Precious Promises

Today is the 50^th anniversary of the day I was born again! I’m so thankful that God rewarded my spiritual seeking, especially my proactive questioning of what the Bible means when it talks in terms of “new birth” or “born again.” My exposure to many different church denominations in high school had raised questions rather than provided answers, and my curious nature that can’t stand confusion motivated me to set out to seek answers. I told my mother when I left for college that I planned to leave the denomination I was raised in because I needed to find a church that I could feel confident was going by the Bible more than that church seemed to do from what I had experienced so far.

In my first year at college, I pursued my quest within the limitations of my dependence on others for transportation to different churches. I realized that looking for a church where I could see and understand for myself in the Bible that what they taught was true was going to be a long process. In the days before the internet, the only way to discern what any church taught was to attend long enough to pick up some bits and snatches of their foundational doctrines through classes and sermons.

I kept a journal of my experiences both in life and in my spiritual quest, which for these past fifty years has been a source of encouragement to me as I see how God rewarded my seeking, particularly about the question of what it means to be born again. When I came across this promise in Hebrews 11:6 later, after I had found the answer to my question about being born again and had experienced my own new birth on August 13, 1974, I had the “Aha!” moment of gratitude for this promise: “And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek him.” I knew God had rewarded my seeking that had been as earnest as I knew how to be.

My path has been full of zigs and zags since my New Birth Day in terms of church experiences, as I’ve written about here on 7/16/2017 (“A Summary of My Church Experiences). Since writing that, another chapter of my life has been added which I hoped was going to be a happy last chapter in a marriage to a man I met in 2019 and married less than five months later, only to discover within three months of the wedding that he was not the gift from God I believed him to be. I had consciously asked the question of every man I interacted with after becoming ready emotionally to be more proactive about meeting and dating men again in November 2017, “Is this man a gift from God or a temptation from Satan?” The realization came in shock after shock that he was not the “Aquila” I believed him to be as the last post here on January 27, 2020, expressed. After spending over three and a half years proactively working toward and hoping for compatibility of mind, heart, body, and spirit, I concluded that I couldn’t continue in the relationship which had proven over and over to be a “bait and switch” experience of discovering incompatibility in every one of those aspects.

I believe that his desire to win my agreement to marry him tempted him to be less than honest with me about his beliefs until after he had secured me as his wife, when his real nature and beliefs became discernable as incompatible in almost every way with me. And I naively didn’t pay enough attention to the signs of our incompatibility during our too-short courtship that I can see more clearly in hindsight. Probably both of those factors were at work. But after setting goal dates for coming to a decision about whether to separate and end the relationship at least three times and giving us more time to continue to work toward compatibility, I determined to try one more time with the goal to separate for sure if it proved yet again to be impossible to reach the unity he knew I require before I agreed to meet him in person when we started to communicate in writing on September 17, 2019. That is why I view my experience with him as a bait and switch, because I was very clear about my needs and requirements for ever wanting to marry again, and the person he presented himself to be in courting me is not the person he revealed after the wedding. I have concluded that I stepped into the snare of Satan that I had hoped to discern and avoid, and I see clearly now my own vulnerabilities to how I was tempted and fell for the temptation.

Only someone who has experienced the shock of discovering after the wedding that he or she has married a person who is not who they seemed or even claimed to be before the wedding can understand or empathize with what the four years of my marriage were like for me. After being determined to not raise the subject of separation again until and unless I was ready to follow through and not change my mind about it as I had the other times, I told him my decision on September 10, 2023, that I wanted to separate for sure and I asked him to move out to accomplish that because we lived in my house that he has no ownership interest in. He refused! And he continued to refuse to move out of my house, so after five more months of confirming that I couldn’t continue in a relationship with him, I moved out of my own house to start the process of separating and ending the marriage.

And that’s where I am today, on this milestone day in my life. I’m living in a room graciously granted to me by someone who cares enough to give me a place to live without adding hugely to my expenses of making a house payment for a house I can’t even live in during this waiting time while I pursue the legal steps to remove him from my house and end the marriage. I can say, along with every other person who has endured having to  conclude that a marriage has failed and must be ended, that I never imagined I’d be in this situation. I have withdrawn from almost all church fellowship since Covid-19 shut down so many things, including in-person worship assemblies, shortly after the wedding and have not felt ready to pursue that again until this process of ending the marriage and getting my house back is complete. I’ve experienced the love and care and encouragement of a few close friends and family and the presumptions and judgments of others. For now, I don’t have the emotional bandwidth to deal with those who don’t know how to respond to me or who pronounce their judgments before even trying to understand or care about me when they learn of my circumstances.

As I wrote in response to my husband’s Facebook post on January 21, 2024, about the major doctrinal incompatibility that he hid from me until after I told him my decision to separate: “When my husband posts his beliefs publicly, I am forced to state also publicly that I do not and never will agree with his Universalist interpretations of the Bible. I was clear with him the first day we met in person that I will never be a Universalist nor marry one. He has spent the past 4 years parsing his words to deceive me about his true beliefs and claiming that he and I really agree but that language obscures that. I’m thankful that he is at last being honest with me – and even going public here – so now I will pursue what I must do with a clear conscience that I have done all I can to try to become compatible spiritually but must now accept that we will never be united in our beliefs. Those who know me best know what I mean. I hope those who may be tempted to judge from afar will not presume they have the knowledge or wisdom to do so.”

I spent my free time on this day pondering these fifty years as a child of God. I’m so thankful that I am never alone because I’m experiencing the love and care of my Heavenly “Abba” (“Daddy”) Father in many, many ways. I look forward to when I can look back on this time, with lessons learned and with the clarity of hindsight to show me the ways God is working everything together for good as he promises to do and as I’ve experienced in so many ways throughout the years since my immersion into Christ on August 13, 1974. So, I can say, “Happy New Birth Day to me” with a whole heart, even in the midst of the most difficult and painful time in my life. Thank you, God, for loving me and for the people who have cared about and for me as I’ve endured this so far and who will continue to do so for as long as the process takes to get back to my home and my life of contented singleness. Please help me learn the lessons and embrace your promises and benefit from your discipline as you reveal in Hebrews 12:4-13: “In your struggle against sin, you have not yet resisted to the point of shedding your blood. And have you completely forgotten this word of encouragement that addresses you as a father addresses his son? It says, ‘My son, do not make light of the Lord’s discipline, and do not lose heart when he rebukes you, because the Lord disciplines the one he loves, and he chastens everyone he accepts as his son.’ Endure hardship as discipline; God is treating you as his children. For what children are not disciplined by their father? If you are not disciplined—and everyone undergoes discipline—then you are not legitimate, not true sons and daughters at all. Moreover, we have all had human fathers who disciplined us and we respected them for it. How much more should we submit to the Father of spirits and live! They disciplined us for a little while as they thought best; but God disciplines us for our good, in order that we may share in his holiness. No discipline seems pleasant at the time, but painful. Later on, however, it produces a harvest of righteousness and peace for those who have been trained by it. Therefore, strengthen your feeble arms and weak knees. ‘Make level paths for your feet,’ so that the lame may not be disabled, but rather healed.”

My prayer now is for wisdom, more conscious discernment, and to keep growing spiritually for the rest of my life as I’ll reach another milestone of turning 70 in a couple of months. I long to experience more of God’s precious promises of his new foundation, new treasure, new birth, new life, new love, new family, new Spirit, and new purpose. And I want to seize opportunities to share the good news I’ve had the great good fortune to hear and respond to fifty years ago with any who cross my path who are open or seeking to know God.

Filed under: Personal Subjects |