Refocused

Saint John Vianney, known also as the Curé of Ars, writes this about Spiritual Communion: “There are some who make a spiritual communion every day with blessed bread. If we are deprived of Sacramental Communion, let us replace it, as far as we can, by spiritual communion, which we can make every moment; for we ought to have always a burning desire to receive the good God.”

During the week following my first spiritual communion, I wondered what was happening to me. I was tempted to doubt my act of faith, wondering if I had fooled myself into believing I was experiencing Communion. I was not sure. Yet, gone was the constant rancor in my heart. I was surprised, too, by moments of joy. However, I was so attentive to my preparation for an art show at the end of August that I took less notice of that joy than I should have. In my view, what was taking place at Mass for me was a great idea. I knew it was a gift, but I guessed it was more like a substitute, and not true Communion.

Not comprehending what the Lord had offered me, I remained satisfied that He had taken pity upon me. I had supposed He was letting me participate on a level that was more like seeing, but not tasting. I did not know this spiritual communion was much more than Jesus’ gift to help me feel at ease. I did not realize the magnitude. Like a toddler who sucks a pacifier, I was pleased to leave the church building each Sunday contented.

The next Sunday I again received my Communion by faith, as I had the week before, but this time during the consecration, my doubts vanished. As soon as I swallowed and said, “Amen,” after the elevation of the cup, I felt a wellspring of joy in my heart, and recognized the presence of the Holy Spirit. For the next few weeks, this became a pattern for me during each Mass.

Rich and I continued to sort out our new lives. We were not in perfect harmony, but at least he was not getting an ear-full of woe each week.

One Sunday in August he commented on the difference. I shared with him what I was doing, and he hugged me, encouraged that in a small way I was happier at Mass.

With the art show fast approaching, Rich also encouraged me in my artistic endeavor by helping with the housework so I could concentrate on the rubrics of my craft. Thankfully, he was satisfied with scrambled eggs or pizza for dinner on days I had spent hours in the studio. With high hopes of sharing my images in a large venue, Rich took me to the airport and sent me on my way to Atlanta during the Labor Day weekend. I sensed that this trip would change me, although I hadn’t a clue how that would happen - and I expressed that to Rich.

The first day or so of the art show was enough to convince me I would not participate in that type of venue again. I was not part of the Fantasy/Gamer crowd, and my art did not seem to appeal to them either. This was a great disappointment for me because I had hoped my unique work would fit well within this eclectic group.

On Sunday I attended a Protestant service with our daughter, who lives near Atlanta. My foray once more into an Evangelical congregation was not as satisfying to me as I had expected. After three years in sacramental churches, I supposed the difference of liturgy and unfamiliar songs left me with a spiritual emptiness. I came away confused by my attitude and disillusioned with what I had thought would be a very satisfying morning. What I did not take into account was how the small act of faith I had experienced at Mass had now changed me.

On the flight home, failure and self-pity engulfed me because of the disappointing reception of my art. The past year’s trials paraded before my weary thoughts, and I slumped in my seat.

After a while, I took out a drawing pad from my carry-on and made some notes about my emotional state. I was determined to keep up a good front of cheerfulness – but my heart had gone out of me. I had come to the end of my fortitude and I felt morose. Moreover, I wondered how long I would be able to be as supportive of Rich as I had been. I knew from experience that over time my resolve would languish, causing my cooperation to falter. I loved Rich, and wanted our covenant-marriage to succeed, but on that flight home, remembering the past months, we seemed sorely in trouble.

It never occurred to me that all the difficulty I had experienced, as well as the failure to prosper in my venture, was exactly right for me. I thought my eyes were wide open and I understood all that had taken place. However, I was still blind.

But Jesus was in the process of giving me sight.

The Undeserved Gift

Spiritual Communion . . . I had no idea what it was as I doggedly attended Mass with Rich each Sunday, all the while wrestling with my frustration and attempting to cope with all the differences in our lives since Rich converted to Catholicism.

