August 23, 2025
By Grant Van Leuven
Because of a number of heart-felt requests for advice on finding a covenant wife or husband by church members and visitors during my fifteen years of ministry (and several within the last year or so), I offer the following Scriptural guidance from my own personal application for encouragement.
Nearly eight years ago, I read about a retired pastor bringing Proverbs 18:22 to the attention of his grandson: Whoso findeth a wife findeth a good thing, and obtaineth favour of the LORD. The sage grandfather highlighted how this Proverb lauding a man for finding a wife equally implies the need for men to take the initiative to search for wives proactively and persistently. Grandpa’s nudge was this: “Go find her, my boy!”
The story encouraged me as a relatively recent and young widower at that time to continue trying to find (and crying out to God to provide) a new help meet for me and my four children. My search had been proving difficult and discouraging, and along my journey a few well-meaning (and married) consultants seemed to suggest that I may be trying too hard and not resting enough on divine providence. This verse emboldened me to diligently carry on in my exhaustive and exhausting search until I found “her” as God’s reward because He usually uses such means.
After six months of mourning and then gaining wisdom in many counselors, I spent nearly a year on an earnest quest for a new wife and mother that included my children traveling to two continents and hemispheres as well as another of the United States. Our exploration expanded from personal references to eight dating sites (Reformed, Christian, and secular) and the use of video conferencing, passports, airlines, and rental cars. While nearly defeated earlier in the year, I remembered that Jesus says, “Seek and ye shall find.” So I kept trying and by His grace guiding our steps we did soon cross paths with our ruby, Fernanda, with whom I celebrated seven years of matrimony on March 16. What’s more, we prayed through potential medical obstacles early on toward quickly being answered with four more covenant children filling our quiver now with eight (the youngest who turned one also in March and began standing not long after on his own one evening while many of us cheered him on in pajamas and Mama cried, “Oh, my heart!”).
This article is our testimony to encourage others in the context of too much modern, hesitant speculation (fueled by either an influence of worldly priorities or a fearful misapplication of God’s sovereignty) to seek matrimony with the earnest zeal of Biblical precept, precedent, and promise. For there is no finding with closed eyes and crossed legs—but the seeker will have his reward. My children and church who ran this marathon to matrimony with me can assure others to strive toward such a finish line because our search for a good wife was worth it![1]
It is important for a man to diligently search for a good wife.
A bi-vocational minister, I also rejoiced near our wedding anniversary with my family and our church over reaching my 90-day review with my new full-time “tent-making”[2] employer. At that time last year, I never fathomed that I’d be running an uphill pursuit that totaled nearly eighteen months, included some especially humiliating experiences with family in tow at times, and tenuously strained personal and church finances until we reached mid-November and God answered our supplications with a wonderful ministry overlap offer. At some point during that journey as I was clearly running out of steam and stride while given an elder-mandated mini-ministry sabbatical, my eldest (then) sixteen-year-old son also wrestling through job hunting disappointments coached us both through the grind by reminding us it was just like looking for a new wife and mom years before (which he watched and wondered over firsthand as a yearning younger boy)—we eventually found our Fernanda in the finding! (He also landed his first job a few months later.)
Proverbs 18:22 twice speaks of finding a wife; similarly, Proverbs 31:10 testifies to the difficulty of finding a good and virtuous one. Both words of wisdom thus express the oft-necessity of lots of longing and long looking as a Biblical norm to enjoy the worthy result of reaping marriage and family.
Christian men should expect and plan to be searching for good wives and by creative means if necessary, because God no longer draws them from our ribcage while we sleep. So Abraham sent his servant on an arduous trip to find Isaac Rebekah. So Jacob never quit on gaining Rachel’s hand those doubly-seven years. And so upon Ruth’s request Boaz decisively took care of the rest. Jeremiah 29:6 even teaches that fathers ought to help their children look for wives and husbands (see footnote three below). And because covenant marriage is the foundation of the Church, all should discourage unnecessary delays as did Abraham’s servant Laban.
Likewise, Christian women should be ready to be found and recognized as pearls like Rebekah and Rachel at the well and Ruth in the fields, and be availably attentive to the right men when they are noticed and approached. Our eldest daughter similarly knows the fruit of being faithful with means guided by her father’s support as she and my son-in-law celebrated two years of marriage last month.[3] Note that Scripture shows women also taking initiative in attaining husbands. While Reformed and Christian dating and social sites seem to target young men as dragging their feet to the “altar,” my experience has observed that Reformed and evangelical women are not necessarily any less indecisive procrastinating for a “perfect” fit though the Apostle Paul advises, I will therefore that the younger women marry, bear children, guide the house … (1 Timothy 5:14). So we see Rebekah responded quickly at the well, ran to her father, and hastened to her would-be husband in Canaan. And Naomi regularly pressed the widow Ruth toward remarriage even to pursuing and essentially “proposing” to Boaz with success (I hope this insight encourages women especially on dating sites not to helplessly wait for a man to ideally first introduce himself).
