlier in the prophecy, to emphasise how much I can really trust Him with this, and that His direction to really embrace this time was exactly what He was wanting me to do.

I know I don’t have to make sense of God’s ways as they are so above mine, but when I actually embrace the situation He has for me, something real happens between me and Him

Even though I knew the truth of that word from God, it did feel so counter to how I would naturally approach this time, as instinctively it can feel like an in-between time to endure and try to ‘get through’ until Covid is under control and Ella and I can be together again. It wasn’t until God spoke about how much He wants to build between me and Him during this time that I knew I wanted to align myself with that. In looking back over the past year, I can see how much God has done, both between me and Him but also in my relationship with Ella and with the people around me. I know I don’t have to make sense of God’s ways as they are so above mine, but when I actually embrace the situation He has for me, something real happens between me and Him, without me fully understanding what I’m actually trusting Him with.

Along the way, it has been freeing to discover that my emotions don’t always have to line up with what I know in my heart. Although at times I can still feel like this situation is unfair and wish for some certainty or control around when I’ll be able to see Ella (in a situation where everything is unknown and I can’t possibly be in control) I know that God is in control and that He has a plan for us both which is far better than anything I could think of. I do feel aware of how much Ella and I are growing closer through this time, and I love how we can be so involved in each others lives despite not being in the same place. The situation He has me in now does feel perfect in its own way and I know that I just want to discover God’s plan for me, knowing how much He loves me and Ella and how much it means to Him when we trust Him in this way.