Love Worth Waiting For

By Rebecca Walker Yount

"When, at the age of forty-three, you have never yet married, the dreams you once possessed of finding your 'prince charming' and living happily ever after have a way of fading off into a ridiculous waste of time and energy."

Love Worth Waiting For is one woman's true story, proving that dreams do come true! Once in a while, right in the middle of an ordinary life, love can come along and bring you a fairy tale--even at the age of forty-three! But how does one begin to comprehend when that husband she had waited for, the one who was all she ever wanted, falls asleep beside her one night, two-and-a-half years later, and never wakes again?

Becky Yount recounts for us one of the most beautiful and touching love stories ever lived. She openly shares the unimaginable pain of suddenly losing her young husband, without even the chance to say goodbye. She then allows us to feel her struggle as she finally surrenders her brokenness to God and begins the painful road toward healing.

Believing that God never wastes our pain, the author has chosen to share her story. It is her sincere desire to remind each of us of God's ever-present love, to prove His ability to answer our most personal prayers, and to encourage those who have found love to cherish it.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Christian Faith Publishing, Inc.
• Release date: Oct 19, 2022
• ISBN: 9781638743866

Book preview

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Love Worth Waiting For

Rebecca Walker Yount

ISBN 978-1-63874-385-9 (paperback)

ISBN 978-1-63874-386-6 (digital)

Copyright © 2022 by Rebecca Walker Yount

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods without the prior written permission of the publisher. For permission requests, solicit the publisher via the address below.

Christian Faith Publishing

832 Park Avenue

Meadville, PA 16335

www.christianfaithpublishing.com

Cover and engagement photos by Amy Coleman

Wedding photos by Karen Gilmour

Printed in the United States of America

Table of Contents

Preface

Acknowledgments

Introduction

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Chapter 28

Chapter 29

Chapter 30

Chapter 31

Chapter 32

Chapter 33

Chapter 34

Chapter 35

To my beloved husband, Matthew William Yount, and my dear father, Robert Blair Walker, the two men I have loved most in this life.

My husband, Matthew, was and always will be the love of my life. Without a doubt, Matthew made me one of the happiest women to have walked on this earth. In conversation with him one day, I said to Matthew, You know, I have often watched God answer prayer in remarkable ways for people. But in my opinion, God outdid Himself when He brought the two of us together. I truly meant that.

I remember telling Matthew that someday I hoped to write a book. He responded casually by saying, Oh yeah! Am I gonna be in it?

I replied, "Are you kidding? You are the reason for it!"

Often I have wondered if I would ever have been blessed to have had Matthew as my husband if it had not been for the faithful prayers of my father. Dad was my cheerleader when life was going especially well and my constant source of encouragement when circumstances became difficult. I was richly blessed to have had a father who regularly and consistently prayed, perhaps more faithfully than any other, for God to send a man such as Matthew into my life.

These two amazing heroes of mine arrived in heaven only six months apart from each other.

Preface

My husband once told me that he was intrigued by walking through cemeteries and reading the headstones and memorials. He enjoyed calculating how old the people would have been when they passed and reading the inscriptions chosen by someone who likely loved them in this world. Only once did Matthew and I take such a walk together, and I am so grateful that we did. Matthew appreciated the fact that every person who ever breathed air on this earth had a story to tell.

Well, now that my Matthew has been chosen to take up residence in heaven with his Lord, it became my honor to choose the words engraved into his memorial. Those few words, however, cannot possibly tell his story—or ours. It just so happens that I am biased enough to think that our story is quite spectacular, so I will do my best to tell it.

You never really know the true value of a moment until it becomes a memory.

—Author unknown

Acknowledgments

I would like to give special thanks to my Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, for bringing a truly exceptional man into my life in October of 2010. This book is dedicated to my Matthew's memory…the gentle giant of a man who married me in August of 2011 and went to be with our Lord two years and five months later on January 29 of 2014.

