Posts Tagged ‘prayer’

Latest Stop OnThe Restoration Tour: A Graduation Party

Posted: May 29, 2011 in Love and Marriage
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Yesterday’s post was very difficult to write.  Jesus said that people would recognize His followers by one characteristic.  It wasn’t how often they went to church, how much money they gave, or how much they read their Bible.  It also wasn’t that they didn’t curse or drink or fool around.  Very often, christians define themselves by what they do or don’t do.  Jesus said, “By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.” John 13:35

Someone once said, “Love is giving someone the power to destroy you, but trusting them not to.”  My wife and I ended up pushing that one to the limit before we figured things out.  You see, when you think someone loves you, and you want them to love you back, it hurts infinitely more when they hurt you and let you down.  The pain my wife and I caused each other was deeper than any that anyone else could have caused because of the relationship that we had with each other.  The disappointment that we felt when people from our church let us down in our time of need was minute compared to the way we failed each other.  Even so, it was much more significant than it would have been, had we not known what it was to be loved by them previously.

There were a handful of people who remained true friends.  One in particular was a guy named Joe, who had moved to the area at almost the same time we had.  We had become friends right away, but then had a falling out during the time that I was wandering.  We had pretty well patched things up by the time my marriage fell all the way apart, and he was a true rock for me throughout.  We called each other almost daily, and he would pray with me, come over when I couldn’t bear to be alone, and offer encouragement any time, day or night.

Joe has a daughter who was and is a true miracle child.  She was born so prematurely that she weighed less than 2 pounds.  She went to special schools most of her life, but she was always loved and prayed for.  Her development continued over the years to the point that she attended a large public high school for her senior year, where she earned a student of the month award and graduated as a member of the National Honor Society. 

When we received her graduation announcement and party invitation, we had every intention of going.  When we saw that the party was being held at our former church, my wife balked.  Going to the party meant not only facing people that we weren’t sure how to respond to, it would also mean returning to the place that held such bitter memories.  I told her that I stood by her whatever she decided and that we could celebrate with Joe’s family privately instead. 

Love has a way of building people up, giving them courage, and making them strong.  From within the safe covering of my unconditional love, my wife soon announced that she was willing to go after all.  She only asked that I stay by her side and not let her get cornered or put in a difficult situation, which was the very thing I was eager to do.  We were going to celebrate Joe’s daughter and her accomplishment; everything else was secondary. 

Last Spring, we left that church broken and disgraced.  Almost exactly a year later, we returned as a completely different couple.  It was definitely awkward being there, but enough healing has taken place apart from the church that we were able to put aside that part of the past.  I couldn’t have been more proud of the beautiful lady by my side. 

A few days later, Joe told me over the phone that my wife had never looked better.  He said she had a glow about her and she looked like she was free of some huge burdens.  He was right.  She and I both still have some healing and the final phases of the restoration to go through, but we’ve reached that point where it shows on the outside.  Just like when the new siding, paint, shutters, etc. draw people’s eyes to a house that’s undergoing restoration, so the effects of everything that’s taking place inside our marriage can now be unmistakably seen on the outside.

Church: A Family Or A Failure?

Posted: May 28, 2011 in Love and Marriage
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Our move from Kansas to Missouri was a pretty amazing story of faith, adventure, and starting over.  We were floundering helplessly in Dodge City.  My parents had retired to Springfield, MO, and were getting older and starting to see their health deteriorate.  They kept encouraging us to relocate to that part of the country, so in the Summer of 2005, we did. 

I called a school district who was advertising a teaching position in a small town I’d never heard of, while I was teaching summer school in Dodge City.  I set up an interview over the phone, and we drove up over the fourth of July weekend.  Before I even went to the interview, we scoured the classified ads for rental houses and signed a one year lease on a home in the country.  Fortunately, I got the job.  Unfortunately, the place we rented was the ill-fated tornado house.

What still remained was to find a church.  I was afraid it would be a long drawn-out process, but it was exactly the opposite.  We decided to try a church in the town closest to our new house of the same denomination we were used to attending.  That first Sunday, we knew we were home.

