I haven't kept it a secret that I've been going through a divorce this year. It's been stressful and painful, and has cost a LOT of money.
Through it all, my least favorite people to deal with have been my fellow Christians.
Think about that. Aren't we supposed to be salt and light? Aren't we supposed to be helping each other lighten burdens and proving comfort? Then why don't we?
I'm not talking about the Christian brothers who know me well. It's the ones who sort of know me; but weren't close enough for me to let them in on things until after the die was cast.
The people who saw the pain my 12 year marriage put me through; who saw what I'd done to keep it working; who prayed for me and with me, thought it was probably best. The people who didn't were a galactic pain in my butt.
The moment I came public with my divorce, these Christians were right there "trying" to be helpful and failing drastically.
"You need to FIGHT FOR YOUR MARRIAGE!" Thank you very much. That never occurred to me. Why didn't anybody tell me that 5 years ago? Never thought of that one. Would have made all the difference.
"YOU NEED TO PRAY FOR YOUR MARRIAGE!" Thank you very much. That never occurred to me Why didn't anybody tell me that 5 years ago? Never thought of that one. Would have made all the difference.
My least favorite bits of advice dealt with Fireproof and The Love Dare. You people do know Fireproof is fiction, right? That it's not even based on a true story? And "The Love Dare" is merchandising based on the movie (or the movie is based on the merchandise) and again is not guaranteed. Plus, yes, I did.
Something else I came to loathe was "Well, I just prayed for God to fix my marriage, and He did!" Yeah, that's helpful. I prayed for him to fix mine, and he didn't.
One of the people who gave me some of this recentvaluable advice turned out to be going through his own divorce. I seriously toyed with feeding some of it back to him. "You should PRAY FOR YOUR MARRIAGE! I bet that never occurred to you, so do it NOW! You should watch FIREPROOF! I see that Love Dare copy on your desk. READ IT UNTIL IT WORKS!"
But I decided not to. I decided to be merciful to him. I told him I'd pray for him, and I'm sorry to hear that it's happening to him.
In a perfect world, there would be no divorce. We don't live in that world.
On the bright side, it appears God did answer my prayers; just not the way I expected. But I can't go public with that yet.
Through it all, my least favorite people to deal with have been my fellow Christians.
Think about that. Aren't we supposed to be salt and light? Aren't we supposed to be helping each other lighten burdens and proving comfort? Then why don't we?
I'm not talking about the Christian brothers who know me well. It's the ones who sort of know me; but weren't close enough for me to let them in on things until after the die was cast.
The people who saw the pain my 12 year marriage put me through; who saw what I'd done to keep it working; who prayed for me and with me, thought it was probably best. The people who didn't were a galactic pain in my butt.
The moment I came public with my divorce, these Christians were right there "trying" to be helpful and failing drastically.
"You need to FIGHT FOR YOUR MARRIAGE!" Thank you very much. That never occurred to me. Why didn't anybody tell me that 5 years ago? Never thought of that one. Would have made all the difference.
"YOU NEED TO PRAY FOR YOUR MARRIAGE!" Thank you very much. That never occurred to me Why didn't anybody tell me that 5 years ago? Never thought of that one. Would have made all the difference.
My least favorite bits of advice dealt with Fireproof and The Love Dare. You people do know Fireproof is fiction, right? That it's not even based on a true story? And "The Love Dare" is merchandising based on the movie (or the movie is based on the merchandise) and again is not guaranteed. Plus, yes, I did.
Something else I came to loathe was "Well, I just prayed for God to fix my marriage, and He did!" Yeah, that's helpful. I prayed for him to fix mine, and he didn't.
One of the people who gave me some of this recent
But I decided not to. I decided to be merciful to him. I told him I'd pray for him, and I'm sorry to hear that it's happening to him.
In a perfect world, there would be no divorce. We don't live in that world.
On the bright side, it appears God did answer my prayers; just not the way I expected. But I can't go public with that yet.