Marriage and family are priorities in Scripture which expects deliberate focus to find, acquire, and build.
Hebrews 11:6 assures us that God rewards those who diligently seek Him; surely this usually includes ordinary means and His creation design and blessing for a good spouse and godly children.
When a man finds a good wife, she is God’s reward for her husband’s searching for her.
When a miner finally finds a jewel he rejoices and quickly acquires it because of his intense effort and its tremendous value. Proverbs 31:10 admits that it is hard to find a certain kind of wife and thus she is such a treasure to behold and hold; in fact, her valued wisdom is more precious than many rubies for she is “virtuous,” which in Hebrew (as described in the whole chapter) connotes power, strength, and capacity. This meaning resonates with me because amid my daunting search I determined by various encounters that I was looking not only for a certain character but also a degree of caliber in a woman—the kind of virtuosity spoken of Ruth by Boaz in how she was known by the whole city for being a hard-working, self-sacrificing, family and community servant who would be a glorious crown on his head (see also Proverbs 12:4).
When she was visiting in San Diego to get acquainted with my children and church, one of our elders quickly commented on the “servant’s heart” of Fernanda Da Rosa who soon after became Fernanda Da Rosa Van Leuven (she was a no-show for her round trip return flight to Boston). He saw what I continue to witness: a woman with a soft heart who jumps into service and wants to work hard. She is the hard-to-find Proverbs 31 woman whose nature is to help her husband contribute to the church community and care for his children. And so God clearly blessed my search in finding her while also rewarding her own womb with children after crying out like Hannah for years (Psalm 127:3). I regularly tell her I know how good I have it for she is priceless and a “good thing” as Proverbs 18:22 promised and God Himself testifies in Genesis 2:18 when saying that it is “not good” for a man to be alone.[4] This is why a man should search and expect to find a wife as God’s good reward because the Lord designed her to be man’s “help meet”[5] and says, “Go find her, my son!” Perhaps an intensive search best sets up an ever-increasing valuing of her as long as they both shall live.
For about two years singing Psalms in family worship I had to cover as the melody due to our loss of a soprano (while the children sang tenor and alto). I had prayed that God might let me have a harmonizing wife who likes to sing. Fernanda greatly filled that request and I was able to go back to being a bass, just as I continue to to focus on being a daddy again. She brought melody back into our life, and we sing praises to God that I let Proverbs 18:22 and 31:10 keep speaking to me so I kept searching until we found her.[6]
Grant Van Leuven has been feeding the flock at the Puritan Reformed Presbyterian Church in San Diego, CA, since 2010. A bi-vocational pastor, he also serves as Site Manager of the San Diego office for World Relief Southern California. Grant and his wife, Fernanda, have eight covenant children. He earned his M.Div. at the Reformed Presbyterian Theological Seminary in Pittsburgh, PA.
Footnotes
[1] This message is based on a sermon by the author on Proverbs 18:22, entitled “Our Search for a Good Wife Was Worth It!” in a series labeled, “Finding Fernanda,” available to hear here: sermonaudio.com/sermons/32618154900.
[2] For more on this Scriptural concept, listen to the author’s sermon, “There is Precedence of Tent Making in Scripture to Prioritize and Perpetuate God’s Ministry and People,” here: sermonaudio.com/sermons/1525219497101.
[3] See the author’s review of a devotional book used to help her here: reformation21.org/blog/preparing-for-dating-and-marriage. How wonderful that she celebrated graduating college this spring with her husband and his family as well as her own.
[4] This being said, it is important to recognize that the Apostle Paul commends the gift of singleness and even recommends it in 1 Corinthians 7. See also the author’s sermon, “God Honors a Single Woman’s Service”: sermonaudio.com/sermoninfo.asp?SID=93121347595
[5] In Hebrew, counterpart or corresponding to him and essentially, “companion”.
[6] The author wishes to share that due to a number of intensely unusual challenges facing the start of this new marriage, after the honeymoon was over much hard work was required to keep things and them together which involved the significant, patient, and compassionate support of their children, Session, Church, Presbytery, and Christian friends. As their seventh anniversary fell on a Lord’s Day in March of this year , he shared during morning church announcements that while the “Van Locos” parents reminisced at their anniversary dinner a few days before they felt like they should send an anniversary card to each household expressing celebratory gratitude for all their help with growing in grace while growing quickly in numbers and that it has been so worth stepping through the stones to get here. Everyone smiled in a way that clearly rejoiced with “Amen!” And a cake from the saints with special “seven years” decorations adorned the fellowship table that evening. Perhaps another article may tell this other tale another time. But for different marriage encouragement that might benefit some at other similar seasons, this sermon on Matthew 19 by the author, “Never Give Up On Your Marriage,” is available here: sermonaudio.com/sermons/12020713446514.