In addition, I found myself yearning to love, and be loved, by Jesus each time I was excluded from the table of the Lord at Mass. I believed Jesus was there, he is always in the midst of those who trust and call upon His name. St. Matthew writes, “For where two or three meet in my name, I am there among them.” Matthew 18:20 (New Jerusalem Bible) Jesus was in our midst, but I was blinded by my preconceived ideas of how I could meet Him. I expected to meet him through the moving of the Holy Spirit in song, prayer and during the reading and preaching of the word. And I longed to again meet Him at His table – a longing that all Christians receive at birth in Him.

But, at our Catholic church (I wrongly concluded) I was a bystander at His table and He was not there for me. As far as I could tell, before that Sunday in July, God had heard my heart’s cry, but He had chosen to keep silent. He did not change my situation so as to meet my wants as I had hoped He would.

He had another plan.

I knew from my reading of the Psalms that at times God is silent toward His children . . . but He is never out of touch with us. While God had been silent in my life at other times, His silence had never been this long nor this deep – nor had my longing to hear Him been so intense.

On the Saturday evening before the Sunday Mass I mentioned in the last post, Rich experienced for the first time an hour of prayer devoted to waiting before Christ in the Eucharist (know as Adoration). I remember patronizing Rich as he rambled on in glowing terms about his experience that evening at a local youth rally with our church. I listened with skepticism to his buoyant excitement about praying before the Blessed Sacrament (a consecrated host placed in a special holder called a Monstrance). Rich was sure Jesus would answer the prayer he poured out before Christ’s beloved Presence – his prayer that somehow I would find peace and comfort in the Catholic Church.

I sensed his deep disappointment when I told him I was glad to support him in our new church, but that I was quite comfortable with my Protestant beliefs and mind-set.

To say I was interested in understanding Roman Catholic thought would have been false. I was happy with what little knowledge I had already gained. I pined for my life as a Protestant. Moreover, I was hurt – and irked – that our new church’s rules denied my right as a child of the King to the Communion table.

I was doing my wifely, Christian duty following my husband, and I suppose I expected God to notice.

The Lord’s deafening silence hurt me all the more.

I must say, though, when the Lord’s answer came, it was not the welcome release I had hoped for. Rather, it was an invitation to an action of faith.

Although I’d been baptized in the Holy Spirit for years with the gift (Charism) of other tongues, and I’d known His overpowering peace through the moving of the Holy Spirit in my life, I was surprised that the Lord’s first clear instruction to me in many months was that I receive communion by faith. It was one thing to see His answers to prayer like asking for my shoulder to be healed or the bills to be paid, but it was quite another to receive a direction to do something that seemed opposite to my understanding of how non-Catholics should act.

I might not like the rules – but I knew how to follow rules. And, angry though I was with the Catholic Church’s rule that I could not take Communion, I was willing to comply, because complying equaled obedience to the Lord, and that meant I accepted His direction whether I understood it or not.

Christ did not suspend the rule, but offered me a gift I had not expected nor asked for. All I had to do was receive it.

Long ago, I had learned God is not as interested in our pleasure – or in what we think He should do, as He is interested in our obedience. And the Father likes to take us at our word. When we say, “I will go anywhere for you,” – He will send us. When we say, “I will do anything for you,” – He will ask it of us.

I had made those promises of going and doing many times during my thirty years of attending Protestant worship services. It had never entered my mind that His “sending” and “asking” would involve kneeling in a Catholic church. More to the point, I never imagined Jesus would ask me to receive Communion by faith during the consecration of the bread and wine. I accepted Jesus’ gift not because I deserved it, but because of God’s grace given to me to accept it.

I am a proud, arrogant, peevish woman who could never be good enough nor worthy of such a magnificent gift. I’d smirked at Rich’s belief in Christ’s presence in the consecrated host the evening before – and with razor-like precision, Jesus challenged my Protestant know-it-all attitude by offering me Himself as supernatural food at Mass the next morning.