When the tornado hit, we learned what a true church family was. It was people from the church who cleared trees off the road until after midnight to reach us at what was left of our house.  It was people from the church who gave us a temporary place to stay.  It was people from the church who came out and helped us find and salvage possessions, clean up the mess, and move into the rental we found a few days later.  These were people we had only known for few months, yet they treated us as one of their own.

Fast forward a few years.  Same church name and building, but a very different church.  Many of the leading families had left, and the attendees changed almost from week to week.  I was stumbling and falling, but no one seemed to notice or pay it any mind.   My wife became more and more withdrawn over time, but no one reached out to try to find out what was wrong.  More than once, we put in prayer requests indicating that we were having marriage problems.  I’m not sure if anyone prayed, but I know that no one from the leadership ever offered us any help.

We’ll never know for sure, but we believe that if there had been a support system there, if people had cared and gotten involved, things may not have gone so far, and so much damage might not have been done.  As it was, they not only didn’t reach out, but in many cases they pulled away from us.  My wife felt completely abandoned and alone.  People who we thought were true friends just disappeared once we went public with our problems.  The phone didn’t ring, and when we did still attend church, people avoided and ignored us.

After my wife quit going to church altogether, and once she had moved out, I took it upon myself to go to the pastor and tell him what was going on.  He pretty much told me to put on a smile, come back to church and everything would be ok.  I still attended a few more times, but it was awkward and painful to realize that people now knew what was happening and still did nothing to help. 

My purpose in writing this is in no way to bash any particular church or people.  It is simply to say that this should never have happened.  When that church was healthy, I don’t think it would have.  I don’t know what changed, or why, but there was no longer a family for us to be part of.  Where we should have felt loved and encouraged, we felt abandoned and rejected.  What should have been part of the solution became an aggravating factor in the problem.  My wife had already been hurt and angry with me.  All of this compounded her hurt and anger to include many people from the church and God Himself. 

God was not to blame, but at the time, she couldn’t separate Him from His people.  She lost her way when she lost hope in the people and the institution that should have been a refuge and strength for her.  It’s not their fault that either of us fell, but we wouldn’t have fallen as far had someone been there to catch us, or, better yet, pull us back from the edge before we went over.

Change is Good…and Sometimes Necessary

Posted: May 25, 2011 in Love and Marriage
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There is one major difference between auto restoration and restoring older homes.  When a car is being restored, it’s all about original parts.  The focus is on replacing worn out and damaged parts and making the finished product exactly like the original.  No changes, no artistic license.

It reminds me of an experience I had in Spain, during a luncheon sponsored by a winery.  We were served a traditional soup, but it had been made differently than it normally was.  Our host became quite upset and had an animated conversation with the waiter about why it hadn’t been made in the traditional way.  The people of southern Spain value tradition and are resistant to change.

I was all about change at this point in my life and my marriage.  Mostly, I needed to change myself.  I was going through the process of allowing myself to be changed by God, and also learning to change with the help of my therapist and others who I opened up to and accepted counsel from.  I was listening, and that was key. 

I had never realized that my wife felt smothered and controlled.  It was a case of an unintended consequence.  I always wanted to do things for her and help her, but I was unintentionally sending the message that I didn’t think she was capable or competent.  We also had an issue regarding something she wanted that I hadn’t thought was very important.  She had talked off and on for years about wanting a tattoo, and I had always told her that I didn’t like them and didn’t want her to get one. 

She had understood me to be forbidding her and now she was intent on getting one.  It was an opportunity for me to show her that things were different, and that I would love and accept her and allow her to make her own choices.  We looked at designs and chose a tatoo artist together.  I sat with her and held her hand through the entire application.  The tatoo artist never suspected that we were separated, and I hoped and prayed that my wife was receiving at least a little bit of the love that I was desperately trying to show her.

Sometimes, the restoration of a house involves making some changes.  There is a certain amount of updating that is not only acceptable, but often necessary.  A house that was originally built with no bathrooms and little or no electricity probably shouldn’t be restored to be exactly like it originally was.  So it was with our marriage. 

I was sharing the story of the vision with a colleague and friend one day and he made a most astute observation.  He said that it sounded like the original “house” was never entirely adequate.  He pointed out that it not only needed to be restored, it probably needed to be added on to.  He hit the nail right on the head.  Even though our marriage started out as a beautiful thing, there were aspects of it that had never been healthy.  The curb appeal was amazing, but underneath, it hadn’t been built right.

