Instead of sending a message to her friend’s sister in August 2009, Brenda Sterns accidentally messaged a complete stranger. The message was received by her now-husband Isaiah, who decided to strike up a conversation. Shortly thereafter, the two became a couple and got engaged six months after their meeting, reports Metro.

The erroneous message Brenda sent was a biblical passage about putting others first. Isaiah replied, “Amen to that, who is this?” and they discovered they were both Christians, sparking a conversation. Isaiah called Brenda the next day. Brenda said, “Initially, I wasn’t very comfortable because I had never seen him. I intentionally didn’t respond. But deep down, I hoped he would leave a voicemail so I could hear his voice – it sounded sincere and authentic, so I called back.”

On the other hand, Isaiah says he actively sought a genuine connection, and after receiving Brenda’s message and reading the biblical verse, he initiated the conversation. “As we continued to talk, within two or three weeks, I realized I liked her and wanted to get to know her better. There’s no way this could have happened by chance,” he adds.

As the two conversed more and more, Brenda learned that Isaiah lived only an hour away from her mother. But that wasn’t the only strange coincidence – due to issues with his mobile provider, Isaiah actually changed phone numbers the same day Brenda first messaged him. “He got a new number and received my text 30 minutes later – no one else knew he had the number at that time,” says Brenda, which is even more bizarre.

Brenda actually planned to text her sister’s friend earlier in the day, but something came up, and she forgot to hit send: “Had I sent the message in the morning, she would never have received it.” After exchanging photos, Brenda thought Isaiah was very handsome, and they began talking regularly. Isaiah started calling Brenda every other day, and they began to get to know each other and develop feelings.

However, Brenda still wasn’t entirely sure she could trust Isaiah: “I hesitated because I hadn’t met him in person. I had a feeling maybe he was lying to me, maybe he was a creep, so I was a little scared.”

Seeking advice, Brenda confided in her mother about her situation, and she suggested meeting Isaiah to assess him. Instead of Brenda, her mother and sister met Isaiah. Brenda was nervous about this situation because, as she says, everything was so abnormal.

During the meeting, Brenda waited at home, anxious to hear her family’s opinion. “I waited all night for my mother to call me. When she did, I asked her to rate Isaiah from 1 to 10. My mother paused and said, ‘Eleven, you’re going to marry this guy.'”

“The fact that she said that made me think this is destiny,” Brenda says. She adds that Isaiah must have been truly wonderful because when it comes to boys, her mother is very picky. In the end, they agreed to meet for the first time in December 2009, but when it seemed Brenda’s work obligations might change the plan for their first meeting, she made a drastic decision.

She and her family were planning to travel for Christmas, so her mother suggested inviting Isaiah. She adds, “I was getting ready to leave, and one day before my annual vacation, my boss said I had to stay in the office. At that moment, she decided to cancel and thought that the decision she would make now would affect the others in her life.”