His mercy is overwhelming.

Blind

The continued emptiness of my prayer-life increased even as we attended Sunday Mass and assisted in a Faith Formation (Sunday school). Although I experienced the predictable awkwardness associated with any new comer to a community, this could not account for the emptiness in my relationship with God. Not even walking forward to receive a blessing lifted the barrenness of my heart.

I wondered how could Jesus, whom I loved and to whom I had committed my life, place me in such an unreasonable place. I longed to be at His table. How could He who said that those who believe in Him must eat His body and drink His blood, now engineer a situation where I could do neither?

I accepted that God had moved upon Rich in such a way as to change his understanding of Holy Scripture passages from a Protestant interpretation to a Catholic one. Rich’s love and desire for Communion (the Eucharist), and his deepening prayer life, were indications to me of a move of the Holy Spirit.

In contrast, my relationship to God seemed a rock-strewn path with signposts that advised me to “Pay attention, examine yourself, and follow Me.”

But, follow where?

I had wrestled with my past and present only to realize I was who I was. That was all I could be. Nevertheless, I was exhausted with the struggle that ended in discouragement. Even reading the Scriptures provided no comfort. All I could see in those words was a persistent directive to love.

But God, being rich in mercy, knew what He was doing. Until the Holy Spirit opened my eyes, my situation resulted in an ever-deepening longing for Jesus, even as the strain of abandonment grew in intensity with each Sunday Mass.

Then, one Sunday Morning in July 2005, I sat in the pew next to Rich half-listening to the lector read the Scripture. The second reading in our Missal was from Paul’s letter to the Romans. “Brothers and sisters: What will separate us from the love of Christ? Will anguish, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or the sword? No, in all these things we conquer overwhelmingly through him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor present things, nor future things, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Romans 8:35, 37-39).

I had memorized those passages as a young Christian, but had never experienced the extreme need that would propel my soul to cling to those words and their offered gift of God’s love. I rolled the text over again in my mind: “For I am convinced . . . that nothing can separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

I interpreted that to mean nothing can separate me from Jesus. Jesus was here at this service for me. He had not kept himself from me. However, my blindness to His love had kept me from Him.

I wondered, was He telling me He would never refuse His body and His blood to me? Would I come to Him, who promised to cast no one away, who approached Him in complete surrender? I didn’t hear much of the homily (sermon) that morning because my thoughts had fixated on the idea that nothing, nothing could separate me from my Savior.

And at that moment I remembered an incident that had occurred years earlier. In 1968, prior to my commitment to Christ, I sat with my parents in an unremarkable Sunday Service at the Congregational church we attended. As a young adult who believed myself to be a Christian because I had been raised to be one, I was welcome to take Communion.

It was Communion Sunday. The small glasses of grape juice and plate of broken unleavened bread had been passed through the congregation. The pastor had already intoned, “This is my body given for you . . .”

I chewed the bread and reached for the cup sitting in its holder on the back of the pew in front of me, but before my hand touched the glass, the thought dropped into my mind, “That’s the blood of Christ.”

Mystified, I picked up the tiny cup and looked into the sparkling liquid, which seemed to thicken and deepen in color. The pastor spoke the words, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood . . .”

I didn’t know what to do. Should I put the cup down? What would I tell my parents – that there was blood in my cup? They would think I was insane. So, I drank it. It was an awful, gagging, difficult thing to do. A black revulsion gripped my heart. I wanted to flee. My spiritual eyes had opened for the first time in my life and I saw I was filthy with sin.

After that Sunday, I avoided Communion for six years. Not until I repented of my sins, asked Jesus to forgive me, and by His mercy obtained forgiveness, did I receive Communion or desire it. When Jesus gave me new life, I became a beloved child of my Father in Heaven. I was buried with Him in my Baptism and raised to newness of life in Him. And with that new life came a deeper understanding of the special sacredness of Communion. I had not forgotten His blood in the cup, nor the need to be clean before Him.