I will always be grateful to my mother, Kathy Walker, without whose intervention, I may never have heard of, or met, the wonderful man who would later become my husband. Along that same line, I will forever be thankful that Mr. Dale Fry and his late wife, Mrs. Nancy Fry, allowed the Lord to use them to arrange for Matthew and me to meet on a blind date in their home.

I also want to thank the family and friends who have expressed to me through the years that my story ought to be told, in hopes that it may be a help and an encouragement to others. Special thanks to one friend in particular who told me many times in the years before I met Matthew, Becky, I just don't think this is the rest of your story. You were right, Jodie. I had yet to meet Matthew Yount.

I owe a debt of gratitude to my late father, my mother…and also to my sisters, Amy Coleman and Colleen Sexton; their husbands, Aaron and Larry; and my nephews and nieces, Chase, Leanna, Reed, and Allison. I was inexpressibly thankful for the way they excitedly welcomed Matthew into our family. My mom told me that she considered Matthew to be our icing on the cake. I also remain indebted to them for the way they faithfully kept me in their prayers when I needed them most, following Matthew's death. I can't imagine what I would have done without them during this time when I had no further desire for my life on earth to continue. I still recall with clarity how night after night, for a brief while, either my mom or one of my sisters would take turns spending the night with me when I couldn't bear the thought of being alone again. One other fact I remember just as clearly: each one of them would read the Bible to me the next morning and pray out loud for me when I could not find words to speak to God myself. I also remember the times when I was reminded, Becky, God isn't finished with you. You have a book yet to write.

I want to express heartfelt appreciation to my precious extended family of Calvary Baptist Church in Butler, Pennsylvania. I will always be grateful for the way they shared in Matthew's and my joy as we were falling in love and as we married. Just as importantly, I am thankful for the many prayers they prayed to the Lord on my behalf after Matthew was taken to heaven so suddenly. I feel truly blessed to have these wonderful people in my life.

Finally, I would like to thank all of my closest in-laws for their continued love and support. I want to begin by thanking my father-in-law, Carl Yount, and Matthew's only brother, Michael Yount, and his wife, Amy. Michael, Amy, and our nephew and nieces, Aidan, Kathleen, Lindsay, and Claire, frequently sent cards to me throughout every month of the entire first year that we had lost Matthew. They will never realize just how much that thoughtfulness meant to me. I owe special thanks to Matthew's beloved Grandma Q, the late Dorothy Quesenberry. I am truly honored to have had the privilege of knowing her. And most especially, I want to thank my mother-in-law, Louise Yount. It has been an unexpected blessing for which I will forever be thankful that she and I have developed a special closeness since losing Matthew. This, I am certain, would make my husband extremely proud. My mother-in-law is the closest earthly tie I have to Matthew and has become a treasured friend. She has no idea how it has warmed my heart when she has said to me, Becky, Matthew would be proud of you.

Introduction

When, at the age of forty-three, you have never yet married, the dreams you once possessed of finding your prince charming and living happily ever after have a way of fading off into a ridiculous waste of time and energy. Instead, you begin trying to wrap your head around the idea that you might likely end up the stereotypical old maid.

Now don't get me wrong. I know as well as anyone does that not every person who walks the face of the earth is destined to marry. I also know that some who do marry wish they never had…yet the dream of having a husband of my own remained.

My name is Becky Yount and this is my story.

Chapter 1

This was the day I had dreamed about all of my life! I was standing in the sunlit foyer of the church, dressed in a beautiful white, chiffon-and-satin gown. My right hand was resting on the arm of my father, clad in a black tuxedo, and my left hand carried a fragrant bouquet of white roses and lilies. Side by side, my father and I stood waiting behind a pair of heavy wooden doors. We could hear the wedding music playing; and in just another moment, those doors would be opened. I would then begin the long-awaited walk down the aisle to join the tall, dark, and handsome man waiting for me at the front of the church auditorium. Today, this man would become my husband.

Yes, I am well aware that this same scene has taken place countless times in countless places, the world over. But this wedding was different. This was my wedding, the wedding that I had nearly ceased to hope would ever take place. I had celebrated my forty-fourth birthday only six days before. I had not ever been married, nor had I ever lived with a significant other.