Not fighting my wife over her tatoo, but accepting it and being part of it was a tangible act that showed a change in the way I responded to her.  The tattoo itself was also something tangible that showed that her life was changing.  She had told our oldest daughter that if it was going to work out between us, I would have to love all of her.  If I couldn’t accept all of who she was, we couldn’t get back together.  What a person wears, the way they style their hair, or what they put on their skin isn’t who they are.  It’s just self-expression.  True love sees the person beneath the skin and listens to the heart.

Therapy

Posted: May 24, 2011 in Love and Marriage
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My spiritual decline had begun in Dodge City, where I had become so disillusioned with church leaders and so disappointed in the way things had gone that I was angry at God and the church.  Not that I had ever been that great spiritually, but there had been a time when my faith was real and vibrant and I was really trying to serve God.  My heart had never been completely right, but by the time we left Dodge City for the Missouri Ozarks, I just didn’t have it in me anymore.

The changes to my demeanor and personality that happened after the tornado were more difficult to put a finger on.  I quit being interested in any of my hobbies.  I worked too much and withdrew from friends and family.  I carried an anger that smoldered just below the surface.  It rarely broke through, and when it did, it was almost exclusively aimed at the one person I loved the most and who deserved it the least.  In those moments, I did terrible damage to my wife, who had no way of understanding why I would treat her that way. 

For some people, therapy is a way to relieve their guilt and say they tried.  Many people don’t really want to change, and no amount of therapy can change a heart that doesn’t want to.  In my case, I was willing to do whatever it took to fix what was wrong inside and become, once again, the man that my wife could love.  I had already allowed God to change my heart.  Now I needed to fix my mind and my emotions.  The next logical step was to find a therapist.

When I made the appointment, my plan was to talk about the tornado and see if I was, in fact, suffering from PTSD.  The doctor had his own agenda, and that was to get to know what made me tick and look at the whole picture.  On the first visit, he asked me a series of questions that seemed unrelated to anything and I found myself thinking, “This is a complete waste of my time.”  I figured that I would finish the session, pay my bill, and never come back. 

So, how do you feel today?

What a shock it was when, after about 45 minutes, those seemingly unrelated questions all connected up like a dot-to-dot puzzle and I was looking at a picture of myself that was very telling and undeniably accurate.  Things that I had never realized meshed with things I knew, but didn’t understand about myself.  I didn’t find my answers that day and we didn’t even get to the subject of the tornado, but there was enough that made a whole lot of sense to make me realize that we were onto something.  Now, I found myself thinking, “Either this guy is really lucky or really good, or else God just directed the whole conversation.”  He gave me a homework assignment and I agreed to continue. 

Over the next few weeks and months, I came to understand that there had been a pattern throughout my life that now was at the root of my marriage problems.  When I experienced something traumatic or very stressful, I would shut myself off emotionally, and withdraw inside myself.  I shut others out and pushed everything down instead of dealing with it.  That would manifest itself as depression and mood swings, a bi-polar disorder.  It also showed up as some dissociation, where I would almost become a spectator in my own life.  It was as if these things weren’t a part of me, but rather I was seeing them happen to someone else.

When I shared some of this with my wife, she listened, but said nothing.  She was going to need time.  She told me that she was going to be watching me.  She needed to see changes in me, not hear about them.  I was ok with that.  I knew that she deserved much better than I had been giving her and I knew that nothing was going to stop me from getting to the place I needed to be.

The Great Romance

Posted: May 21, 2011 in Love and Marriage
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When I was a basketball coach, a saying I used with my players was, “Don’t waste your energy on things you can’t control.”  There was only a certain amount of energy they had available to them, and they couldn’t control the temperature in the gym, what the referees did or didn’t call, how the fans or other players treated them, and so on.  Any focus on those types of things only served to distract them from their ultimate purpose; winning the game.

I knew that in my marriage, the same principle had to apply.  I could spend time and energy worrying about whether there was another guy or if this was a mid-life crisis my wife was going through, or whether becoming an empty nester was at the root of the problems she was having.  Any of that would only take energy away from my ultimate purpose; winning back her heart and love.

