I heard the still small voice in my spirit whisper,

“No matter how dark it gets, will you keep your eyes on my face?”

“Yes.” I replied.

The Lord will be your everlasting light, and your days of sorrow will end. (Isaiah 69:20)

In 2024, my faith was repeatedly put to the test as I faced many closed doors, closed chapters, disappointments, and horrible news. My ceiling caving in at the end of the summer was almost poetic as it marked a season of my life colored with chaos, change, and uncertainty. Looking back on it all, I realized something; that season, though full of trials, wasn’t the most difficult season I would face. The most difficult seasons were the seasons I chose to carry it all on my own instead of leaning into God. Despite the uncertainty I faced last year, I remained certain of the one thing that truly mattered—God’s presence. Looking back on 2024, I remember most vividly not the darkness but the joy and the peace that filled my spirit despite everything around me falling apart. Undoubtedly I wouldn’t have made it through had I not had faith in God—His sovereignty, His promises, His direction, and His timing.

At the beginning of 2025, I said yes to many things. I said yes when God told me to start selling my art and poetry. I said yes when He told me to create a Facebook page. I said yes to joining the photography team at my church. I said yes to leading a small group despite my reservations. I said yes to a first date with the most amazing person I’ve ever met despite my fear of getting hurt.

As summer 2025 came to a close, I said yes to something else; I said yes to forever.

It wasn’t saying yes to a ring that would ultimately make me a wife, but rather all the other yes’s that led me to that moment. I didn’t just say yes to a ring; I said yes to God’s timing.

Years ago I said yes to something I would later realize God led me to do. I was jobless, in debt, very much single, and had no church home nor genuine friendships in my life. From the outside, it appeared my life was empty, but truthfully my life was as full as it could ever be. God filled every hole, every gap, every broken place that lingered after the pain, the loss, the trauma. I stopped seeing value in the things of this world and began to pursue the treasures of God’s heart. He put it on mine that day to go find a rock, a heart-shaped rock to be exact, as I walked the trail of some of my fondest memories. I prayed for God to lead me to this rock, and it stunned me when I actually found it.

The heart-shaped rock became a treasure of mine, something valuable, tangible, that I would cherish for the rest of my life. It became a symbol of my faith, a symbol of an answered prayer, something that reminded me when God tells me to do something, it’s for my good. It became a reminder that love is out there, and in God’s perfect timing, it’ll be found.

I stood on that bridge, the bridge that stood between dimensions in time—solitude and partnership, before him and after him, now and eternity. I stood there, and I held his heart-shaped rock in my hand, the heart-shaped rock he sought out many years ago at a time of great turmoil in his own life.

The funny thing is, Daniel isn’t a rock collector like me, but when God speaks, he listens; when God puts it on his heart to do something, he says yes. I realized in that moment, God really is in the details; I realized God is slowly but surely weaving together a story created by a series of our yes’s made possible by His divine guidance and our faith in His direction.

An entry from a previous blog post, “The Gift of a Heart-Shaped Rock”—

All I wanted that day was to find a heart shaped rock, so I prayed to find one. I had envisioned a small pebble, but God gave me this rock. God is like that— you ask in faith for something, and He gives you something a thousand fold better than what you ever imagined.

Indeed God is like that. I prayed for many years for something, someone very specific. Truth be told, what I prayed for was a small pebble in comparison to the man Daniel is. If there’s one thing I’ve learned in this—when your heart is aligned with God’s, He delivers; He delivers a thousand fold.

“We Found Our Hearts”

by Daniel and Kamille

We sought a rock and found a heart 

while God purposed our hearts to start.

Those days were a part of His greater plan 

to reveal to us what His true love demands.

Our broken selves emptied and redeemed,

no longer our own but beloved it seemed.

He kept us hidden from one another 

until we found our hearts in Him and no other.

Waiting to unveil earthly love

until it became a symbol of His above.

These rocks from the Lord we do adore,

a symbol of His love and ours forevermore.

“I Said Yes” is inspired by the man that got down on one knee and asked me to spend forever with him. The idea for this painting was birthed from the two of us praying and brainstorming together until God spoke. He gave Daniel an idea, and I formed a vision. Daniel drew out the vision in pencil, and I brought to it color and depth with my oil pastels. Then together we added in the final touches. This painting represents what our forever will look like as it was brought to life by both of us working together in unison under the sovereignty of God.

I pray you’re inspired by our story—not merely mine and his but even more importantly, His. I prayed many years for God to write my love story, and undoubtedly, in His perfect timing, He did just that.

I had to say yes first; I had to say yes to the dark season—the trials, the pain, the growth; I had to say yes to the hard things, the uncomfortable things that were leading me down the path of becoming my best self and ultimately a wife. Above all else, I had to say yes to God’s timing.

God’s timing is everything—beautiful, perfectly aligned, and without fail. In His timing, all of Heaven and Earth will declare: “YES!”

Delight yourselves in the Lord, and He will give you the desires of your heart. (Psalm 37:4)

Connie Bell Photography https://www.conniebellphotography.com