So now, as I stood during the Mass, I wondered if Jesus indeed wanted to give me Communion. Was He asking me to trust Him for something that only He would provide for me? Could I accept as true that all I had to do was believe that He wanted to do so?

Fear enveloped me that somehow I had misunderstood. Yet, spurred on by hope in His love, I would take a leap of faith.

During the Offering, I examined my conscience in preparation for communion.

I knelt as the priest held up the Host and said the same words that my Protestant pastors intoned for years during Communion. As our priest spoke those words and consecrated the host, I accepted the idea that Jesus was giving me His body. I swallowed and recited, “Amen.” Then the priest took the cup, elevated it above his head, and repeated the words of the Lord. And once again, I chose to believe Jesus' offering to me. I swallowed and said, “Amen,” once more.

I felt nothing -- much as I had felt nothing the evening I gave my life to Christ.

However, for the first time since we had attended a Catholic church I did not feel conflicted when Rich went forward for the Eucharist and I for a blessing. On the way home, I sat quietly next to Rich, ruminating on a small kernel of peace, pondering what I had done. For the first time in two very long years, I thought I might feel at home once more in church.

It would not be for another several months that I would learn about Spiritual Communion. By that time, the Lord had radically changed my life.

How We Got Here

My parents came from different denominations and avoided problems inherent with inter-church families by attending Protestant churches without preference to denomination. Their only requirement was that the church they attended would be either Methodist, Presbyterian, Congregational, or Disciples of Christ. My parents also opted to dedicate their children to the Lord, rather than baptize them. (When Protestants dedicate their children, the parents, acknowledge their children are a gift from God and promise Him to raise their children in such a way that the children will accept Christ as their savior and be baptized. The children do not usually become members of the church when dedicated). Thus, they kept us from becoming members of any denomination by baptism.

My parents taught me I could choose a Protestant denomination once I was an adult. By the time I committed my heart to Jesus at the age of 26, I was uninterested in denominations. My only desire was for Christ, alone. I was baptized in a Protestant denominational church, not as a declaration of my membership in that body of believers, but as a declaration of my love for Christ and my intent to follow Him.

I sought no other label but Christian.

Rich developed his attitude toward church membership within an overseas military chapel environment in a non-Christian country. This setting discouraged denominational divides. Protestants and Catholics shared friendship and fellowship in bible studies and every-day living. They lovingly cared for each other and overlooked their denominational differences. Rich’s idea of Christian servant-hood had remarkable similarities to my own. We were well-suited for each other.

But when Rich converted to Roman Catholicism, I thought he had forgotten he was a Christian. He talked no longer about Jesus, but of the Church, or the Church’s doctrines. This left me ill at ease and, as I have stated in previous posts, I felt abandoned.

However, while I thought Rich had replaced Jesus with a denomination, he believed he was simply trying to share with me his excitement about what he was learning. He wanted me to experience the same wonderful call of God on his life. He hoped I also would discover Jesus in a new perspective within the historical tradition of this ancient church body.

Years earlier, in 2000, Rich had hung a crucifix above his computer. The image of Christ on the cross reminded him of the cost God paid for our salvation. Rich also began to write for a Catholic newspaper on the East Coast, and as each edition arrived, his desire grew to communicate his love of Christ with Catholics. He talked with me about this and I encouraged him to keep writing, for I too, felt the tug to see Rich minister to that part of Christ’s body. Rich’s desire to be more fully involved with some type of gospel ministry with Catholics seemed to grow with each year. However, he could not see how to fit himself into a Catholic context; nevertheless, we were sure we would be shown the way.

In 2002, we moved to Connecticut and spent two months living in a motel room waiting for our newly purchased home to be readied. During this time, we did some local sight seeing. A regional travel book mentioned, “A Sunset Cruise,” sponsored by St. Edmund’s Retreat on Enders Island. I thought this would be fun, since the mini- retreat would be on a sailboat at sunset. It sounded like a great way for us to see some of the coast and spend time with Jesus.