My wife and I are both Ted Dekker fans and read everything he writes almost as soon as it comes out.  A number of his books deal with the subject of sacrificial love.  He spins tales of characters who have to make terribly difficult choices and endure awful pain for love.  The theme of rescuing the beloved is also prevalent in many of his novels.

My wife had revealed that, deep in her heart, she still carried a desire to be loved that way by me.  I went back to God for wisdom, and back to Ted Dekker for inspiration.  I began to search the scriptures for every verse I could find about love, marriage, husbands, and wives.  I wrote them all down on notebook pages and began to speak them out loud every day.  I made them my constant prayer, substituting my wife’s name into the verses and making them personal declarations.

For inspiration, I went to Ted Dekker’s Circle Trilogy to read again about, “The Great Romance,” as he calls it.  It’s the story as old as time.  The man rescues the woman, wins her heart, and makes her his bride. She is unable to resist and falls forever in love with her hero who protects and cares for her ever after.

It’s exactly the kind of love that so many people today dismiss as only a silly fairy tale and not to be believed in.  It’s the kind of love that an entire culture is on the brink of rejecting.  It’s the kind of love that I believe that everyone, deep in the secret places of the heart, longs for.  And it’s exactly the kind of love that I decided I would do anything to experience, no matter the cost.

Separation

Posted: May 20, 2011 in Love and Marriage
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My prayer life was continuing to grow and evolve as I struggled with everything I was facing and dealing with.  I continued to yield my heart to God and let Him bring about changes to my thinking and my inner being.  I was praying for wisdom and understanding in how to deal with my wife.  I was also trying to learn to rely on God instead of trying to do everything myself. 

While in prayer, I would have thoughts that were not typical of my way of thinking and I would wonder if it was God trying to speak to me.  As time went by, I became more and more convinced that the changes in my thinking were, in fact, coming from His Spirit.  Sometimes, they were specific guidance, like things to say and do.  Other times, they were advance notice of things that were going on or that were coming up, so that I could be prepared for them. 

In our relationship, we were stuck.  I was trying to change and show my wife that things were going to be different.  She realized what I was doing, but was unable to respond to it.  It wasn’t getting through to her heart, and she often felt pressure because she knew that I expected a response that wasn’t forthcoming.  The idea that we might need to experience some time apart to break that impasse began to take a stronger hold in my thoughts, even though I objected to it greatly. 

One afternoon, we stopped at a deli to eat and the fateful conversation took place.  She broached the subject. For a while, I had been trying to figure out if there was a way that I could go stay somewhere else for a few weeks or so.  I figured that if she spent some time alone, she would miss me and things would work out.  Now, sitting across from each other, she said she thought we needed a separation. 

She told me there were things she needed to figure out about herself and what she wanted and that if I could give her that, she might decide that I was what she wanted.  She said that she felt she had always had to be dependent on a man and she wanted to know if she could make it on her own.  She reasoned that if she could be independent, and then chose marriage to me, it would be because she decided that was what was best for her. 

She presented it as a way that I might possibly get her back, but it caused a major war to break out inside me.  One side understood that what she was saying was the truth, and I even told her that I had been working on possible separation scenarios myself.  The other side said, “What about what’s best for me?  I’m your husband and you made vows to me that were supposed to be forever. You already chose marriage 12 years ago.  That choice is already made and you don’t get to change it.”

I didn’t voice any of these latter thoughts.  We talked and I found out that she’d already been looking for an apartment.  She said that there were loft apartments in downtown Springfield that she could afford and where we might both want to live if things worked out between us. 

It was both a terribly painful and somewhat hopeful conversation at the same time.  It hurt tremendously to know that we had reached the point where my precious wife wanted to live apart from me.  It also cast a vision that showed her thinking in terms of reconciliation and ultimately, staying together.  We agreed to table the subject for the night, but to continue it the next day.

As it turned out, we went together and found a loft apartment within the next few days that would be hers, but that we both liked and would want to share together if we got things worked out.  The message was clear.  “I’m stepping away, but not too far.  You’ll know where I am.  Will you come after me and pursue me and win back my heart, or do I not mean that much to you?  Is this love you are now professing real, or is it just for show?”  It wasn’t a game, but she had made her move and now it was my turn.

