Beauty from Ashes

This morning in Church the sermon was about suffering and specifically about the suffering that comes from divorce and the fall out from divorce.  Interestingly enough, as I looked out on the congregation which in the 2^nd service is mostly older people, I saw couples who had been together for many, many years.  One couple in particular that had been married 60 years. 

I noticed a few people in the congregation that I knew were re-married.  Not that many though in comparison to the long marriages that made up most of the couple in the sanctuary.  And I noticed a lot of people, including the choir mate next to me that were widows, or widowers. 

Pastor Rusty went on to say before beginning that even though probably not that many in the congregation had experienced divorce first hand, he doubted that there were many at all that had not had their live altered in some way through a divorce in their own family.

It surprised me to hear him say that in his 48 years of ministry, he had been through deaths of all kinds; but he felt the most devastating pain of all was that experienced by someone going through a divorce. 

I have been very blessed in my life to have experienced only a few very profound losses.  To this day, when I think of my mom, I feel a sense of loss that I cannot put into words.  But the loss in my life that perhaps has affected me more than anything else, the most life –changing experience I have ever gone through was my divorces.  Yes plural. 

Those of you that know me well know that I was married very young to my high school sweetheart.  By the time we married it was clear to me and to everyone around us that we were not a good match.  We were too young to understand that love didn’t consist of anger and pain and lashing out.  We had no idea what true commitment was but we married anyway.  It was “what everyone else” was doing. Once the ball was rolling, the invitations out, the showers, held, the dress bought, the flowers ordered and the band hired, there was no turning back.  I knew walking down the aisle that day I was making a big mistake.  He knew it too.  But  we didn’t have the maturity, or the wisdom to call it off.  Instead we spent 2 miserable years together before I finally found the courage to make a break.  And even though I knew it was the right thing to do it was so painful knowing that I had hurt someone that I cried myself to sleep for months thinking of not just him, but of his family and our friends, and all the other people who would no longer be in my life because of that divorce.

I married again, not too long after that divorce and when I married the 2^nd time I was head over heels in love.  I believed to the core of my soul that the marriage would last until death did us part…and I went into that marriage with experience in heartache, experience in what it took to be married, the sacrifices that would be required of me and I embraced that with open arms.  To say that all I wanted was a husband and children and a home and a 50^th anniversary someday would have been entirely accurate.  And though there were challenges, when I was asked for a divorce by this man I counted on to be with me for the rest of my life I was so distraught, so completely taken off guard, and so entirely devastated that I wanted nothing more than to lay down and die rather than feel the pain of having someone stop loving me.  It was a huge blow to my heart and one that I have never fully recovered from.   Had it not been for my children, my family and a wide circle of loving friends, I don’t know if I could have made it through that time.  Like Pastor Rusty said, there is no pain in the world that compares to the ripping apart of two lives. 

That loss occurred well over 10 years ago, but yet as I write this and think about that time in my life and the memories  come to my mind, I find tears rolling down my cheek.   You are never the same when you lose love in that manner.  You recover, you go on and in many cases, you are stronger and better and have a life that is unbelievably wonderful and fulfilling. If you are lucky enough as I have been, to find love again, it’s the most incredible feeling in the world.  Sometimes, I feel so happy when I’m with Joe that I think I’m just gonna burst open and hearts and flowers are gonna float out of my body.  LOL 

Pastor Rusty said that one of his favorite things to do is to re-marry people.  To join together two lives that have been scarred from the pain of divorce yet have healed and gone on to love again is a joy to him.  I can understand why he feels that way.  The Bible has a verse about God bringing beauty from the ashes.  I think that’s what he has done for my life.  For a long time, I was afraid to love. And then when I did put my heart out there again, it got broken again when a long term relationship didn’t work out.  The only difference in that and the pain of the divorce was that I knew that that person would eventually be totally gone from my life since we didn’t have kids together.  Unlike my children’s father who will always be in their life and  in mine through them.  I’m good with that.  I am happy that he’s happy.  The pain has dulled to the pain of regret, not the pain of rejection.  Big difference.  At some point in the healing process, you are able to realize that the divorce was not anyone’s fault.   And when you are able to accept that, and realize that you are a whole person even without a spouse, it’s a turning point.

That God has answered my prayer and brought Joe into my life is so amazing and I am so very grateful.  There is just something very special about having someone to share your life with.  Not just anybody will do.  I would never settle.  Which is why its been over 10 years since I have been wholeheartedly, undeniably, incredibly sure that this marriage will be my last.  When I say those words, till death we do part, I will mean them with all my heart and soul.  I have done the work, gone through the soul searching, began to recognize the person God created me to be.  I am using my talents, I am living a life of grace and peace and I am striving to be the best person I can be.  I know I am a good friend, a good mother, a good daughter, sibling, choir member, bell ringer (ok that’s debatable but I do try anyway) a good Christian, a hard worker.  And I know that I have the capacity to be the best wife a man could want.  Lucky Joe…Lucky me.  We are truly blessed.