Rich was not sure we would fit in; the retreat was sponsored by a Catholic group. I assured him that there were no qualifiers mentioned in the ad, and I called and made reservations for the next week. We sailed out of Mystic, Connecticut, past Enders Island, out to Fishers Island where we dropped anchor, ate our boxed dinner, listened to a portion of Scripture, and watched the sun set over a glassy sea. Rich initiated a conversation with the priest, who was the retreat director, and who, in the next two years of friendship, opened the door for Rich to explore the mystery and life of the Catholic Church.

When Rich and I discussed the deepening call he felt toward the Catholic Church I found myself in conflict. I thought I was willing to follow Rich into ministry anywhere. But as he moved closer to embracing the doctrines of Roman Catholicism, I discovered my own lack of enthusiasm. What surprised me most, though, was my almost total opposition to Rich’s now consuming desire to join the Catholic Church. My childhood experiences of exclusion by family and friends from participation in any Catholic service or practice had indeed formed a deep gulf of pain.

As we traveled from Connecticut to the state of Washington, we moved into the unknown with knowledge that our future was somehow bound-up in a division that was creeping into our one-flesh marriage.

But God’s grace came to me in a word of comfort one sun-filled morning as we drove through miles of sunflowers along the road headed west. Rich was asleep in the seat next to me and the horizon was an undulating sea of brown fields. Humming a hymn softly to myself, a thought dropped into my mind: in the future we would be attending a Roman Catholic Church.

I was shocked with that idea, but somehow strangely comforted, too. I thought God would do something in me to change my heart. Perhaps we would both be part of this call -- not just Rich. I pondered that possibility over the months ahead and waited to see how I might change.

What I discerned, however, despite my willingness to be changed, was a resounding discovery that I was most definitely a Protestant.

What Followed

After weeks of feeling miserable and uninvolved, I set about to know more about the Roman Catholic Mass, and dutifully studied the Missal – a book comprising the yearly congregational readings and responses. I found the Missal next to a hymnal in the bookrack.

It took me some time to discover how our Missal worked. I learned by trial and error that the basic outline, or order of the Mass, is in the front. Scripture readings and responses are in the middle section. To find the correct reading on any particular Sunday I looked for the date of that Sunday printed at the bottom of the page. Hymns were in the back of the Missal. Special days such as Easter filled entire sections, and like all books, there was a table of contents.

Across the page from the table of contents were the “Guidelines for the Reception of Communion,” which described who could take Holy Communion, and how those who could not take it might participate in the Celebration through prayer. The suggestion in the Guidelines encouraged everyone to pray to be united with Jesus and other Christians.

I was especially grateful that the general form of the Mass was almost exactly like the Anglican services we had experienced. The service seemed comfortable to me until it came time to sing the Communion hymn and Rich processed forward to take Communion. As had happened each time we attended Mass since his conversion, I was in tears by the time he returned to his seat.

I thought to myself in anger, surely, being a Protestant in a Catholic world was much too difficult for me. Although I was no longer attending a Protestant church, the desire to participate in Communion was a natural outflow of my Christian commitment, experience, and practice. I wondered if I had better rethink finding a Protestant church. The church where I attended a woman’s Bible study would be a good fit, but it was a 45-minute drive, and we had only one car. The more I mulled over the possibilities, the bleaker my predicament grew.

I knew Rich was praying for me. He hated to see me suffer, and was beside himself with misery. He told me many times he didn’t know how we could survive this continuous heartbreak, and if I would be more content, we would attend a Protestant church and he would sort out his Catholic obligations as he could.

Love is patient . . . patient to let the Lord work in me, in Rich, and in our situation.