I caused the Problem. I am to Blame.

Posted: May 18, 2011 in Love and Marriage
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They say that the first step in changing is admitting that there is a problem.  Sometimes there’s a disconnect between recognizing that there is a problem and recognizing what to do about it.  It’s easy to look at a run-down house and say, “There’s a problem here.”  Understanding how to restore that house can be considerably more difficult. 

Through the giving over of my heart and will to God, I had gained a lot of insight into what the problems were.  Fortunately, I wasn’t on my own in figuring out what needed to be done.  Between God showing me the places I had failed and needed to restore, and Mort Fertel’s emails giving me practical advice on things to say and do, I had a pretty good set of blueprints. 

I also had an impulsive desire to fix everything NOW!  Of course, it doesn’t work that way, but once confronted with the truth of it all, I just wanted to make it right.  I didn’t want it to take time.  I wanted it fixed this minute.  Because of that, I sometimes said and did things that were counter-productive and probably set us back instead of moving us forward. 

The most unique aspect of Mort Fertel’s Marriage Fitness idea is that you don’t focus on the problems.  You step away from the problems and begin using words and actions that will begin to rebuild love.  In terms of fitness, it is perfectly logical.

If you find yourself overweight and out of shape, it doesn’t help to talk about how you got that way.  You need to get to the gym and get to work.  You won’t lose weight, build muscle, or get fit by focusing on why you haven’t been exercising or how poorly you’ve been eating.  You’ve just got to do the work.  The result will be that you’ll get fit and it won’t really matter how you got off track in the past.

By trying to get my wife to see what I was seeing and get her to focus on the past, I was missing the mark.  I was unintentionally still making the situation in our marriage her fault.  Although I didn’t mean to be, what I was really saying was, “Why can’t you see it like I see it?  Why don’t you just get over everything and it will all be ok?”  She needed a whole lot more than that to learn to love me again. 

I quickly realized my mistake (a scenario that would, unfortunately, repeat itself many times over the next few months) and began to simply work on saying and doing as many loving things as I could to her and for her.  I didn’t try to get her to talk about what had happened and why she couldn’t forgive me or any of that.  I just started loving her, really loving her, on God’s terms and her terms, not mine.

During this time, I began writing all these thoughts and realizations down so I wouldn’t forget and lose them.  I kept papers that had scripture verses, memories, and things I needed to go back and restore like the wedding ring.  I also wrote on one paper this statement:  “I am to blame.  I caused the failure of our marriage.”  That admission allowed the shift to occur from, “Why doesn’t my wife respond in the way I want her to,” to “I caused this, it’s my responsibility to fix it.”

Seeing the Big Picture

Posted: May 10, 2011 in Love and Marriage
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For anyone who says that people can’t change, I say, “You just don’t know.”  It’s true that many people don’t change, but there is too much evidence of changed hearts and lives all around us to take such a narrow view. 

Living with and loving a person who needs to change, but won’t, is a very difficult spot that many people find themselves in.  The message of this blog is simple.  Don’t give up.  With God, all things are possible. 

As my stony heart was being cut out, my eyes began to be opened to things that I should have seen, but didn’t.  It was during this time that the vision for the restoration tour was birthed. 

One day, about a year ago, as I was praying and meditating, I saw a vision that would become a driving force in my life and marriage.  I saw our marriage as a house going through stages.  At first, it was newly built and ready for the first occupants to move in.  The curb appeal was very strong and it was the kind of property that people would drive by and think, “What a great place!” 

That was us in the newlywed stage.  We were the ones always chosen as the cutest or most romantic couple.  We had that special something in our marriage in a big way and others recognized it.

Then the house began to experience normal wear and tear.  Some of the paint began to peel.  Hinges got rusty.  Windows began to stick.  All these were small things that happen naturally.  The key is that they are easy to fix. 

Some homeowners take pride in their house and quickly take care of this type of maintenance.  Others procrastinate.  I was one of the latter.  I let things go.  I’m not sure why.  I just didn’t see the big picture.