One other particular fact was even more amazing to me. My handsome groom also had never married or lived with someone that he had been dating. Neither he nor I had ever had a physical relationship which could have resulted in having children—not with anyone else nor with each other. I myself have never heard of another couple of similar ages whose situation was the same—certainly not in the twenty-first century.

But if you'd like to be further befuddled, here is a little-known fact that I must add to the story so that you can understand the slim likelihood that I would yet marry. By the age of forty-four, I still had never been kissed. (Yes, you read that correctly.) I hadn't even held hands with a man, not even a young man, when I was dating as a teen. I also made sure to never date alone or to even ride in a vehicle alone with a man. If the dates did not take place at a group activity, I would arrange to have another couple along. All of these rules and boundaries were in place because I had established a goal when I began dating at the age of seventeen. I wanted to be fully and completely pure for the husband that I hoped to marry one day. I wanted to enjoy every romantic touch of any kind with one man and one man only. And after stating that, I'm sure you understand that men were not lining up at the door to date me.

The fact that Matthew and I had both stayed single for so long was surely not due to lack of dating opportunities, for we both had plenty of those through the years. Each of us also had family and friends who thought enough of us that they would endeavor to set us up on dates with prospective candidates as often as the opportunities might arise. And in both cases, we tried to be open to the possibilities. Yet I will be honest with you. We admitted to each other that we were both terribly picky and we knew it. Speaking for myself, I had finally decided that I wanted to stop looking for a man that I could live with. I wanted to find the man that I couldn't live without.

Chapter 2

As a ten-year-old girl, I had come to the realization that I was a sinner in need of forgiveness after being taught that the Lord Jesus Christ had loved me enough to die on a cross, paying the penalty for my sin. At this time, I had knelt down beside my bed and asked Christ to forgive my sins and to be my personal Savior. A few short years after that, I became part of a good solid youth group in a great little Bible-believing church. I sincerely desired to live the kind of life that would make my Savior proud. In my youth group, I was taught that it was important to ask for God's help in choosing a man to become my husband one day. It was also strongly recommended that I only date the kind of young man that I would want to marry.

Well, I earnestly tried to keep this in mind as I became old enough to date. I had even decided that I would have no physical contact with young men—saving myself, in every sense of the word, for that one man who would become my husband.

To be completely honest, these rules were not terribly difficult for me to keep, for many reasons. First of all, I was very quiet and reserved. I didn't even have my first date until I was a high school senior at the age of seventeen. My first boyfriend was from an excellent Christian family. Because he was away at a Bible college in the state of Indiana, most of our dating was done through letters. When we were together in person, he treated me in a respectful and gentlemanly fashion. For the several months that we dated, he was the perfect first boyfriend.

Then it became my turn to go to college. I wanted to become a schoolteacher.

Upon enrolling in a Bible college in Massillon, Ohio, I had decided that I hated having the reputation of always being quiet and shy. Because I would be living in a college dormitory in another state, I realized that these people didn't know me yet, and this would be the perfect time for me to come out of my shell. Those years were fun and exciting, and I considered them to be some of my happiest. I didn't have a serious boyfriend until the beginning of my second year in college when I met the most handsome young man I believe I had ever seen up to that point.

This man, only two years older than me, arrived on campus during my sophomore year of college. I came into contact with him initially because he stopped to ask for my help. He was dropping off his fiancée at the door of the ladies' dorm and was helping to unload her things from the car. He explained that they were both enrolling in college but that she was already homesick and threatening not to stay. Then he asked me to try to befriend her. I do not remember seeing her after that day. I did hear that she quickly went home.

This very good-looking man, however, stayed.

What I did shortly after was terribly unwise. I began to pray that God would cause this man (we'll call him Brandon) and his fiancée to break off their engagement. I would pray almost daily concerning this matter and would tell the Lord, that because I knew He was not an unkind God, surely He would arrange for me to get to date Brandon. Then I would say that if He