One Sunday, during the processional hymn at the beginning of Mass, I was surprised to hear a voice very different from the usual near-whispered singing. A man behind us sang with passion, as if expressing his love directly to the Lord. I was impressed. The lackluster congregational singing often made me wonder if anyone in the Roman Catholic Church really cared that they were addressing the Trinity in song.

Later, during the portion of the Mass when the congregation “passes the peace” and shakes hands with those around them, I noticed the young man who had been singing so energetically radiated a joyful countenance. In weeks past, I’d only encountered pleasant, reserved, or non-expressive faces.

After Mass, Rich suggested we try the coffee and donuts in the social center. Because Rich received his RCIA instruction from a military chaplain, this church was a new community for both of us and Rich was eager to meet someone – anyone – with whom we might connect.

As we held our coffee cups and watched the milling crowd, I spotted the young man again. I urged Rich to speak to him. Surely, I thought, a person who seemed to be rejoicing in Christ might be a good person to get to know.

While the three of us sat at a table and talked, Rich mentioned his recent entrance into the Catholic Church. The young man immediately stood up, brought the senior pastor to our table, and introduced him to us.

Our pastor sat down and encouraged us to involve ourselves in the parish. When I explained I embraced the Anglican belief that the bread and wine become the body and blood of Christ, he made a genuine effort to address my concerns about not receiving the Eucharist. He explained that the rules of the Roman Catholic Church prohibited him from giving Communion to a non-Catholic Christian. Although there were special circumstances during which non-Catholic Christians might receive the Eucharist, he said these were few and needed special permission. However, he warmly invited me to come forward to receive a blessing during the Liturgy of the Eucharist (Communion.)

I was grateful for the kind welcome and invitation by this good pastor.

My Husband is a Roman Catholic

By the time we were seated on our chairs in the base chapel for the Easter Vigil Mass, I had accepted the inevitable change that was undeniably upon us. Although I wasn’t thrilled with what lay ahead that evening, I wanted to make the best of it for Rich. After all, I had determined to accept God’s will in my life, and my life was intertwined with Rich’s and I deeply regretted not being able to be fully attuned to this good thing in his life.

It grieved us that Rich had not received any recommendations or suggestions during his weekly instruction of how we might maneuver through these new waters. However, Rich and I talked about it quite often and concluded we had only two options: I could attend Mass with Rich, as a show of unity (but not join the Catholic Church), or I could go to my Protestant church while he attended Mass at the Catholic one.

Rich and I mulled over the solution of dual church affiliation. We knew of couples who’d chosen that option. A group of them had formed an online inter-church ministry to promote a one-couple-two-churches approach. Their web site, www.interchurchfamilies.org, was a great help for us in sorting out our options. The members of the group encouraged husbands and wives to respect the theological differences between their Catholic and Protestant church communities. Many of the couples even attended their respective churches together, and had done so for years

Rich and I discussed this form of church affiliation, and it seemed like a dual commitment of emotional energy, miles of travel, and the juggling of service times; as a 50-something couple, Rich and I were not capable of such an energetic “unity”.

During the Easter Vigil Liturgy, as the congregation recommitted themselves to Christ, Rich and I recommitted ourselves to the Lord, as we had at our baptism. That was a reaffirming part of the Mass for me, yet while Rich recited his part as a convert, I found myself enveloped in a profound sadness. Rich had no idea how wobbly my legs felt when the service ended; I kept a firm hold on his arm as we followed the crowd of well-wishers into the fellowship hall.

While I leaned against the wall and watched, Rich was greeted by one and then another of the congregation. I was happy for him.

Suddenly, I found myself warmly greeted. The man shaking my hand was the priest Rich had been meeting. Looking into his kind eyes, I wondered why he never reached out to me during all those months of counseling my husband. Rich’s half-hearted statement to me that the priest would be glad to answer my questions, and that I might attend any of their sessions, seemed to me an afterthought because of its timing--- midway into Rich’s weekly sessions. My Protestant experience had prepared me for joint pastoral counseling; I did not understand why our marriage had not been an important factor from the beginning.