Eventually these little depreciations became bigger and bigger problems.  Boards began to sag.  The lawn and landscaping became an unruly mess.  There were plumbing and electrical problems.  Windows broke.  Not nearly so easy to fix now.

My response? I sat in my chair and ignored it.  It’s not that I didn’t care.  I just didn’t want to deal with it.  In the vision, I clearly saw how lazy and negligent I had been.  I saw my beautiful home turn into a dilapidated, run down eyesore. 

My wife and I used to buy old, run down properties and restore them.  We would find houses that were built to be something special and work on returning them to their former glory.  It’s very hard, dirty work and you have to deal with a lot of mess along the way.  You also have to undo a lot of things that shouldn’t have ever happened, but did.  You can’t ignore them and they won’t just go away.  They have to be dealt with before you can complete the restoration.

As this vision passed before me, I immediately recognized its meaning and what I had to do.  I had to get to work and it wasn’t going to be on little things.  This wasn’t routine maintenance.  If my wife was ever going to want to live in this house again, it was going to take a full scale gutting of all the mess and a committment to renewing all of it. 

Fortunately, I had the Master Builder, a carpenter from Bethlehem to lead me through the process.  The same one who said in the book of Revelation 21:5 “Look, I am making everything new.”  Time and circumstances were not in my favor, because this was going to be a long and daunting task, but for everyone who has ever heard or said the words, “It’s too late,” I would counter with the idea that as long as we have breath of life in our nostrils, it’s never too late.  Real change is possible, but it has to start with ourselves, on the inside.  Only then can meaningful change spill over into our circumstances.

Removing the Heart of Stone

Posted: May 9, 2011 in Love and Marriage
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It’s a sad thing to pray a prayer that God can’t answer because the heart of the one praying isn’t sincere.  Over the years, I wouldn’t want to know how many of those I prayed.

For whatever reason, I always had a heart problem.  I wanted to follow the Lord and do what was right at some level, but only on my terms.  Bottom line – If I was the one calling the shots, He wasn’t really my Lord.

The prayers of the hypocrite go like this:  “Lord, I’m sorry that I haven’t been living right and following you like I should be.  Please forgive me and help me to do better.”  The words themselves are a prayer that God wants to answer.  It’s hypocritical because I knew, even as I would say the words, that I wasn’t really willing to change.  I didn’t want to do better.  I just didn’t want to feel guilty.

We all have our currency.  We all have something that is worth enough to us to want it, work for it, and be willing to change if necessary.  My currency turned out to be my wife.  As we approached two months of still living under the same roof and sleeping in the same bed, but having next to no level of intimacy, the urgency to somehow fix what was broken began to skyrocket.

I finally did the only thing I could.  I got real with God and with myself and I began to pray in earnest.  I began to pray prayers that I not only meant, but that emanated from a heart and soul in desperate anguish.

Nothing changed overnight.  You’ve got to realize, even though God knows our hearts, He’d been listening to these kinds of prayers off and on for two or three decades.  If I was serious this time, I was going to have give more than lip service.  It was almost like He was giving me the chance to reconsider.  “Do you really want what you are asking for?  Do you really even understand what you are asking?” were the implied questions in the days that followed.

I was praying about my marriage, but instead of answering in terms of that, God began to show me what I had done to my relationship with Him.  He began to let me look into His heart and see how pure and true His love had always been for me, and how horribly unfaithful I had been to Him over and over again.  I had pledged myself to Him so many times, but just like a wayward lover, I had gone after whatever caught my fancy and left Him with the choice of forgiving me and taking me back one more time or rejecting me for good.

In Ezekiel 36:26, God says, “I will give you a new heart, and I will put a new spirit in you. I will take out your stony, stubborn heart and give you a tender, responsive heart.”  That’s what I needed.  Heart surgery under God’s masterful hand.  I let go of all the things that had held me back for so many years and went under His knife.  I allowed Him to reach inside and show me all the horror of my inner self.  I allowed Him to hold the mirror in front of my face and compel me to look.  And I allowed Him to cut away that stony, stubborn heart and remove it once and for all.

I can never decribe or explain the pain of that experience (which lasted for days, not minutes or hours).  I never knew my eyes could hold that many tears.  I only knew that, through the agony, healing would come.  I knew that death was what I deserved, but life came instead.

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