…to the most beautiful girl in the world.

So, as many of you may have heard by now, Rachael and I are official engaged. We were waiting to go public with this announcement until now because she wanted to announce it Wednesday night to the youth at Belle Aire Baptist (Murfreesboro, TN) first.






This weekend marked one of the biggest chapters in our story. It was months in the making, and I really was surprised and thankful that nothing got back to her throughout the planning stages.

If you do not know our story, it is a great one… patiently waiting for God's timing in all this. We have both followed His heart in all this even when I suddenly moved to New York City to help plant a new church in SoHo. Leaving her behind in Murfreesboro was one of the hardest things I have ever done, despite the fact that we were not even dating at that time. That's right… mark it up, a little under three months and we are engaged, but the story goes much further back than that. Both of us have known for a while that we were meant to be together. That is another story for another night. This story is our engagement night.






So, I decided to fly Rachael to New York to visit for several days. She flew into the city last Wednesday night (special thanks to Ellie and Maria for letting Rachael stay with them). We got to spend several days together *fast forwarding sound*

So then came Saturday night, the big night.

I rented a private car service (you gotta get the private car service…). We went to dinner at a trendy place in Union Square called The Lemon. It was excellent. It was fun looking at and talking to my future fiancée right across the table from me. We had to rush through dinner because we were running a bit late (thanks to my driver for helping me find a florist on the way to pick Rachael up)…

After dinner, I had our driver drop us off at the foot of the Brooklyn Bridge. Now, it was cold and wet on Saturday night, but I was determined to propose on the Brooklyn Bridge. You see, the bridge is one of the places that Rachael and I went on our first official date when she was here a few months ago… The same bridge that on the night of our first date, while playing the "I like you more than…" game back and forth, I accidentally slipped, "I love you more than the Brooklyn Bridge…" Funny slip on the first date, and it was actually a couple months later that we started saying this on a regular basis, even though we both knew it was true.

So, we walked the first portion of the Brooklyn Bridge. A couple yards from the first platform, we started seeing rose petals sprinkled about. As we approached the platform that overlooks the cityscape, the rose petals increased in number until we were standing in a bed of rose petals (I had some help having this arranged). The twinkling lights from the cityscape created a nice backdrop.






At this point, she started to know something was up. I nervously fumbled my way through several lines that probably did not make any sense and then pulled the ring box from my messenger bag. You can imagine the rest… I got down on one knee and asked Rachael to marry me… making me the happiest guy in the world. She accepted immediately (after repeating "Oh my gosh" about 57 times)…


















So now, we were officially engaged. We made the appropriate phone calls and headed back to the foot of the bridge… we had to go to our next location.






We arrived at 72nd Street some time later. This is the building in which I work. We took the elevator up to the third floor and as we exited, people were standing on either side, tossing rose petals in our direction.








I had arranged a special after party/reception for us to celebrate (which really would not have worked out too well if she had said, "no"). Thanks to Maria, Susan, and Ellie, the third floor looked amazing… The room was covered in rose petals… all over the floor, the window sills, the tables. Christmas lights strung from the ceiling and candles in the windows and on the table lit the room. It was perfect, though the original plan was to have it on the roof. It worked out nicely and the room looked amazing.

We mingled for a few minutes and then proceeded with one last surprise… I blindfolded her and sat her down in a chair. I then sat next to her, awaiting the next event. The next thing she knew, the first chords of our song, "Bigger Than Us" were being played. I took off the blindfold and there, sitting before us, was Andy Davis. Andy Davis is from Nashville and her favorite artist ever. And it worked out nicely that he also wrote what we consider "our song." So there it was. Andy Davis gave us and the others at the party a special private party. It was amazing.




















So that wrapped up the surreal night. It still does not feel like it really happened. I tried to completely make it the best night of her life and think I came pretty close. She deserves a lot more than what I could accomplish though.






So now the next step is the wedding. I still cannot believe that we are actually engaged. I would not rather share this moment with anyone else.




Make sure you check out the photos in my photo box and on her PhuseBox site. Also, make sure you check out Andy Davis at http://www.andydavisonline.com.