Nevertheless, this man seemed kind and genuinely interested in me. We chatted for a few moments before he moved on to converse with others.

And so, our new life in Christ had begun.

The following morning we attended our first Easter Mass at the Catholic Church we’d visited several times during the previous months.

A Week Before

The Saturday evening service between Good Friday and Easter morning, called the Easter Vigil, was the Mass during which Rich would enter the Roman Catholic Church.

A week before the Vigil I finally grasped that this Catholic change was really going to happen, and I’d better prepare. I planned to make a nice dinner, get my hair cut, and select just the right clothes to wear. I queried Rich about the dinner, but he promptly informed me he did not want a fuss. The process leading up to the week ahead had been difficult enough, and he did not want to emphasize it any more. I knew he was thinking of my needs, so I planned his favorite breakfast for that Saturday morning. We had a quick dinner the evening of the Vigil.

During the days leading up to the Vigil, I mused on my future within this unfamiliar body of believers. That future looked somewhat bleak. Rich often sat holding me as I mulled over questions about my role in Rich’s new home church. What if I had a spiritual problem? To whom would I go? As a non-Catholic, how would I “fit in” as Rich involved himself in the life of his church? I had always been at his side during church ministries, such as teaching Sunday school and home Bible studies. Would I now have to remove myself from those ministries in which he would participate? We clung together and pondered these questions from time to time – I in despair and he in anguish, unable to give me answers or comfort me.

By “coincidence,” my daily Bible reading took me through the book of Job during Holy Week. I’d read this book many times before, and had always plodded through the narrative of what seemed like one long, dull complaint. This time I saw myself in a Job-like situation, and his question, “why?” echoed in my mind.

But the more I read of the futility of Job’s situation and how he suffered without understanding the reason for his pain, I realized Job’s character grew stronger through his trials. His steadfast trust in God remained firm despite circumstances and personal attacks. Nothing altered Job’s trust in the mercy and righteousness of his Redeemer.

Friends accused Job of living a sinful life, and that was the reason for his troubles. Although no one had accused me of living a sinful life, I began to accuse myself. I desired so desperately to have renewed life breathed into our marriage that I now agonized over my supposed and real failures. For a time, I worried something was wrong with me because I could not accept the new beliefs that were so easy for Rich. I struggled with this every day. And, like Job, I pleaded with the Father to let me know what I was to do –not what I wanted to do, but what He wanted me to do.

I found part of my answer in Job 23:8-16 (New American Standard Bible):

8"Behold, I go forward but He is not there,
And backward, but I cannot perceive Him;
9When He acts on the left, I cannot behold Him;
He turns on the right, I cannot see Him.
10"But He knows the way I take;
When He has tried me, I shall come forth as gold.
11"My foot has held fast to His path;
I have kept His way and not turned aside.
12"I have not departed from the command of His lips;
I have treasured the words of His mouth more than my necessary food.
13"But He is unique and who can turn Him?
And what His soul desires, that He does.
14"For He performs what is appointed for me,
And many such decrees are with Him.
15"Therefore, I would be dismayed at His presence;
When I consider, I am terrified of Him.
16"It is God who has made my heart faint,
And the Almighty who has dismayed me,”


Our Father poured into my troubled heart the balm only He could provide. I was comforted by His reminder that He knows the way I take, and that He appointed for me this time, this place and this way. Even when my heart felt faint from the darkness of an unknown future, it is His nail pierced hand that orchestrated it.

I read that passage repeatedly; and I remembered the exhortation of pastors and teachers in my past who encouraged me to trust in the Lord, lean on His word, accept good and bad from His hand.

The words to a favorite hymn played in my mind, “It will be worth it all when we see Jesus. Life’s trials will seem so small when we see Christ. One look at His dear face, all sorrow will erase; so bravely run the race till we see Christ.”

I would try to accept everything from the Lord’s hand as something He had planned for me.